The public knows writer James Frey chiefly as a talented author of non-fiction who caused quite an uproar when it was revealed that he was secretly a talented author of fiction. The discovery that Frey had fudged certain parts of A Million Little Pieces, a novel he touted as a hard-and-fast memoir of his drug-addicted youth, riled up many readers, none moreso than Oprah Winfrey. Fun fact: That shameful turn of events drew so much ire from a conned readership that Random House offered a full refund to anybody who mailed them page 163 of the hardcover edition, along with a sworn statement promising that they sincerely believed that the novel was 100 percent fact at the time of purchase. The stench of that scandal has stuck to Frey’s work ever since, to the extent that even news bulletins on film-related websites written several years after the fact must necessarily lead by spelling out his highly public embarrassment.

But Frey’s more than a gifted storyteller/purveyor of non-truths. The man began as a frequent screenwriter, whiling away his time on indie projects and eventually penning the script for Kissing A Fool. Beyond that, his own novel (written under the nom de plume of Pittacus Lore with Jobie Hughes) I Am Number Four was adapted for the screen in 2011, without Frey on board. As such, when word got out from Deadline that Frey’s in the process of preparing a new sci-fi franchise, Tinseltown was all in a titter.

Frey’s name still holds enough weight in the industry that when he lets slip that he has even an inkling of an idea—all that’s known at present is that it would be called Space Runners—publishers and studios alike ring his phone off the hook. Fox 2000 has aggressively pursued the option on this percolating property, with the everywhere-at-once Russo brothers as tentative producers. It’s like they say: In Hollywood, you’re only as good as your next picture, and not the scandal that made you a figure of contempt on the national stage.