csdHercules over at Aint It Cool News has posted an item from the Austin Chronicle claiming that Arrested Development has been picked up for a third season. Here’s the thing, though – only this small paper has the info, and the renewal is tucked away in a parenthesis in the eighth paragraph of an article about pilot season. Here’s the whole paragraph:

Laughs are sought in a comedy about a single woman who has a child through a sperm donor on the WB. This doesn’t strike me as high hilarity, but with the production team of Brian Grazer and Ron Howard, this could potentially be another offbeat comedy in the style of Arrested Development. (For those who’ve been wondering, the show has been picked up for a third season).

Something just strikes me as odd, or wrong about this. I (and I am sure a thousand others) will investigate and get back to you.

UPDATE: Belinda Acosta, who wrote the Austin Chronicle piece, was good enough to get back to me about my query:

Well, this is the mystery of the moment. I SWEAR I saw a press release on the renewal. Now that everyone has been coming out of the woodwork to ask me how I know, I CANNOT FOR THE LIFE OF ME FIND THE RELEASE!!!!!

I am a boob.

However, like Maeby inventing herself as a Hollywood producer, I’m hoping that if I say the show is renewing…….

Hope that helps.

It does – let’s hope that Belinda had some kind of pre-cog dream…