as I was told recently, if an exec just gushes about how much they like it, that means they can't make it, but if they just tell you all the stuff they want to change, it means they actually have an interest in doing something with it.

Reminds me of Dr. Brainard, the historical-dance researcher who really got the SCA into dance. As I learned, getting yelled at by her was a real compliment, because it meant that you were good enough to be worth pushing higher. If she thought you were hopeless, she'd just be blandly nice to you.

And the Robin Hood story sounds like it has a lot of potential, not least because it's rather timely -- I could totally see a story like that catching the zeitgeist well. Fingers crossed on it...