A lawsuit against Adam McKay, his production company and Netflix accusing them of ripping off a self-published novel in Don’t Look Up has been barred from moving forward.

U.S. District Judge Sherilyn Peace Garnett dismissed the lawsuit, finding that several of the alleged similarities are too “generic” to constitute a copyright infringement claim. She allowed the book’s author an opportunity to fix his claims and refile the complaint, according to the ruling issued on Thursday.

In 2012, William Collier self-published a dark comedy novel called Stanley’s Comet. It follows a low-level NASA scientist’s discovery of a giant comet on a collision course with Earth. Initially, the government is skeptical of whether it will make impact but eventually plans a nuclear strike, which, for political reasons, is aborted. In the meantime, the scientist is catapulted into fame as people are divided on whether to take the threat seriously...