As if the heat finally breaking was not good news enough, now comes word (or rumor, at least) that a Gossip Girl spin-off is in the works. The potential series would roughly follow the It Girl series of books, which were spun-off of the Gossip Girl novels when the littlest Humphrey, Jenny, decided to reinvent herself and head off to a tony boarding school in "New York horse country". A boarding school setting is great because it promises class warfare, upstairs-downstairs townie romances, and snobby boys who show up to dances and spike the punch. (The show will be set in 1958, right?)

It's not clear yet whether Jenny Humphrey, played by the ubiquitous Taylor Momsen, would star in the show or if a new character would be introduced on GG, a la Will Krudski, a character who popped up in a couple episodes of Dawson's Creek in preparation for the delightful, short-lived, queer-curious boarding school romp Young Americans. (RIP) Some may complain that the CW, which will be airing both GG and the new 90210 spin-off in the fall, is already too teen-heavy, but they'd be forgetting the brief but glorious rise of the WB, whose programming, at its peak, was almost entirely teen-centric. These days, what with all those studies that indicate that our pimpliest, awkwardest consumer force is taking over the Earth like an army of darkness, amassing a strong stable of teen programming is not an unwise move. [THR]

Sad Update: Gossip Girl creator Josh Schwartz tells EW.com: "We have no plans right now for a TV spin-off. Everyone is focused on making season 2 as good as possible — that's our goal right now. Not saying never, just very premature."

Sigh.