Love Quote by Robert Kirkman

The charm of Robert Kirkman saying, "It's no secret that I love the Ultimate line" is how aggressively casual it is. He frames a preference like an open fact, not a hot take, which quietly disarms the fandom reflex to litigate taste. In comics culture, where continuity arguments can feel like blood sport, "no secret" is a rhetorical shrug: I am not auditioning for your approval, I am locating myself.

The specific intent reads as both endorsement and positioning. The Ultimate line (Marvel's early-2000s reboot sandbox) was built to be sleek, modern, and slightly scandalous about it. Admitting love for it signals an appetite for reinvention over reverence, for stories that treat iconic characters as usable material rather than sacred text. Coming from Kirkman - a writer associated with long-form, high-stakes serial storytelling and a willingness to break the toys - it functions like a creative thesis statement in miniature: make it accessible, make it urgent, make it mean something now.

The subtext is also reputational. The Ultimate imprint is divisive; it produced genuine breakthroughs and some notorious misfires. Saying you love it, publicly and breezily, is a way of aligning with its ambition while skating past its baggage. It's fandom politics with a smile: I'm picking the side that prioritizes momentum.

Context matters because "Ultimate" was a gateway for a generation. Kirkman isn't just confessing taste; he's nodding to an origin story - the kind of mainstream on-ramp that shapes what writers later think comics are allowed to do.