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WALKING DEAD creator Robert Kirkman has fired back at former collaborator Tony Moore, who is suing him for fraud. In a statement released via his lawyer, Kirkman stated:

“The lawsuit is ridiculous, we each had legal representation seven years ago and now he is violating the same contract he initiated and approved and he wants to misrepresent the fees he was paid and continues to be paid for the work he was hired to do. Tony regularly receives payment for the work he did as penciler, inker and for gray tones on the first six issues of The Walking Dead comic series and he receives royalties for the TV show, to assert otherwise is simply incorrect.”


As reported yesterday, Moore has filed suit charging that he was fraudulently coerced into signing away his rights on the Walking Dead TV show in exchange for a piece of the publishing on several other series, and that he has not been able to audit the accounting for the series since then.

Kirkman also produced the credit page for the first issue of the book, where he is credited as creator, writer, and letterer and Moore is credited with “pencils, inks and gray tones.”

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Significantly, Moore’s suit doesn’t claim that he has never been paid, but that he has not been able to audit the books to monitor those payments. Should the suit continue, it’s likely to turn into a pretty boring accounting fest.

1 COMMENT

  1. But once resolved they might work together again. Stranger things have happened. Ask Todd McFarlane and Neil Gaimen.

  2. I had the impression that Moore’s main contention was the lack of Kirkman opening his books. The rest was just examples of how Kirkman had wronged him in his eyes. It’s just funny how kirkman’s statement didn’t mention anything about any audits. I just wonder how, exactly, did Moore violate his contract. Was there a gag order?

  3. Episode 8: “Nebraska”
    The episode starts at the exact same spot the previous one left off. One of the walkers who got shot (the stepmom) tries to grab Beth (Hershel’s youngest daughter), but is killed by Andrea with a swift hoe through the head. Shane shouts some more and Hershel tells the group to “LEAVE MY FARM!” for the umpteenth time. Maggie finally slaps Shane right in the face and things cool down somewhat.

    Sophia is buried along with Hershel’s dead family members from the barn. T-Dog, Andrea, and Shane pile the other corpses on a truck, drive to a nearby field and burn the bodies in a pyre. Hershel has something of a mental breakdown as he slips out of the farm and goes to a bar in the town to get shitfaced. Beth goes into catatonic shock from the ordeal at the barn, so Rick and Glenn head to town in order to bring Hershel back.

    Meanwhile, Dale tells a skeptical Lori about his suspicions that Shane killed Otis and his belief that Shane will sooner or later kill someone else. Daryl snaps and shouts at Lori when asked to bring Rick and Hershel home quicker, stating he’s “done looking for people”. Lori heads out by herself, hits a random walker on the way and flips the car into a ditch. It’s not shown what happened to her. That’s the second (and the last) actual walker we see in the episode.

    Glenn and Rick find Hershel in the bar. After a five-minute rant by a drunk Hershel, two dudes (Tony and Dave) enter the bar. They are bad guys. They inform Glenn, Rick, and Hershel that Fort Benning is overrun and they’re heading for Nebraska, which is supposedly safe. “Low population, lots of guns,” as they put it.

    The two quickly deduce that Rick and company must have a farm nearby and want to go there because “they’ve got people to look out for”. “That’s not gonna happen,” says Rick. There’s a tense situation, since both guys are armed and threaten to take the farm by force. This culminates with a Clint Eastwood-style gun draw and Rick shoots both guys dead. The scene then cuts to bodies of walkers burning in the pyre. End episode.

    Episode 9: “Triggerfinger”
    The episode begins with Shane asking Daryl if Rick and Glenn are back. Daryl tells him “NO” and also tells him that Lori asked him to go look for them, but he ain’t doin that no more. Shane lets him have it for sending Carl and Lori out to look for Rick, and Daryl tells him “Not to talk to him about getting his hands dirty.”

    Then we go back to the bar, where Rick tells Glenn he needs to “shoot the bad guys in the head”, so he can go back and talk to Hershel. Glenn says, “but they are already dead, and we need to save our ammo” and Rick says, “Glenn, just do it.” Rick and Hershell go for a talk.

    At the farm, Daryl goes to see Carol, who is still in a catatonic state. He suggests that she go to Sophia’s grave and make her peace. She says nothing. He helps her up and walks with her. When they get there, Carol finally speaks to the grave and Daryl cries. Carol sees a Cherokee Rose on the grave, and she cries.

    Shane finds Lori on the side of the road. He kills the zombie trying to get in the car. Lori is okay but shaken. She doesn’t know where Carl is. He tells her to drive back to camp, tell Daryl what happened and the both of you, come back for me. Shane goes in woods to look for Carl. Carl is getting ready to shoot a zombie, Shane shoots it for him. Make that the sixth time Shane has saved their lives.

    Still in the bar patiently waiting for Rick’s arrival, Glenn doesn’t get why Rick wants him to shoot the bad guys in the head. Rick and Hershel return in a panic as the rest of the dead guys’ gang chases them in. Rick starts shooting at them when out of nowhere, the two dead guys become the undead. Glenn freaks and gets triggerfinger, and kills them dead. After the gun fight, Glenn is a mess and wants answers. Rick tells him Jenner’s secret: everyone is already carrying the zombie virus, and will come back as a zombie no matter how they die. End of episode.

  4. So when kirkman advocates creators rights, is that only when they apply to him? everyone else can suck it, apparently

  5. Tim O’Neil, one of the smartest guys in the game, wrote a piece a week before this went down about how companies have been screwing creators with “net profits.”

    http://whenwillthehurtingstop.blogspot.com/

    I was thinking about how Eminen and Royce took 15 years to work together again after being friends, getting business messed up to the point of lawyers being involved, and then remembering they were boys and money wasn’t as important. Hopefully Kirkman and Moore end up the same.

  6. Mark Evanier wrote an excellent piece a couple of decades back about “Hollywood accounting,” in which studios make tons of money but never actually show a profit on their books.

    In a nutshell, all the funds get paid to “subcontractors” which are actually owned by the same people who own the studios. This is done so that creators naive enough to agree to “percent of net profits” contracts can get shut out.

    It’s also why I’ll never sign a “net profits” contract, nor offer one to another creator. I deal with “net receipts,” clearly defined as gross receipts less returns and charge-backs.

  7. @Andrew Brown. You’re assuming Kirkman’s in the wrong. Just b/c Moore filed a lawsuit, doesn’t mean he’s telling the truth.

  8. Bah. This rather sucks. Of course with Hollywood accounting, you may never get net profits. According to Lucas Film and Fox, the Star Wars trilogy has never made a profit so they cannot pay David Prowse from the net profits.

    Ain’t Hollywood grand?!

  9. Moore was replaced when he could not keep up with the tasks he was assigned to do. The gentleman who took over was able to complete his tasks on time. That’s what it comes down to. Moore’s work was excellent, but he took too long to do it.

  10. Kirkman is being a jerk. Comic-books are not “created” by writers alone. Novels are. Comic-books, by definition, are created by words AND pictures.