The Brexit storyline has been about as believable as a shark on water-skis for some time now, but we appear to be approaching the moment when in jumps The Fonz.

And that will be in January, when we end up with the worst possible kind of Brexit imaginable, and the blame will be put upon Gina Miller.

In one of the most magnificent ironies of all, it was as a result of Miller’s intervention that, via the Supreme Court, the House of Commons must now vote on whatever deal Theresa May manages to extract from Brussels.

Here is a vague guide to the current likelihood of a) a deal materialising and b) MPs approving it.

A month after what was meant to be the deadline for any deal, the civil servant Olly Robbins and his counterpart in Brussels, Sabine Weyand, held talks until 2.45am last night. Downing Street has confirmed there are still “significant obstacles” to overcome.

These obstacles relate to Northern Ireland and they have not meaningfully changed in many months. They only way they will do so now is via a meaningful concession from either side, and don’t be in any doubt about who will have to do it between us and them.

Way back before the meaningful vote arrived, Theresa May could just have done what she has been attempting to do anyway. Which is run down the clock while conceding more and more, dealing with cabinet resignations by replacing them with human ciphers who, for example, “hadn’t properly understood until recently” that the UK is an island. Or who “hadn’t understood” that in Northern Ireland, Republicans don’t vote for nationalists and vice versa. Or who hadn’t understood that telling Russia to “shut up and go away” is a magnificently ridiculous thing to do.

Until, in the end, the deal is done, no one is happy but there’s nothing they can do about it, and May can go and walk off the rest of her days in the Swiss Alps.

Now, however, junior ministers like Jo Johnson can resign and set off seismic tremors. Tory and Labour rebels – and potential rebels – are counted and recounted each day, in a desperate attempt to foresee what might happen.

The Labour Party, led by a man who is anathema to its values and, on Brexit, its members, continues to agitate for a general election rather than a second referendum. Corbyn and McDonnell know that the fastest and most likely route to power is the most disastrous Brexit possible and the bringing down of the government. It is the kind of power grab via Pyrrhic victory that only Boris Johnson was once considered shameless enough to want, but they are every inch his equal.

Meanwhile, as they agitate for a general election, the leader and the Brexit Secretary, Keir Starmer, openly contradict one another as to whether stopping Brexit is possible. Starmer says it is, as that is the Labour Party’s policy. Corbyn gives an interview to a German newspaper and says it can’t be stopped.

The only way to save Brexit in Brussels, which is to concede to at least the possibility of Northern Ireland remaining in the EU’s customs union, kills it in Westminster.

Tory Brexiteers like John Whittingdale publicly warn that if Theresa May’s deal is voted down, she will be replaced as leader, while simultaneously making it impossible for any kind of deal to be achieved.

And for those in his party who continue to claim there is nothing to fear from a hard Brexit, another new plot development emerges. We are far past the point that, according to Liam Fox and David Davis, dozens of new free trade deals would be ready to sign the second the UK left the EU. The US would ride to the UK’s rescue, as would Australia, New Zealand and everybody else.

Instead, those three countries have issued formal objections to the independent trade schedules the UK has already submitted to the World Trade Organisation, meaning a hard Brexit currently looks even harder than had been feared.

We have been driven to the cliff-edge by lies, incompetence and utter shamelessness, to the point where we face little choice but to close our eyes, lean back and accept our fate.