Life & Wisdom Quote by Robert Kirkman

There is something deliciously blunt in Kirkman admitting the quiet part: the real money in mainstream comics often isn’t in the superhero factory, it’s in the stuff you can actually own. “Trades” means trade paperbacks, the collected editions that sit in bookstores, get assigned in classes, and keep selling long after a monthly issue disappears. “Image” is the other half of the flex: a publisher built on creator-owned work, where the writer and artist keep control and a far bigger slice of the revenue. Against that, “than Marvel” lands like a shrug at the myth that the Big Two are the promised land.

The intent isn’t just bragging. It’s a correction to the prestige hierarchy. Marvel offers cultural visibility, a logo people recognize, and sometimes a professional stamp of approval. Kirkman’s line reframes success as leverage: steady backlist income, ownership, and the ability to build IP you can steer instead of rent.

The subtext is labor politics in a soundbite. In a system where creators have historically been underpaid while corporations harvest characters for decades, Kirkman’s comparison reads as a warning and an invitation. If you can make more money away from the biggest brand in the business, the brand’s power looks less like opportunity and more like dependency.

Context matters: Kirkman is the Walking Dead guy, a case study in how creator-owned comics can become a media empire. The quote works because it punctures fandom’s romance with Marvel with one capitalist metric: who gets paid after the applause fades.