Robert Kirkman: Conversations

By Terrence R. Wandtke

Robert Kirkman (b. 1978) is probably best known as the creator of The Walking Dead. The comic book and its television adaptation have reinvented the zombie horror story, transforming it from cult curiosity and parody to mainstream popularity and critical acclaim. In some ways, this would be enough to justify this career-spanning collection of interviews. Yet Kirkman represents much more than this single comic book title.

Kirkman’s story is a fanboy’s dream that begins with him financing his irreverent, independent comic book Battle Pope with credit cards. After writing major titles with Marvel comics (Spider-Man, Captain America, and X-Men), Kirkman rejected companies like DC and Marvel and publicly advocated for creator ownership as the future of the comics industry. As a partner at Image, Kirkman wrote not only The Walking Dead but also Invincible, a radical reinvention of the superhero genre.

Robert Kirkman: Conversations gives insight to his journey and explores technique, creativity, collaboration, and the business of comics as a multimedia phenomenon. For instance, while continuing to write genre-based comics in titles like Outcast and Oblivion Song, Kirkman explains his writerly bias for complex characters over traditional plot development. As a fan-turned-creator, Kirkman reveals a creator’s complex relationship with fans in a comic-con era that breaks down the consumer/producer dichotomy. And after rejecting company-ownership practices, Kirkman articulates a vision of the creator-ownership model and his goal of organic creativity at Skybound, his multimedia company. While Stan Lee was the most prominent comic book everyman of the previous era of comics production, Kirkman is the most prominent comic book everyman of this dynamic, evolving new era.

• Language: English
• Publisher: University Press of Mississippi
• Release date: Jul 29, 2021
• ISBN: 9781496834836

Book preview

Robert Kirkman and Tony Moore: The Death Cookie Interview

LEIGHTON CONNER / 2000

From The Death Cookie, July 2000. Reprinted by permission of Leighton Connor

PART ONE: KIRKMAN

Death Cookie: Give me the lowdown on Battle Pope.

Robert Kirkman: The Battle Pope miniseries is about the not-so-holy Pope of the not-so-distant future and his quest to rescue Saint Michael with the help of Jesus. It’s got lots of action and lots of jokes, so it should be pretty entertaining. I think I might have thrown a couple of chicks in there for eye candy, too. Buy lots!

DC: How did the series come to be?

RK: Tony and I met in middle school, and have been friends ever since. We always liked comics and wanted to someday work on them. Last summer I was digging through some old papers of mine (I keep EVERYTHING) and I found a picture of a para-military type Pope I drew my senior year in high school. I looked at it and thought BATTLE POPE, and then it hit me. I plotted the first issue based on that old sketch, laid out all the pages and mentioned the idea to Tony. He dug it pretty well, and we started on the book less than a month later. It only seemed logical to publish it ourselves. Not that I didn’t send out submissions to other publishers—I did. Image, Dark Horse, and Oni didn’t seem interested, but it was always the plan to do it ourselves. So far it’s worked out pretty well—I can’t seem to keep Diamond in stock!

DC: We’ll get back to Battle Pope in a minute, but I want to get your thoughts on another matter. It’s well-documented that you’re a big fan of the comic book Savage Dragon. What did you think of the big turning point issue #75 that came out a few months back?

RK: I’m not ashamed to admit that I was a little disappointed. There wasn’t much resolved, and it was too much of a BIG FLASHY ACTION sequence to feel like the last Dragon issue in this continuity. I’ve since gotten 76, and I must say that I missed the supporting cast immensely. This new stuff is going to take a little getting used to. I still LIKE it, mind you; it’s just not the same. The ART was GREAT