DAYS OF X PAST & MORE - CATCHING UP WITH ROBERT KIRKMAN [Archive]

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MattBrady

01-17-2008, 04:46 PM

<img src="http://www.newsarama.com/marvelnew/Kirkman/ultxm092.jpg" border="0" align="right">by Vaneta Rogers

After just over two years with the title, writer Robert Kirman announced (http://www.kirkmania.com/) in late December that he would be leaving the series with issue #93. As he said in his blog, after being hired for a nine issue fill-in arc, sticking around for over two dozen ain’t half dad.

We spoke with the writer about his time on the series.

Newsarama: For those who might not have seen your blog post, why are you leaving Ultimate X-Men now?

Robert Kirkman: Well, I was sitting down with [Marvel editor] Ralph Macchio. Well, he was sitting down in New York and I was sitting down in Kentucky. And he was asking me what I was going to do after the Apocalypse storyline. And everything I've been doing in Ultimate X-Men since my run started -- and you know, there are a lot of subplots and a lot of things going on and different layers to the storyline -- it's all been leading up to the Apocalypse storyline. So I didn't really see the point of overstaying my welcome and trying to hang onto the book after that point, and force myself to come up with more storylines that may or may not live up to what I'm doing in the Apocalypse storyline. So I figured it was as good a time as any to do my swan song storyline and tie everything up and then walk out the door.

NRAMA: You know there are a lot of rumors about changes coming for the Ultimate Universe.

RK: I cannot speak about any of them!

NRAMA: [laughs] That's not surprising, but...

RK: I mean, I'm aware of what's going on. But I can't really comment because I don't know what they're steering people to believe. There are definitely a lot of changes in store and some cool things happening.

NRAMA: But it leads next to the question: Are you leaving the series, or is the series leaving you? I’m just wondering if the title is even going to still be around? Or is there something coming that drove you out? Or is the title perhaps becoming something completely different?

RK: Well, my last issue is #93, and I can guarantee you that there is going to be an issue #94. I'm pretty sure I can guarantee that there are going to be a #100. I will say that after Ultimatum, all bets are off--there might not even be an Ultimate universe! Won’t Bendis be pissed?

<img src="http://www.newsarama.com/marvelnew/Kirkman/ultxmen091.jpg" border="0" align="left">NRAMA: OK. Well, let's talk about all the things that you've been building during your run as you head toward the introduction of Ultimate Apocalypse. As you said, there are a lot of threads running through this storyline since you started, aren't there?

RK: Yeah, and then there are ties to Mark Millar's run on the book, and there are ties to Brian K. Vaughan's run on the book. And I'm bringing back a lot of things that were set up in the original Mr. Sinister storyline.

NRAMA: In that storyline, Sinister seemed like he made up Apocalypse. Now that you're basing a whole storyline on him, is it safe to assume that's not true? He's a real person?

RK: Who knows? I certainly couldn't say. [laughs]

NRAMA: But he's not a -- what was that? A scarecrow kind of voodoo doll that Sinister had and was calling Apocalypse?

<img src="http://www.newsarama.com/marvelnew/Kirkman/ultxmen090.jpg" border="0" align="right">RK: I believe that's a mannequin. [laughs] But there was some kind of stitching, so I guess that could be a scarecrow type thing. I wasn't on the book then, so who knows?

But yeah, I will say there are some answers given to that mystery in Ultimate X-Men #90. I mean, when he was originally introduced, it was left kind of ambiguous as to whether or not Apocalypse really existed or it was just a crazy invention from a psychotic Mr. Sinister. And that's definitely not forgotten. It's something I'm toying around with in issue #90, and there will be some solid answers given to that in the issue.

And there's a giant statue of Apocalypse shown in the future in issue #88, so obviously there's some kind of physical manifestation of Apocalypse.

NRAMA: Well, yeah, and Cable is super scared of him. So there must be something there, right?

RK: He is definitely super scared. Those are the [i]exact[/i] words I would have used. [laughs]

NRAMA: Thank you. Sometimes other writers come up with expressive words, you know.

RK: You're doing a fantastic job. Super scared. Hold on! I think I'm going to stay on the book. That's the title of my next arc on the book.

NRAMA: Super Scared! But seriously, you've confirmed you're addressing the Sinister storyline. Can you speak to some of the other threads that you're going to tie up in this storyline? You imply that everything leads to this story, so are we going to see the resolution of everything you've been hinting?

RK: Yeah, definitely. I mean, you know how every two issues, I'd bring up the Phoenix stuff that's going on with Jean, but never actually do anything with it?

NRAMA: Yeah. So we'll finally understand all those hints about what's going on with Jean?

<img src="http://www.newsarama.com/marvelnew/Kirkman/ultxmen089.jpg" border="0" align="left">RK: Exactly. That's coming to a head in the Apocalypse storyline as well. And then everything with Cable in the future, and why Bishop is on the team. And what's going on with Xavier. Everything like that is going to be wrapped up in a hopefully satisfactory fashion by the end of Issue #93. We'll know all the answers.

Nightcrawler leading the Morlocks is brought back into play, and so we see a little more of him there. And Scott and Jean, who are running Xavier's school as a just an honest-to-god school now in Ultimate X-Men, that's touched on and that's brought into play in this arc. Everything kind of intersects and is woven together into what hopefully will be a cool story and will say everything I want to say about Ultimate X-Men.

NRAMA: So at the end of issue #93, are you getting it back to a nice, neat Ultimate X-Men story that somebody else can pick up on? Or are there major changes coming in your story arc that will lead to something a little different for the next guy?

RK: It will be as messed up as it's been the whole time I've been writing it. [laughs] No, you never want to wrap [i]everything[/i] up and bring it all back to status quo, and go, "Hey, there you go. Everything I did doesn't matter!" So I'm not planning on doing that.

NRAMA: So does that mean there are big changes down the line for the Ultimate X-Men?

RK: Yeah, yeah, yeah. There will definitely be some problems left to solve when Issue #93 is over.

NRAMA: Let's look back, then -- what's probably your favorite thing or favorite few things that you brought to the Ultimate Universe during your run on the X-Men?

RK: Well, I'm pretty proud of what I did with Cable. I thought that was a pretty cool storyline, and I had a lot of fun doing that. And with Ultimate Cable being Wolverine, and his whole story arc. Of course, his story isn't done yet, but I think when it's all said and done, that will probably be my legacy in the Ultimate Universe: Ultimate Cable, for better or for worse.

NRAMA: Looking back, what in your run was the biggest challenge?

RK: When I took over Ultimate X-Men, I think there were 75 people in the main cast -- in the team. OK, I'm exaggerating a little bit. But the team was basically 14 members, and for awhile there were six kids that wouldn't actually do anything, but were stuck in the school trying to learn. And then there were eight kids who were the actual X-Men team who would go out and do stuff. And then over the course of Brian K. Vaughan's run, he had them doing so much cool stuff that they kind of became like a cohesive team. He just really had a big X-Men team and I think Brian did a really good job of juggling everything.

But I wasn't interested in writing that many characters regularly. So when I came on, I made the decision that I'd eventually get around to thinning out the team as much as I could and get to a core cast, while keeping everyone in the book and doing subplots and stuff. I do a lot of subplots in Invincible, and people don't seem to mind. So I thought that I would make Ultimate X-Men a little bit more like Invincible. I would keep characters on the back burner for a long time, but just because Cyclops and Jean weren't in the story every issue, it doesn't mean that they weren't a member of the book's cast and wouldn't be popping in from time to time. I kind of liked that there were so many characters, but there were probably characters who I should have shown more and characters I shouldn't have shown quite as much as I did. It was a tough thing.

I was very excited to be on Ultimate X-Men, because it was like I was writing every X-Men book in a certain universe. There's only one X-Men book for the Ultimate line, and you have the entire cast of the X-Men Universe to play around with. So that aspect of it was really fun. But at the same time, it can all get a little unwieldy. So if I were to criticize my whole run, I'd say maybe -- like once or twice, for like maybe a page -- things got a little unwieldy. But for the most part, I enjoyed juggling the entire cast.

<img src="http://www.newsarama.com/marvelnew/Zombies/Zombies2/02/t_MarvelZombiesII02Cover.jpg" border="0" align="right">NRAMA: OK, let's switch from Ultimate X-Men and talk about Marvel Zombies. You have good zombies and bad zombies now?

RK: Yes! And they're fighting each other!

NRAMA: Crazy! You've taken every zombie rule and thrown it away! Your zombies don't die when you cut off the top of their heads... they talk... they turn good... what's up with that? [laughs]

RK: See, if you want standard, straight-up, dramatic zombies, then you need to be reading The Walking Dead.

NRAMA: Good point.

RK: And because I do The Walking Dead and I do Marvel Zombies, I definitely set out to do a book that was very different. They're written by the same guy, so I guess there are certain things that appear in both books as far as my writing style and the way I do things. But I didn't want anybody to ever pick up Marvel Zombies and say, "Oh, well this is just like Walking Dead, but with superheroes."

NRAMA: Well, it's not just the zombies that are different. It's a completely different tone. It seems like you're just having fun with this story.

RK: Exactly. You can't really take it too seriously, to a certain extent, when you have characters who are who [i]they[/i] are, doing what they're doing. Spider-Man running around with a missing leg is not going to be the most dramatic, serious thing in the world. So you do have to kind of have fun with it. There is a definite black comedy angle to it all.

NRAMA: Do you want to tell people anything about the next couple issues?

<img src="http://www.newsarama.com/marvelnew/Kirkman/mzom3.jpg" border="0" align="left">RK: I'm pretty excited about how the whole thing is going to end. So that's pretty cool. I definitely don't want to give anything away, but I'm hoping it's on par with the ending of the first mini-series, which was my favorite ending of any ending that I've ever written.

NRAMA: It was pretty mind-boggling.

RK: Yeah! Galactus zombies. Wooo! Hopefully this ending will be as much of a shocker and as much out of left field as the ending to the first mini-series was. And I'm going to kind of thin the herd as we go through this second series, 'cause there's just too many characters. [laughs] I didn't kill enough in the first mini-series. And it's a zombie book, so a good number of people have to die by the end of it.

NRAMA: Are there more Marvel Zombies series coming someday soon?

RK: The future is wide open. I think that Marvel Zombies 2 has been a huge success, and all of the zombie-related things that have happened in 2006 and 2007. And I think -- rightly so -- after Marvel Zombies 2, Marvel has decided to give them a bit of a rest as to not play out the trend too much. And hopefully things will be as fresh and exciting as Marvel Zombies 2 has been when and if they ever return.

<img src="http://www.newsarama.com/marvelnew/Kirkman/mzom5.jpg" border="0" align="right">Assuming I don't kill everyone at the end of Marvel Zombies 2.

NRAMA: Now that Marvel Zombies 2 is winding down and Ultimate X-Men is heading toward your last storyline, do you have more projects coming up at Marvel?

RK: I guess it certainly could appear that I don't. Well, there's a Killraven series that I'm doing with Rob Liefeld that's still in the works.

NRAMA: That's right. Where is that?

RK: Where is that? In Rob's hands. But no, Rob has been feverishly finishing up Onslaught Reborn and working on Killraven at the same time, so there's a great deal of work already done on Killraven #1 and #2. So we're ready to go. I'm hoping that we'll have enough to launch in the middle of -- what year is it? 2008?

<a href=http://www.newsarama.com/Chicago_07/Marvel/Mondo/killraven_1.html target=new><img src=http://www.newsarama.com/Chicago_07/Marvel/Mondo/killraven_t.jpg border=0 hspace=3 align=left></a>NRAMA: It is 2008.

RK: Hey... it's still early. But yeah, I'm hoping that maybe we'll be able to launch Killraven this summer. But there's no release date set. Rob won't be waiting for script on this one, at any point, and so it should ship fairly regularly once it comes out.

NRAMA: Anything else you have coming up for Marvel?

RK: I have a few things that I can't really discuss, which is always a lot of fun. A couple minis here and there. And some different thing that I'm currently discussing.

NRAMA: But they are Marvel?

RK: Oh, yeah. Definitely.

NRAMA: And for your Invincible fans, can you tell us anything about the next couple issues as you gear up for issue #50?

<a href="http://www.newsarama.com/ImageComics/Invincible/Invin_Gate.html" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.newsarama.com/ImageComics/Invincible/t_Invincible_Gate.jpg" border="0" align="right"></a>RK: Big action and crazy surprises with all kinds of different status quo-changing events that are going to happen in issue #48, #49 and #50. But yeah, #48 is going to be a fun issue because almost the entire Invincible universe is featured. So we get to see the Astounding Wolf-Man make an appearance. And the characters from Brit also come in. It features a villain in the book called Doc Seismic who has appeared a few times, and he's going to make his final move starting in issue #48, and there is going to be some earth-shattering, world-conquering kind of supervillainry. So it's going to bring all the superheroes out of the woodwork to take him on.

And then that leads to all kinds of chaos between Invincible and his current employer, Cecil Steadman, who runs the Global Defense Agency.

NRAMA: ... who is not exactly who Mark thinks he is.

RK: Yes. Mark is a young character in the book, and he has taken everything at face value thus far. He's just kind of gone along for the ride and done whatever he's asked. So he sees how naive he's been in Issue #50. It's going to be a good moment of growth for the character, so we'll kind of get to see him grow up, which is always fun in a creator-owned book because you get to see the characters grow and evolve and see their personalities mature and change with time, so I'm very excited about that.

NRAMA: And another one of your Image books, The Walking Dead, has a lot of solicitations for the future that are very cryptic. I know the comic is in the middle of a war right now, so obviously, we'll have to talk again after the war is over.

RK: Yeah, it will be easier to do because then I can talk about how I've wrecked my book. [laughs]

<a href="http://www.newsarama.com/ImageComics/Invincible/51/lee_invin.html" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.newsarama.com/ImageComics/Invincible/51/b_lee_invin.jpg" border="0" align="left"></a>NRAMA: [laughs] Oh no!

RK: No, if you really liked some character and would quit the book if he or she were to die, don't worry. That one is not going to die.

NRAMA: That's not going to be the one to die, right?

RK: No! No! It's not [i]your[/i] favorite character. Don't worry. They're fine.

But it's been 50 issues, so it's time to kind of inject new blood into the book and shake things up and make things a little more dangerous and more edgy. And I'm not going to say that they're leaving the prison, but they've been safe behind fences and...

NRAMA: I think you already did. In our last interview, didn't you just come out and say they're leaving the prison? [laughs]

RK: Oh, fine. I can do that again, I guess. [laughs] But I'm not going to come out and say it! But they've been behind fences and dealing with relationship-related things, so once they get outside those fences, we'll see how dangerous their world really is. And whoever survives will have a very interesting time in the issues to come.

NRAMA: It's interesting that you're at a turning point with both Invincible and Walking Dead where they've reached 50 issues, but you have a brand new series starting up with Astounding Wolf-Man. How's that going?

RK: Things are going fine. Wolf-Man is selling on par with Invincible, and I'm excited about that. It's an odd thing to have a book start out as a success, because with both The Walking Dead and Invincible, we kind of struggled along for the first year, and then people started reading it. So it's cool to work on the first few issues and know that people are actually seeing it right now. But it's fun to start a new thing. I don't want to be a two-hit wonder. It's fun to kind of insure that it's just as cool as the other two books. And it's fun to see them compared to each other in the press or online. I think that when it's all said and done, it will be able to stand on its own and be a new kind of horror/superhero book.

NRAMA: And getting back to your upcoming work with Marvel: You said you had a couple mini-series, right?

RK: Yes. But maybe I've said too much already... be vague--I’ve got to be vague!

NRAMA: Is this something that you pitched or something that Marvel wants you to do?

RK: Something I was asked to pitch and came up with the idea for it.

NRAMA: And can you tell us about when it would be released?

RK: I don't know. Hopefully it will be announced before the summer.

spidey 85

01-17-2008, 04:53 PM

cant wait i really enjoy all those books

Jeremy Holstein

01-17-2008, 05:02 PM

Any update on "Haunt"?

Marius665

01-17-2008, 05:06 PM

johhnypanic

01-17-2008, 05:06 PM

I enjoy RK's work. he is a great writer and Invncible is one of the best books around!

Tom Daylight

01-17-2008, 05:23 PM

I guess UXM is for the chop at #100. As great a job as writers like Kirkman and BKV have done on it, the book itself never served any pupose other than to prop up the Ultimate line (although I'll be damned if I wasn't sad when BKV and SI left). The best X-Men storylines always, always involved new characters and continuity has only ever been an issue on that line when the writers let it get out of control. Kirkman's received a ridiculous amount of flak for his work on the book but I think he's done a fine job and I'm eager to see how it all ends. As much 1990s-era nonsense as he's brought into the book he has done new stuff with all of it and told some pretty interesting stories.

JoeZhang

01-17-2008, 05:41 PM

His work on the title was steady and consistent - sadly I look for those qualities in a bread-maker not a writer.

(and before people leap all over me - I love his other stuff especially invincible, his work here just wasn't very good).

bkbirge

01-17-2008, 05:48 PM

Astounding Wolfman is a great read, hope it continues for a long time.

Goldenboy

01-17-2008, 05:51 PM

Ult Apocalypse is going to kick so much @$$:D

out of curiousity, what characters share the Image universe? Invincible, Savage Dragon, Shadowhawk:confused:

oh, and how is this Astounding Wolf-Man? I'm thinking about picking it up.

Kirkman's creations - Invincible, Brit, Capes, Wolf-Man and Tech Jacket have a VERY closely linked universe. Just after Christmas, I read the Tech Jacket, Brit and Capes TPBs, and found they really expand on some minor cameos, characters and events which take place in Invincible. Events and characters in books like Savage Dragon don't really impact on Kirkman's comics at all; but since they do co-exist in the same universe, various Image characters do pop up occasionally; mostly at funerals.

The Astonishing Wolf-Man is excellent, despite it's unfortunately bi-monthly schedule.

PhoenixFacto

01-17-2008, 05:53 PM

While I've found Ultimate X-Men frustrating at times lately, I hope this Apocalypse story will make a lot of his run make more cohesive sense.

subhuman

01-17-2008, 06:05 PM

Hopefully this wraps up his storylines into a fairly neat and cohesive package. I am not too sad about Kirkman leaving the title, as I was thinking about dropping most of the Ultimate titles after the current storylines wrap up anyway. Kirkman definitely improved his stories after the initial nine issues, but I find the regualr universe stuff to be much more intersting...Walking Dead and Marvel Zombies 2 are both awesome, and I can't wait to see what he is writing next!

Colonsus

01-17-2008, 06:11 PM

I like Kirkman in general, but boy am I glad to see him leaving Ultimate X-men. What an abysmal run.

CoreyB

01-17-2008, 06:25 PM

What's Lion-O doing with Captain America's shield?

Punchy

01-17-2008, 06:36 PM

Kirkman's creations - Invincible, Brit, Capes, Wolf-Man and Tech Jacket have a VERY closely linked universe. Just after Christmas, I read the Tech Jacket, Brit and Capes TPBs, and found they really expand on some minor cameos, characters and events which take place in Invincible. Events and characters in books like Savage Dragon don't really impact on Kirkman's comics at all; but since they do co-exist in the same universe, various Image characters do pop up occasionally; mostly at funerals.

The Astonishing Wolf-Man is excellent, despite it's unfortunately bi-monthly schedule.

The closest link between the Kirkman-verse and Larsen-verse is Superpatriot, mainly because Kirkman has written 2 great Miniseries with him, and his wife is friends with Mark's mum.

ascloseasme

01-17-2008, 07:20 PM

samnoir

01-17-2008, 07:22 PM

As much as I enjoy Kirkman's Marvel work, I enjoy his creator owned work best and look forward to Invincible and Walking Dead on a monthly basis.

It will be interesting to see what else Kirkman will be working on once Marvel Zombies and Ultimate X-Men wrap up.

have they announced who's taking over Ultimate X-Men?
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JJ Fresh

01-17-2008, 08:12 PM

I'm going to say it and I hope he sees it: ROBERT KIRKMAN: YOU WERE THE WORST THING TO EVER HAPPEN TO ULTIMATE X-MEN!

His other work is great, but as someone who collected from issue 1 and dropped promptly after "Magical" (although, I followed), the entire run was sloppy, people were ridiculously out of character, and it was not only uninspired, but convoluted. The choice to bring back Beast was horrible and as emotionally dry as the Sahara. There was the disregard for the established rules of time travel in a line of comics that should be striving towards better choices of continuity. The Magician was more two dimensional than the artwork. The list goes on and on and on. He also approached the book with a sickening arrogance, initially saying he'd turn it from a title focusing on "who gets ultimatized next" to something more emotionally rich. Not only is it a slap in the face to the previous writers, but he didn't even stick to that philosophy!

What's worse is throughout the entire run there was no greater metaphor related to the X-Men. It was just a big chicken nugget of a run. Nothing of substance. The characters now are no longer recognizable and the DRASTIC drop in sales (more than any writer on the title to-date) prove it. (Notice how he avoided the "Did you get fired?" question? Bad reviews on the internet and in print + massive decline in sales + about three weeks ago saying he was on for the "foreseeable future" = fired.)

And regarding what he's said in this interview about the size of the cast: There were 11 main characters at the end of Vaughan's run. Not 14. 10 if you consider Dazzler went into a comma at the conclusion of "Magnetic North." What title does he think he wrote where he had less than that at any point during his run? Again, a complete bitch-slap in the face of the other writers to say the non-X-Men just "sat around."

Geez, did Kirkman kick your dog or something? Also Marvel publishes at least twenty other X-men related titles, why not give them a try instead of spewing venom just to maybe instigate a feud? If it happens I highly doubt people will side with you anyway, so what's with the hate? Creative criticism is okay, but criticism to try and make yourself credible? Lame. You don't know if he's been fired or not, so why jump to conclusions? Slap in the face to previous writers? How so? Because it uses the same characters? Because he said 14 team members instead of 11? Keep scaling that molehill friend. I'm not praising Kirkman's run as the best or throwing eggs because it might be the weakest of the writers on that particular title. What I will do is tell you to punch a pillow, count to ten, stand on your head, and take a chill pill. Kirkman's run was Kirkman's run, move on. If it does bother you that much to have such a black hole in your collection, just do a Mephisto tango and pretend it didn't happen....or maybe slip into a "comma";) .

President Kang

01-17-2008, 08:12 PM

johnny.blaze

01-17-2008, 08:43 PM

I'm going to say it and I hope he sees it: ROBERT KIRKMAN: YOU WERE THE WORST THING TO EVER HAPPEN TO ULTIMATE X-MEN!

His other work is great, but as someone who collected from issue 1 and dropped promptly after "Magical" (although, I followed), the entire run was sloppy, people were ridiculously out of character, and it was not only uninspired, but convoluted. The choice to bring back Beast was horrible and as emotionally dry as the Sahara. There was the disregard for the established rules of time travel in a line of comics that should be striving towards better choices of continuity. The Magician was more two dimensional than the artwork. The list goes on and on and on. He also approached the book with a sickening arrogance, initially saying he'd turn it from a title focusing on "who gets ultimatized next" to something more emotionally rich. Not only is it a slap in the face to the previous writers, but he didn't even stick to that philosophy!

What's worse is throughout the entire run there was no greater metaphor related to the X-Men. It was just a big chicken nugget of a run. Nothing of substance. The characters now are no longer recognizable and the DRASTIC drop in sales (more than any writer on the title to-date) prove it. (Notice how he avoided the "Did you get fired?" question? Bad reviews on the internet and in print + massive decline in sales + about three weeks ago saying he was on for the "foreseeable future" = fired.)

And regarding what he's said in this interview about the size of the cast: There were 11 main characters at the end of Vaughan's run. Not 14. 10 if you consider Dazzler went into a comma at the conclusion of "Magnetic North." What title does he think he wrote where he had less than that at any point during his run? Again, a complete bitch-slap in the face of the other writers to say the non-X-Men just "sat around."

I really like Kirkman. He's one of the standup guys in the biz. Walking Dead is easily one of the books i look forward to reading each month. He's a good writer and any book that has his name on the cover, i automatically give a chance. Unfortunately i'm going to be very happy to see him leave Ultimate X-Men.

i essentially agree with all of the above sentiments (though i'm going to sound less uh emotional/passionate).

Kirkman was a poor fit for the book. The book dragged severely with his story arcs. The book never found a flow and each story read very herk-jerky. Bringing Beast back was atrociously done and his integration back to the XM family was handled poorly. He only wrote one good story (the one where Nightcrawler goes ape ____ crazy). His Ult Cable seemed more as an attempt to draw shock-value than have any actual substance (combined with that being sloooooooowly being milked). Which leads to the de-compression issue.

As Kirmans says in the article above, he was originally asked to pen the book for 9 issues but instead stuck around for 30. The story he's telling now should've been told in 9. His cast of characters were horribly written. The dialogue (which is one of kirkman's forte) was piss poor.

This book was one of the crown jewels in the Ult U (along w/ Ult Spiderman) but this book has DRAMATICALLY fallen from grace.

The last thing i'll say is that his lackluster run was made worse by the ugly art.

I hope whoever takes over the book after him kicks it up a notch and increases the fun factor. Something this book has been missing for more than the past year

Sweeps

01-17-2008, 08:55 PM

Fill in "Heroes" writer for 4 issues then Loeb's Ultimatum crossover starts.

So, when exactly does Ultimatum start? I though this summer? Issue #93 has this "Apocalypse" story wrapping up in April.

Sweeps

01-17-2008, 08:56 PM

Fill in "Heroes" writer for 4 issues then Loeb's Ultimatum crossover starts.

So, when exactly does Ultimatum start? I though this summer? Issue #93 has this "Apocalypse" story wrapping up in April.

lesterg

01-17-2008, 09:30 PM

I admire Kirkman's work elsewhere, but I'm shocked he remained on the book as long as he did (particularly in light of sales/fan reaction). He just never seemed to click with the title.

Hacker

01-17-2008, 09:38 PM

What was Kirkman's first issue of Ult X-Men?

ascloseasme

01-17-2008, 09:40 PM

Geez, did Kirkman kick your dog or something? Also Marvel publishes at least twenty other X-men related titles, why not give them a try instead of spewing venom just to maybe instigate a feud? If it happens I highly doubt people will side with you anyway, so what's with the hate? Creative criticism is okay, but criticism to try and make yourself credible? Lame. You don't know if he's been fired or not, so why jump to conclusions? Slap in the face to previous writers? How so? Because it uses the same characters? Because he said 14 team members instead of 11? Keep scaling that molehill friend. I'm not praising Kirkman's run as the best or throwing eggs because it might be the weakest of the writers on that particular title. What I will do is tell you to punch a pillow, count to ten, stand on your head, and take a chill pill. Kirkman's run was Kirkman's run, move on. If it does bother you that much to have such a black hole in your collection, just do a Mephisto tango and pretend it didn't happen....or maybe slip into a "comma";) .

First off: Zing. Pointing out a spelling error. That's clever. :rolleyes:

Second: I don't really consider it having left a "hole in my collection." I used that point to illustrate I was a long-time fan and I consider a title I once enjoyed to have dramatically decreased in quality... As did most of the "professionals" who reviewed it throughout his run. (Wizard Magazine and IGN to name two.)

Third: I explained how some of his comments are a slap in the face to the other writers... Or at least come off that way. When it was announced that he was coming on to the title, he said he was going to give the title more depth and less "ultimatizing." While you may argue for "depth," he Ultimatized more characters and concepts in this title than anyone except for maybe Mark Millar. He then says in this interview the non-X-Men characters "sat around." You have to wonder if he even read the title.

Lastly, I'm not criticizing to make myself credible. (I'm not even sure what that means to be entirely honest.) I'm also not looking for a feud. But this is a forum and I feel like saying he sucked on this book... Because he did. Sales show it too. If I came on and said "He sucks" without justification or blanketed all of his work as terrible, that'd be unfair. But I'm criticizing specific things. So... Bite me?

JJ Fresh

01-17-2008, 11:03 PM

First off: Zing. Pointing out a spelling error. That's clever. :rolleyes:

Thanks.

Lastly, I'm not criticizing to make myself credible. (I'm not even sure what that means to be entirely honest.)

If you have to ask then that's the first problem.

I'm also not looking for a feud. But this is a forum and I feel like saying he sucked on this book... Because he did. Sales show it too.

Because sales mean a book is quality or not. Better not tell the Vertigo offices.

If I came on and said "He sucks" without justification or blanketed all of his work as terrible, that'd be unfair.

Didn't you just say in your previous post: "the entire run was sloppy"? Make sure we tuck our blanket in.

But I'm criticizing specific things.

But didn't you say in your previous post: "the entire run was sloppy"?

So... Bite me?

No need. You did it to yourself. Please retort again, I'm having too much fun. Zing!

Ken B.

01-17-2008, 11:15 PM

ascloseasme

01-18-2008, 12:04 AM

Because sales mean a book is quality or not. Better not tell the Vertigo offices.

We're talking about one of Marvel's former best-sellers. Not a Vertigo title, which has specific (and smaller) buyers market. And also, I've talked about quality... Not only giving my personal opinions, but mentioning that plenty of reviewers have not liked the work either. You want to read those, google them or buy some back issues of Wizard. (And I'm willing to guess that when a title starts selling 10,000 less issues between Jan06 and Feb07, it probably says something about the quality.)

Didn't you just say in your previous post: "the entire run was sloppy"? Make sure we tuck our blanket in.

Yep. I did say that. His run on UXM title was sloppy. Criticizing specific things about this run. And he writes other titles. Like the one's he discussed in this interview. If I said his work on those title sucked just because I don't like what he's done to UXM, that'd be unfair.

Lights on empty there, J.J. Fad.

Brian009

01-18-2008, 11:40 AM

I can't criticize a writer, since I can't do his/her job. However, I know what I like, and this book was dropped when Cable kidnapped Xavier. Frankly, this book would've been dropped earlier, except I'd once heard David Mack was scheduled to take over the book - what happened with that?

Cheers,

B

Stormbreaker

01-18-2008, 11:52 AM

I had read Ultimate X-Men since the first issue. I stayed through Bendis's lackluster two story arcs and through BKV's very imaginative and entertaining run.

And then Kirkman hit, and I said, "Wow, this sucks." I left after the Wolverine/Sabretooth "revelation" and haven't regretted it a bit.

I have nothing against Kirkman, but his UXM run (what I read of it) was just bad.

But hey, no harm, no foul. Best of luck to him on his other projects.

dalunt

01-18-2008, 11:52 AM

I just started reading The Walking Dead, I bought 1, 2, and 3 hardcovers.

Damn is it good! I read it every night before bed and can't put it down. I honestly haven't felt this pumped about a comic since I started reading Y The Last Man.

...

That footer is hilarious.

Stormbreaker

01-18-2008, 01:37 PM

Hey, remember when Bryan Singer was supposed to write Ultimate X-Men about three years ago? That was funny... ;-)

Salieri

01-18-2008, 01:48 PM

Kirkman says something in this interview which could be an ironic hidden comment on OMD. I'll leave you to point it out. I have other things to do.

Stormbreaker

01-18-2008, 01:55 PM

Kirkman says something in this interview which could be an ironic hidden comment on OMD. I'll leave you to point it out. I have other things to do.

I'm assuming it was the "Oops, your run didn't happen" comment. I was thinking about relating it but chose not to. But I think you're right about it.

Zabardast

01-18-2008, 02:09 PM

See ya Kirkman.

I wonder who they bring in next? It's gotta be some fan-favorites to reinvigorate interest in this book.

UltimateMatt

01-18-2008, 03:06 PM

UXM has been the weak link in the Ultimate Universe. Here's hoping whoever they get for the next run gives the book a shot in the arm. Ultimate Wolverine > Marvel Wolverine.

grphxkindaguy

01-18-2008, 05:00 PM

I had read Ultimate X-Men since the first issue. I stayed through Bendis's lackluster two story arcs and through BKV's very imaginative and entertaining run.

And then Kirkman hit, and I said, "Wow, this sucks."

Same story w/me, I left the book after the whole intro to Cable storyline. I really didn't want to drop the book, but it actually became painful to read, it was sooo bad. :(

Except for Marvel Zombies, Kirkman's strengths seems to lie in writing his creator owned stuff...

ROBRAM89

01-18-2008, 05:09 PM

Finally.

Now somebody get Carey off UFF.

J.Arachnid

01-21-2008, 06:17 AM

I'm not entirely sure what eveyone's problem with Kirkmans run on ULTXM is. I agree that him bringing back Beast was a terrible creative decision as I always liked the fact that Vaughn killed him off quite early on and the impact it had was interesting and subtle. I'm stating to see a problem with the way fans expect the Ultimate universe to be going with the criticism of 'Ultimate-isation'
To wit: Should creators on the Ultimate books be criticised for changing characters from how they're perceived in the main MarvelU? Isn't the whole point of the UltimateU to do things differently?
Kirkmans run has been slow to develop but I'm looking forward to him finally tackling Apocalypse as he's been seeding a whole variety of storylines since he started and I'm pretty sure he's going to do some very interesting things with it all.
The thing I'm basically trying to work out is this: Does everyone hate UltXM because it's different from the main U or because it's too similair?

Bugnaz

01-27-2008, 10:28 AM

I've kind of been "meh" towards Walking Dead since the last trade, really (I read the book through trades). Maybe it's the idea of them not even trying to see what happened to the world since Z-Day and just living in a prison, but it just seems like I'm reading about people sitting around doing nothing.

Add to it the comic-book-ish non-killing of the Governor and his reappearance, which really kind of killed (heh) the reality of the book, and I don't know, I just don't care about them anymore.

I liked how it was about people trying to survive, people trying to understand their new surroundings, but now that they've settled in, it kind of goes against what I guess I would do (find survivors, there has to be someplace that is safe. What if just America is infected? What if Washington DC is actually the only city not to turn into a mess? What if people were trying to use the internet to communicate? How about the nuclear plants that would seemingly be on the verge of meltdown without supervision? Maybe it's not really airborn but something that the citizens were drinking or something?)

This whole world of choices out there and the answer is to sit. You can only take so much of people going crazy and then you just don't care.

I hear ya, but i'm pretty sure things are going to start progressing again soon. They naturaly settled in when they found the prison because for the first time since it all kicked off they could relax a little. They got some nice safe walls to hide behind for a while and take a breather.
They could sleep safely at night, and try to emotionaly deal with this big change in their world / lives.

Now they've had time to take stock, some of them are bound to head out again and start looking at the bigger picture, and thinking toward the future. While i am sure some will just want to stay put where it is safe in their little life, so they can try and regain some normality.
I think it is a natural progression of different types people and the way they might react to a situation differently. Now that we've gotten to know these characters, we can better understand the choices they make, and how they go on to deal with it.

Good point about the power stations though, hmm......

freakybatman

02-18-2008, 10:15 PM

the walking dead is my favorite comic book
i have all three hardcovers
and invincible is great too