NYCC 2017 Panel Recap: Robert Kirkman Spotlight

On Thursday, Robert Kirkman took the stage in the Hammerstein Ballroom during NYCC2017 to talk about his work across various mediums.

One fan asked him how thoroughly he is involved with Fear the Walking Dead. “Same level of involvement I have in Walking Dead except for the fact there’s not a comic book it’s based on. For me, that almost makes Fear more fun…” Kirkman said. “It’s a little less re-treading common ground.”

“The things I know about Season 4!” Kirkman teased. “Oh, the things, You guys are gonna be so excited.”

Another asks about the reception of Princess who was recently introduced in The Walking Dead comics. “She’s fairly unique. She’s gonna add a cool new flavor to the book,” Kirkman said.” “People seem to dig her. Any time you introduce any character to The Walking Dead, 20% of people are like, ‘I don’t know why this character’s in here!’”

He jokes about Negan being criticized for the F-word, Ezekiel having a tiger… but eventually everyone comes around. “Two or three months pass and everyone’s like, ‘It’s my favorite character!’” Kirkman said.

Kirkman goes on to talk about how proud he is of the comics an Walking Dead titles becoming so popular across TV and video games. He is happy with all the success because he gets money from all of them!

As for whether or not he’ll ever make a cameo in The Walking Dead TV series… “Absolutely never! No, never,” Kirkman said. “I hate that. It’s a pet peeve of mine. Like, I’m watching Lord of the Rings, I see Peter Jackson, I don’t wanna see Peter Jackson!” He also hated seeing Todd McFarlane in Spawn during the alley fight scene. “I could do it any time if I wanted to. I’d definitely never be a zombie.”

As for why there are so many British actors on The Walking Dead, Kirkman claims they never really know until after the fact. “To be completely honest, in a lot of cases, we don’t even know they’re British,” Kirkman said “And then we find out they’re British!”

“It’s definitely a bias that we have because we hate Americans,” he joked.

When asked if Fear the Walking Dead characters will cross paths with The Walking Dead, Kirkman dodged by saying, “That would be cool!”

A fan asked about the number of hyphenated ethnicity’s tied into recent issues of The Walking Dead and Kirkman stands by the diversity of the book. “If you’re a white supremacist, you’re more than welcome to not read my comics,” Kirkman said.

Continued

A fan asks about a four-year-old story from Invincible.

“To have a storyline where a very important character goes bad and tries to take over the world, that happens often, you never bet to the end of a comic and go, ‘Spider-Man lost? Doctor Octopus owns New York now?’ That’s no a thing. Having Robot take over the world… He’s been in control of the world for a very long time!”

“We have issue #174 which will come out in December, which is an all Negan issue, which will deal with Negan and that issue and will definitively prove whether or not Negan is a changed man or not.” Kirkman said.

A fan asks about the Invincible movie and whether or not he can share any details.

“Nope,” Kirkman said. “The same thing I said at San Diego months ago. I am in constant contact with Seth and Evan.

Over the summer, he connected with Rogen and Goldberg via Skype from Kentucky. “I got a thing for Christmas that’s like a little plunger and you can stick it to the back of your phone like a kickstand,” Kirkman said. He started playing with it and eventually put it on his forehead. He started popping it on and off of his head. He stops with three minutes until his call and uses the bathroom, where he notices the giant pink hickey on his forehead from the plunger. During the Skype call, he saw himself in the corner of the screen and couldn’t not notice the hickey on the little screen, imagining what it looks like on the bigger screen. He took his chance to ask Seth Rogen about how long hickeys last and explained the plunger situation and they ended up swapping hickey stories. 

The moment reminded him of when he was getting ready to start work on The Walking Dead TV show, he sat down with Gale Anne Hurd and David Alpert, and he dropped a bottle of Coca-Cola on his crotch and it was covered in soda. He was the first person there, so he hand to stand up and meet everyone and swear to all of them that this stain was nothing more than Coca-Cola. 

Continued

When will Marines pop up in The Walking Dead? Kirkman has no idea.

As for the ending of The Walking Dead, “It is hundreds if not thousands of issues away,” Kirkman explains, despite some of the “clickbait articles” which spawned from his comments at San Diego Comic Con.

“I did not announce the end of The Walking Dead, I just know what the end will be,” Kirkman said.

He does, however, have some scenes and plots which didn’t make the story. “There was a divorce plot I had where Lori and Rick were gonna get apocalypse divorced, I thought that was neat, it was like, W’hat do you do? You live in a prison together?’ Kirkman said. “But then I was like, ‘That sounds boring.’”

He also planned to kill Negan six issues after his introduction. “Originally Rick was going to decapitate him and deliver his head to Maggie as gift,” Kirkman said. “That didn’t happen.

“Then I was like, ‘Hey I wonder what would happen if he talked to Carl?’ Kirkman said. “So now he’s been around forever.”

“But I have that script written and every time Jeffrey Dean Morgan acts up!” he joked.

When it comes to killing Ezekiel off the pages and discovering him dead, Kirkman says “each character can’t have a grand death.”

“The impact of not seeing it and then seeing the result of it is as big and as impactful as if you had seen,” Kirkman said. “Just trying different stuff.

What’s next for Battle Beast and the Skybound/Amazon deal?

“Nothing coming up for Battle Beast,” Kirkman said. “He’s dead. Even his skin cape, I think, got destroyed in the fight so he’s not around any more…There is a scene that does indicate there may be another form of Battle Beast out there. There’s only three issues left, it’d be a real downer if I never bring that up again. There will be some form of resolution on that. I’m completely spoiling that, sorry.”

“As far as the Amazong deal goes, very excited…” Kirkman said. “Ran Fox international, became very involved with The Walking Dead Season 1… We’ve had a very close relatjonship with her at Skybound…She’s been tasked with bringing in a lot of cool genre shows…and I’m like, ‘Hey, I like getting packages from Amazon.’ By the way, I do not get faster shipping, I do not get discounts!”

“We’re gonna be doing a lot of, hopefully, really cool, big genre shows,” Kirkman said.

When can we expect some of the Amazon stuff?

“The answer is I don’t know,” Kirkman said after speculating a bit.

“No one is safe,” Kirkman reiterates. “Hopefully there have been points where you go, ‘Is this it? Is this where Rick dies?’ And he doesn’t. One day, the moment will come where you go, ‘Oh my god, it is!’ …It could happen any time between now and 50 years from now. 50 years, that’s not gonna happen…”

Continued

Heath returning to TV? Big plans for Jesus?

“We’ve got a lot of stuff planned for Jesus in Season 8, so be on the look out for that,” Kirkman said. 

“Corey Hawkins…there is an intention to bring him back eventually,” Kirkman said. “He had an opportunity to go do that 24 show, we wanted to be facilitating and allow him to do that… hopefully there is every intention that we get Heath back. It’s in contract land, so… Corey is amazing. Kong: Skull Island, that 24: Legacy show he was on was super cool!”

The relationship between Rick and Michonne spawned during production of Season 3 during the Morgan Jones-return episode Clear. Scott Gimple noticed the chemistry between Andrew Lincoln and Danai Gurira. 

“Before even telling anyone, [Scott Gimple] wrote [Clear] in the mindset of, ‘I think it would be really cool if these characters end up together,’” Kirkman said. “He came to me and said, ‘I’m thinking about putting Michonne and Rick together.’ And as you know, Andrea is not with us on the show.” Kirkman liked the idea right away as the show took attirbutes of Andrea and shared them among others on the AMC series. “This bit of Andrea goes to Michonne, this bit of Andrea goes to Sasha…” Kirkman explained. “I think [Rick and Michonne], in the show especially, they do have a comradery, and they have a tremendous friendship in the comics…”

A fan asks about Eugene’s betrayal of the group on The Walking Dead TV series. 

“There’s much I can say because, as you can imagine moving into All Out War, Season 8, that is a very essential plot thread to what’s happening in the books,” Kikrman said. “We already know Dwight is double crossing Negan. The question is whether or not Eugene is gonna do that…That is something we’re going to be exploring quite a bit.”

Why is Carol so different on TV versus the comics?

“That really is a testament to the difference between comic books and television in that the actor inspires and definitely can shape the portrayal of a character,” Kirkman said. “They have a voice, You end up getting to know them…Once you realize what you have in a Melissa McBride, despite the fact that she’s playing a character who didn’t really have a long story in the comics…once you start realizing what she’s capable of, you have to start servicing that…and I would have to give Melissa a ton of credit.”