Why is Netflix’s The Sandman like that? How Neil Gaiman’s comic came together

Neil Gaiman famously summarised The SandmanWith just one sentence. “The Lord of Dreams learns that one must change or die, and makes his decision.” It’s a funny little statement: poignant in its accuracy, mysterious in its vagueness.

Another way of describing is The Sandman is: “a story about stories and their relationship to our humanity.” William Shakespeare appears in it. So does the Martian Manhunter, the mythological figure of Loki, Marco Polo, and Eve — like, from the Garden of Eden? If you want a third stab at a description, “a horror comic that swiftly turns into a high-concept mythological fantasy comic” could fit the bill.

The Sandman is many things: pulp horror, mythopoetry, urban fantasy, a superhero reboot, a goth’s style handbook, Succession with anthropomorphic personifications, a flawed but earnest attempt to portray queer lives struggling for actualization and safety in the 1990s, a graphic novel, a collection of short stories, and a work that’s canonical with DC Universe.

The one thing you can’t say about The SandmanThe fact that this could have been happening at any other moment in history is a testament to the power of comics. With the first cinematic adaptation of this supposedly unfilmable magnum opus premiering on Netflix, it’s worth turning back the clock to examine all of the ingredients This went into the biggest cult hit in superhero comics, if only to answer the question: Why is Sandman… like that?

Original Sandmans

Image: Neil Gaiman, Sam Kieth, Mike Dringenberg/DC Comics

This is the story about The SandmanIn 1939, the story began. Superman was just over a year old — in fact, the 1939 World’s Fair in Flushing, Queens, New York, was the first time anyone was ever hired to portray the Man of Steel in costume. The fair offered the chance to get a copy of Superman for free. New York World’s Fair ComicsThey found a new, costumed criminal fighter in the pages of this book called The Sandman.

Wesley Dodds worked as a businessman during the day. But at night, Dodds wore a gas mask and would patrol the streets in New York City looking for criminals. He used his gas gun to anesthetize them, adding sand on their bodies, then interrogated them. As the Golden Age of comics came to a close in the 1950s, Dodds’ stories petered out. Comic book heroes are not able to stop a story from being told, even if it is reimagined many decades later.

And in 1974, Joe Simon and Jack Kirby — the creators of Captain America — took a spin on reviving the Sandman. This time around, the hero wore a bright red and yellow costume, and prowled the “Dream Stream” in search of rogue nightmares, dispatching them with his magical pouch of dream dust lest they invade the dreams of children.

Although this Sandman didn’t stay around long, a decade later his story was published in an issue. Wonder Woman. Even later, ThisIn this story, story is merged with story. Infinity IncA team book about the adult children of the Justice League of Earth 2

And in that story, Hector Hall — son of Hawkman and Hawkwoman — became trapped in the Dream Stream and took over the duties of the Sandman. Eventually, he brought his wife, Hippolyta “Lyta” Hall — the daughter of Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor — into dreams as well, where the two conceived a child.

Both these characters have their influences The Sandman. For example, Dream’s black, elongated helm is an interpretation of Dodds’ 1940s gas mask, and the linking of Sandman to actual power over dreams comes from Kirby and Simon. We’ll be stopping at the next major stop on this tour. Sandman influences, we’ll need to leave the realm of fiction entirely for a much scarier one: publishing history.

Crisis on Infinite Earths

Image by Alex Ross/DC Comics

Big swings were the hallmark of DC Comics’ second decade. The company’s first full continuity reboot, Crisis on Infinite EarthsThe official invitation was sent to comics creators for them to reinvent and redefine some of the oldest superheroes.

Batman Year OneFrank Miller, David Mazzucchelli, and sculpted a neon-colored statue of Gotham City. This iconic piece is still in use even 2022. He is Wonder Woman, George Peréz gave the Princess of the Amazons a new origin story that endures to this day. John Byrne transformed Lex Luthor from mad scientist to corrupt industrialist so seamlessly that most people would never know he hadn’t Alwaysbeing a rich jerk. There was change in the air and there was no way to reimagine it.

Karen Berger, DC editor, stepped into this boiling pot of creativity. The first issue of The Sandman was published, her editorial eye had already fueled storylines like Alan Moore’s revamp of Swamp Thing, the first solo series for John Constantine, Grant Morrison’s run on Doom Patrol and Animal Man — all instant classics.

Berger already had a reputation in horror literature that was doubled up as modern takes on the superhero story. Berger also preferred writers from Britain, as they were more familiar with American super heroes through their thriving import trade. However, it was less important to flip the applecart. In a few years, those interests would come together in her very own publishing imprint, DC’s legendary Vertigo Comics, but at the moment, let’s imagine her looking at the work of one of DC’s brand-new writers.

The 27-year old grew up south of England and is now primarily a journalist with a few fiction credits. He’s written a few strips for the British comics anthology 2000 ADHe also has a few graphic novels and some short comics with an avant-garde illustrator friend. He’s also got a few issues of Marvelman under his belt, picking up from where writer Alan Moore — another of Berger’s young Brits — had left off. Perhaps he could have done more, if Marvelman’s home magazine hadn’t gone out of business. The only thing he has done for DC is a miniseries combining botanical horror, including a Post-Crisis overhaul of Poison Ivy, and a kind of tour of DC Comics characters (from Swamp Thing through Lex Luthor).

After considering all of this, Berger decides to ask him if he’d be interested in pitching a reboot of perhaps the most obscure member of the Justice Society, a character that even Jack Kirby and Joe Simon couldn’t crack. Neil Gaiman agreed to pitch the reboot with all of his youthful enthusiasm.

Neil Gaiman

Albert L. Ortega/Getty Images

That’s the story of how The Sandmanhow it came to be. But the story of why it encompasses so much and is so difficult to define isn’t complete without its writer. Neil Gaiman today is an international novelist, whose bestsellers have been made into awards-winning films such as Coraline StardustBig-budget TV like American Gods Good Omens. It’s difficult to picture him as an up-and-coming journalist turned comic book writer whose only published novel is a biography of Duran Duran.

Once you have fixed that telescope to your mind’s eye, however, The SandmanThis is where everything comes in focus. A young writer had no idea if he’d ever get another chance at success, and so he packed every single thing that he liked into the work. The Sandman never attracted a single characteristic artist collaborator — artistically, its steadiest throughline was Gaiman’s imagination and prose.

Gaiman, a voracious reader and devotee of gothic terror, offered Berger his services. Extremely large swing. Instead of another Sandman adventure story, he’d write a six-issue yarn about a sentient personification of the human imagination escaping from captivity and solving a mystery. Every issue would follow the same storyline as a gothic horror novel. His character would travel from DC’s headquarters to hell, taking readers on an adventure through six issues.

In the very first issue, he’d establish that Wesley Dodds’ urge to become a sleep-themed costumed crime fighter was the result of an upset in the realm of dreams. Then, from DC’s own history of gothic horror, he’d pull in Cain and Abel. But not the biblical They did not include figures, at least initially. But later Gaiman might allow some Genesis to seep into them). However the Cryptkeeper-style hosts were able to accommodate. House of Secrets House of Mystery, DC’s midcentury attempts to steal the ravenous audience of Stories from the Crypt.

Next: Saga of the Swamp Thing, by Gaiman’s buddy Alan Moore, he would borrow John Constantine. Following the Hellblazer, Dream of the Endless would visit hell itself, peopled both by biblical Lucifer and DC’s own Etrigan the Demon. From hell the reader would go to a hell on earth — Arkham Asylum — to introduce the story’s ultimate foe: the Justice League supervillain Doctor Destiny. And just before the climax, we’d even get a quick kibbutz with Mister Miracle and the Martian Manhunter in the headquarters of the Justice League International.

Image: Neil Gaiman, Sam Kieth, Malcolm Jones III/DC Comics

As The Sandman’s success guaranteed its life beyond its first story arc, Gaiman only expanded his referential palette. He was revived Swamp ThingMatthew the Raven, Matt Cable is his character. He revealed that Hector Hall’s Sandman was brought about by heretofore unknown actions of Morpheus the Dreamlord, as were a number of Shakespeare’s plays, characters of Greek myth and theater, elements of English folklore, movements in classic literature, and historical figures like Emperor Norton III. The series’ penultimate arc draws in Lyta Hall, daughter of Wonder Woman, and her dream-conceived baby, and also featured Lucifer Morningstar, Puck from A Midsummer Night’s DreamLoki the mythological Loki and Furies from ancient Greece.

The SandmanGaiman invented the Dreaming. It was a place that could hold all ideas the human mind can imagine. And, because to do otherwise would have been dishonest, his story treated all those ideas — religion, myth, folklore, theater, literature, superhero comics — as equally useful elements.

Talk to a friend. SandmanThey might be able to say something about the show today that they love, such as the Old Gods Do New Jobs ideas. Gaiman could expand on these ideas. American GodsUrban fantasy elements would appear in NeverwhereThis is the second time that folklore has been embraced. StardustThe creepily imaginative dream worlds filled with nearly unfathomable rules. Coraline. They are all right.

Sandman, Gaiman creates a story about creation — creation of fiction, creation of self, creation of history — that is, if nothing else, about how creation is a continuous process fueled by all the fictions and selves we have access to at any moment. It was only natural that it would happen. The SandmanIt would also include a portrait the young artist as he is creating his artwork.