Robert Kirkman has been living with the world and characters of The Walking Dead in comic book form for nearly a decade now. By comparison, the TV series based on his acclaimed comic is just a baby, and it's got lots of opportunities for Kirkman to have new fun with old characters. So, as he freely admits in a new special feature for the show's second-season Blu-ray, he loves "screwing" with his TV fans.
In "The Ink Is Alive," a 10-minute featurette on the Blu-ray that's set to hit stores next week, Kirkman details how and why changes were made between the comic and the TV series, beginning with this statement:
"I really like screwing with the comic book readers to a certain extent. I'm always the one in the writer's room going 'Let's introduce this beloved character from the comic in the opening scene of this episode, and then let's kill him at the end of the episode.' People will be like 'What? They just did that? That's crazy!'"
He also provides a very simple explanation for why many things simply need to be different. For him, the comic book is all about the volatility, about the idea that anything can happen at any time. If theWalking Dead TV crew were to simply copy the events of the comic, that element would be gone.
"If we were to adapt the show directly and be extremely faithful to the comic, we would lose that key component," Kirkman said.
From there, Kirkman goes element by element, examining changes in both seasons one and two, including the addition of the Dixon brothers, the group's arrival at the CDC at the end of season one, the altered stories of Shane and Dale and the decision to have Sophia go missing. He also talked in detail about character deaths, and said it actually pleases him when fans get upset that their favorite character bit the dust.
"That's cool to me," he said. "The fact that you're upset about that character because you love that character shows that you love this world. I'm confident that we'll be able to continue to do things to keep you engaged."
But, as Kirkman notes, don't get too comfy with new characters.
"We're probably gonna kill them too."
Check out the full video below, but be warned, it contains BIG SPOILERS from the entire series so far.
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