His eyes light up. That’s a bad sign. “It’s about this ordinary guy, an aspiring writer. One day, the things he writes start to happen. And I don’t mean just generally, I mean exactly. He writes a comic book about a crime fighting superhero, and the superhero suddenly appears in real life and starts fighting the crimes. The problem is, in order to keep the comic book interesting, he has to write a super villain.”

I suppress my groan. I’ve heard this premise before. Who ...