With the highly anticipated return of AMC's The Walking Dead fast approaching, it was only appropriate that its multi-talented creator/writer, Robert Kirkman, took the grandest superhero stage of them all at New York City's Comic Con on Oct. 9.

During its season four finale, the zombie TV show thriller pulled in a whopping 15.7 million viewers; a true testament to the footprint Kirkman has made on scripted network programming.

Interestingly enough, The Walking Dead franchise was initially introduced in 2003 by way of the creator through comic publisher Image Comics.

After nabbing the Eisner Award for "Best Continuing Series" in July 2010 at San Diego's Comic Con, the franchise went on to become a multi-platform phenomenon, after appropriately debuting on the AMC network on Halloween of that same year.

Although several of Kirkman's characters that appear in both the comics and TV series hold a slew of similarities, he was adamant that the franchise's two outlets will never parallel one another.

"I look at the comic and the TV show as totally different things," he said, from atop the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center stage.

Making it a point to humor The Walking Dead masses, one underlying theme of Kirkman's often idiosyncratic responses was his deep passion for the bread and butter of his work; the story.

"That's what excites me the most. Being able to tell this story [the post-zombie apocalypse] over a long period of time," he explained.

When queried on whether he has a favorite character out of walker-battling bunch, Kirkman stated that his only inclination is for whomever he's currently crafting a scene on.

"If I'm writing a Maggie [Lauren Cohan] scene, I say 'oh, that's my favorite character,' but that changes," he continued.

Kirkman also delved into the complexities of Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln), seemingly clearing up any gray areas from the group leader's past, such as his prior abilities as sheriff's deputy, or lack thereof.

"Rick is a crappy police officer. He wasn't a super cop. I wanted to do a story about the people that aren't necessarily capable of handling or accomplishing everything or surviving," he said.

The mood was lightened once again when a fan pointed out that Rick's now longer mane and beard have him looking somewhat similar to one of the creator's yet-to-be-seen comic characters, Paul Monroe.

However, Kirkman, was quick to squash any potential correlation between the two.

"People say that, but if you actually go back and look at Paul Monroe, they actually don't look that similar," he explained.

The fifth season of AMC's The Walking Dead is set to return this Sunday, Oct. 12 at 9/8 Central Time. Be sure to keep checking back with Enstars for more of the latest scoops on the popular TV series.