Comics vs. Show: Compare and Contrast

[Black Knight]

Overall, I thought it was a great adaptation. They left out a few favorite bits of mine, but that's to be expected. I'll still list them, just for the record so to speak:

1) Unity admiring Fiddler's Green and Rose responding with, "Yeah, it was a friend" while patting one of the ferns. Hee! I assume they felt it would take away from the drama of the moment. At least they left in Unity's later remark to Dream that he's obviously not very bright, so not all of the levity was removed.

2) The serial killer who was genuinely disturbed by what he was doing and who had attended the convention in hopes of talking with people who had the same problem as he did. Instead of course he learned that everybody else didn't view it as any sort of problem at all. It was a poignant page in the comics and an effective counterbalance to the pitch-dark humor of the convention.

3) Since the punishment of Alex was changed to "eternal sleep," that whole terrifying nightmare sequence (which I personally found to be the scariest of the whole series) where Alex keeps thinking he's woken up from one nightmare only to find himself in another nightmare was eliminated.

4) Death's "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" - maybe Kirby Baptiste-Howell just couldn't say it right?

I found it interesting how they significantly changed John Dee's characterization and motivations. In the comics he's just a totally malevolent asshole, killing his driver for no reason, torturing everyone in the diner just for the fun of it. He wasn't trying to make a better world. With this John Dee it's easier to accept the reasoning that the gem was not meant for mortals and the resolution of him being put safely away again rather than killed.

I was surprised that in the pub meeting after the one where Dream tells Hob the slave trade is not something to be involved in, Hob's acknowledgment that Dream was right and that he could never make up for it was cut. It can still come up later, of course, but that was a logical point for it to come up (especially since Hob was talking about the mistakes he's made at that point, same as the comics). And if they're saving it for when Hob has a black girlfriend, that's going to come off really badly, like he didn't think he did wrong until he fell for a black woman.

I curse the show for making me like Lyta Hall so much. I felt sorry for her at this point in the comics, but since she had been written with zero personality I didn't feel any affection for her. But with TV Lyta it's really devastating thinking of what is in store for her.

[Chicago Redshirt]

I think the adaptation was brilliant overall. There were a lot of things that they streamlined that made sense, a lot of things that they updated to be less cis-white male forward that I approve of, and a few things since it's unmoored from the DC superhero universe that were changed.

In no particular order:

John Burgess was a much better villain than graphic novel John Dee. It "makes sense" that John was so anti-lie being raised by a conwoman and a thief, and it is a much more relatable (and scary) thing that he was promoting people to tell the truth no matter what the consequences. I think the diner episode was much scarier than the corresponding comic (as well as being less homophobic/sexist).

I don't really like comic Rose Walker but I feel like show Rose Walker was much more empowered and interesting.

I loved the update where Jed was being groomed to be the Sandman rather than Hector Hall.

Because I was familiar with comic Lyta Hall, I had inherent sympathy with her. I didn't particularly care for this Lyta Hall actress, so it took me out of the performance. Also, I think it is something where show Lyta should have been way more freaked the f--- out that she got pregnant by her dead husband in dreams (as opposed to the comic book version, where it seemed like Brute and Glob messed with her mind). 

Charles Dance was an inspired choice for Roderick Burgess, but then they for whatever reason softened Roderick as a terrifying figure. Like Roderick needed the Corinthian to figure out how to keep Morpheus locked up as opposed to figuring it out on his own. And he went out like a chump. 

I was super disappointed that Alex was not gifted with eternal waking, and that they tried to make him a sympathetic figure. It sort of undermines why Morpheus didn't promise not to take vengeance on him. (Whereas graphic novel Alex was interested in the same gifts that were not Morpheus's to give)

[starri]

12 minutes ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

I loved the update where Jed was being groomed to be the Sandman rather than Hector Hall.

If I had known about that going in, I would have been sure i would hate it.  But instead of Brute and Glob torturing the kid so they could be kings of their own little realm, we had Gault giving Jed a space to feel safe and in control because she didn't want to be scary.  That's a good change, and I also appreciated that it made Morpheus look like the unreasonable one.

21 minutes ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

Also, I think it is something where show Lyta should have been way more freaked the f--- out that she got pregnant by her dead husband in dreams (as opposed to the comic book version, where it seemed like Brute and Glob messed with her mind). 

If I remember right, she was pregnant before Hector died.  She was just an airhead not being able to realize she'd been pregnant for two years while living with him in Jed's dream.

The only change that I wasn't crazy about was the way they had to handwave Unity.  They seemed to actively try to make the viewer not think too hard about the fact that she'd be 118 in 2022.

[Black Knight]

1 minute ago, starri said:

If I remember right, she was pregnant before Hector died.  She was just an airhead not being able to realize she'd been pregnant for two years while living with him in Jed's dream.

Yes, book Lyta said to Hector she'd been pregnant for six months before they went to live in Jed's dream. But she wasn't an airhead. Her mind was being messed with so that it was difficult for her to even think, much less hold a particular thought in her head long enough to articulate it to her husband. It took tremendous effort for her to bring up the timeline issue to him. She was smarter than him, and so the demons had to mess with her mind while they could leave his alone. We see a lot of her later on after she is no longer in their control, more than enough to know that they had to have been messing with her mind at the point we first met her.

I was okay with Show Lyta's joyful-rather-than-freaked reaction to her pregnancy. I think it made sense with her mindset. She was still deep into her grief, and as she pointed out on the airplane early on, she was choosing to talk with her dead husband instead of doing other things. She went from that to having dream sex with him, spending time with him in a dream house instead of being in the outside world...so the pregnancy was just another part of that progression for her. After his death she'd likely spent a lot of time mourning that they hadn't had a child and so she didn't have a piece of him to carry with her. The idea that she would have him back and they could live their dream life with their dream child in their dream house...

One mistake I think they made in the show was showing us the Corinthian without his glasses in multiple scenes throughout the show. The eyeteeth just didn't really work onscreen (except maybe for people who have a giant TV); the camera was usually too far away at those times and the eyes just looked sort of weird rather than being clearly teeth. They should have saved it for when Dream confronts him at the convention, like in the comics. (It's never a mystery in the comics what's up with the Corinthian's eyes; when Dream and Lucien are discussing the arcana who are missing, we get a panel of the Corinthian then. Those are the only two times we see his eyeteeth, once when the Dream/Lucien discussion alerts us to the existence of the character and then the convention confrontation.)

[Black Knight]

23 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

Charles Dance was an inspired choice for Roderick Burgess, but then they for whatever reason softened Roderick as a terrifying figure. Like Roderick needed the Corinthian to figure out how to keep Morpheus locked up as opposed to figuring it out on his own. And he went out like a chump. 

Roderick really isn't a terrifying figure though. The spell he cast was a penny-ante one that only snared Dream because he was so exhausted and weak at the time; it's why it didn't bring in Death. He pretended to be more than he was, so I don't think it's a huge change to have the Corinthian advise him on how to keep Dream captive. And bringing the Corinthian up to the first episode made sense since he's the big villain of the second volume, and this made him a through line that tied the two volumes together. Roderick was always gonna be gone before the end of the first episode anyway, so no sense building him up into more than he was anyway. And having his son kill him made for a nice little bit of payback karma for what he did to Dream. Viewers probably would not have found his dying peacefully of old age to be satisfying.

Roderick's death at Alex's hands also fits in thematically with a trope Sandman plays with a few times, that of a father not paying enough attention to what's going on with his son, with disastrous consequences for both. We will see that again later with Shakespeare and Hamnet, and Dream and Orpheus. The latter especially is so consequential for the series that I think it's fitting to have an instance of the trope in the series premiere.

[Chicago Redshirt]

1 hour ago, Black Knight said:

Roderick really isn't a terrifying figure though. The spell he cast was a penny-ante one that only snared Dream because he was so exhausted and weak at the time; it's why it didn't bring in Death. He pretended to be more than he was, so I don't think it's a huge change to have the Corinthian advise him on how to keep Dream captive. And bringing the Corinthian up to the first episode made sense since he's the big villain of the second volume, and this made him a through line that tied the two volumes together. Roderick was always gonna be gone before the end of the first episode anyway, so no sense building him up into more than he was anyway. And having his son kill him made for a nice little bit of payback karma for what he did to Dream. Viewers probably would not have found his dying peacefully of old age to be satisfying.

OG Roderick was terrifying for a human, or at least, that was how he was portrayed. Yes, he was lucky in capturing Morpheus, but he displayed magic in other contexts that made it clear that he knew something about something. I don't think he pretended to be more than he was. He seemingly knew a fair amount of magic. 

This Roderick is shown to have only cast the one spell, and doesn't have any particular knowledge about Morpheus or anything. Seems a waste of Charles Dance.

[Fukui San]

There are discussions in the threads about some episodes being bottle episodes or quasi bottle episodes. I think it’s important to note that while the tv episodes seem like the writing staff needed to have an episode only using one location or whatever, the usual reason for bottle episodes, it is not because the tv producers asked the writers to come up with such a bottle concept. It’s because they are faithfully adapting the comics.

The original comics were written in a way that every five issues or so was a whole issue that was a wild departure from the “plot”. Once Gaiman established the concept, he made great use of approaching it sideways. Telling side stories of how other characters are affected by the main storylines. Or random stuff exploring the accumulating lore. In many issues Dream himself doesn’t even appear. This may or may not be to your taste, but I think it’s useful to know that these odd seeming episodes are not because the producers needed a way to film a low cost episode, it’s because Neil Gaiman thought this would be amusing some three decades ago.

So correct me if I’m wrong, as I haven’t watched the whole season yet, but it appears to me that they’re importing about 90% of the comics into the show, rearranging some things but not inventing things out of whole cloth. Every episode description I say “Yep, that’s from the comics”. 

[Chicago Redshirt]

7 hours ago, Fukui San said:

There are discussions in the threads about some episodes being bottle episodes or quasi bottle episodes. I think it’s important to note that while the tv episodes seem like the writing staff needed to have an episode only using one location or whatever, the usual reason for bottle episodes, it is not because the tv producers asked the writers to come up with such a bottle concept. It’s because they are faithfully adapting the comics.

The original comics were written in a way that every five issues or so was a whole issue that was a wild departure from the “plot”. Once Gaiman established the concept, he made great use of approaching it sideways. Telling side stories of how other characters are affected by the main storylines. Or random stuff exploring the accumulating lore. In many issues Dream himself doesn’t even appear. This may or may not be to your taste, but I think it’s useful to know that these odd seeming episodes are not because the producers needed a way to film a low cost episode, it’s because Neil Gaiman thought this would be amusing some three decades ago.

So correct me if I’m wrong, as I haven’t watched the whole season yet, but it appears to me that they’re importing about 90% of the comics into the show, rearranging some things but not inventing things out of whole cloth. Every episode description I say “Yep, that’s from the comics”. 

I would say that they have imported 90 percent of the first arc pretty close to what was in the comics and about 75 in the second arc.

A quick rundown of many of the differences (apologies for any I miss):

1. Made Roderick Burgess less skilled and Alex Burgess more sympathetic.

2. Inserted the Corinthian as an antagonist from early on and given him an ongoing role in keeping Dream imprisoned and in check, whereas he was only introduced in issue 14 or thereabouts.

3. Given Ethel Cripps more of an independent character and changed it from Sykes and Ethel betrayed Burgess because he was having an affair to Ethel alone betraying him because 

5. Failed to show much in the way of details as to how sleepy sickness affected the whole world other than with Unity.

6. Downplayed the notion that Unity was raped.

7. Stripped as much of the allusions to mainstream DC comics as they could. John Dee is not Dr. Destiny, long-time supervillain who plays with dreams but just a mental patient. No involvement with Mr. Miracle or the Martian Manhunter. John doesn't start off in Arkham Asylum bantering with the Scarecrow. Squatterbloat takes over the role of Etrigan. Lyta and Hector are architects rather than recovering superheroes.

8. John is a dangerous psycho, but he's not an erratic or vindictive one. He actually empowers the woman who gives him a ride instead of murdering her, and his motive to make everyone truthful is more sympathetic.

9. Dream sacrifices Gregory in order to restore some of his power is entirely new and not welcome IMO. In the original, he absorbs letters of commission that he gave Cain and Abel.

10. I think the show tried to make Dream more sympathetic and less of a dick. 

11. The diner episode is very different because comics John was deliberately torturing the diners, whereas Netflix Jon was at least superficially freeing them from their own lies.

12. Various race/gender swaps, including Johanna Constantine, Lucienne, Rose/Jed, Hector. 

13. Had Lucifer fight Morpheus directly in the Oldest Game, rather than the lesser demon. 

14. Shifted Morpheus's escape from the 1980s to 2022ish, which makes things a little messier. We have to handwave that certain characters would be long dead or way older, and certain things probably would be done differently. An in-person meeting of serial killers in the Zoom era seems quaint, for instance. 

15. Dream and Rose have interactions from before their final meeting, and Rose is given more agency.

16. Brute and Glob are consolidated into Gault, and given a motivation of wanting to become a good dream rather than a mere nightmare.

17. The Corinthian briefly poses a threat to Morpheus.

18. Jed is given a little more agency as well. 

19. In the comics, Fun Land is about to sexually assault and kill Rose when Morpheus intervenes.

[starri]

I think if we're cataloging changes, it's worth pointing out the ravens as well.

-Jessamy is not present in the story, and if memory serves, only has one appearance in the entire comic, in "Thermidor."  I also question if Alex would have been able to kill her as she's the ghost of a woman who became a dream.

-Matthew's character is tweaked a little from the comics.  He's less sarcastic and comes across as more friendly and helpful.  We also see Morpheus reject him at first.  And the backstory is different, since I'm sure they had to lose the connection to Swamp Thing, same as they did with JLI and Infinity, Inc.

1 hour ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

14. Shifted Morpheus's escape from the 1980s to 2022ish, which makes things a little messier. We have to handwave that certain characters would be long dead or way older, and certain things probably would be done differently. An in-person meeting of serial killers in the Zoom era seems quaint, for instance. 

The one place where I think it improved the story was in relation to Hob.  In the comic, Morpheus escapes in time to make their meeting.  By keeping him imprisoned for an extra 30+ years, it would look to Hob like he'd actually been rejected, which deepens their reconnection in the present day.

[Shriekingeel]

The most disappointing change in my opinion is the radical transformation of Despair to a depressed college student. I don’t like the casting of Desire, who is supposed to be irresistibly beautiful to everyone (and is far from it here), or Lucifer, “the most beautiful of all the angels”. Gwendolyn Christie is a lovely woman but not that. 
 

But they completely wimped out with this version of Despair. 

[Black Knight]

They were never going to be able to have the comics version of Despair in a live action adaptation, because who is going to play that? No actress is going to sign up for the level of abuse they'd get online. They had to find a different visual for TV Despair. I thought the Crocs were a nice touch.

[Chicago Redshirt]

1 hour ago, Black Knight said:

They were never going to be able to have the comics version of Despair in a live action adaptation, because who is going to play that? No actress is going to sign up for the level of abuse they'd get online. They had to find a different visual for TV Despair. I thought the Crocs were a nice touch.

They could have done either heavy makeup or CGI. 

[Affogato]

4 hours ago, Shriekingeel said:

The most disappointing change in my opinion is the radical transformation of Despair to a depressed college student. I don’t like the casting of Desire, who is supposed to be irresistibly beautiful to everyone (and is far from it here), or Lucifer, “the most beautiful of all the angels”. Gwendolyn Christie is a lovely woman but not that. 
 

But they completely wimped out with this version of Despair. 

Wow. I thought despair was perfect. Not the same. But a great choice. 

[Affogato]

1 hour ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

They could have done either heavy makeup or CGI. 

But the anthropomorphic personifications change with time. If death can fit in, despair surely has a place with humans. Crocs. 

Edited August 8, 2022 by Affogato

[Black Knight]

2 hours ago, Affogato said:

But the anthropomorphic personifications change with time.

And also with who's looking at them. They've already established that for the TV version with Dream in his scene with Nada (and did they ever cast someone good looking for Kai'ckul - I can see why Nada fell in love at first sight!), and to some degree with Unity referencing Desire as a man.

It can be argued that the comics version of Despair isn't relevant for the current era the show mostly takes place in. They kept the hook and how she uses it on her own body, which are the important elements from the comic to carry over.

[Fukui San]

I wonder how many people don't realize that the TV show Lucifer adapted the direct comics sequel to The Sandman, albeit very loosely.

[ItCouldBeWorse]

On 8/8/2022 at 3:07 PM, Chicago Redshirt said:

They could have done either heavy makeup or CGI. 

Making Despair an obese, unattractive naked woman, even through CGI, would be problematic.

[Chicago Redshirt]

4 hours ago, ItCouldBeWorse said:

Making Despair an obese, unattractive naked woman, even through CGI, would be problematic.

I dunno. The original Despair is an obese, unattractive naked woman. Maybe Gaiman received criticism for that that I didn't encounter.

But putting aside fidelity to the original, a few things:

a. No offense to the actress who portrays her, but by Hollywood standards, the Despair is an obese and unattractive woman. Is that less problematic than the comics version because she has clothes on?

b. Would it be less problematic if they gender-swapped Despair and had it as an obese, unattractive naked man?

c. I do wonder how much of the Endless's appearances are fixed or in flux. We know the graphic novel has Dream appear differently to people based on who the viewers are (Nada sees him as a black man with dreadlocks, Azazael sees him as looking like a demon, a cat sees him as a giant cat, etc.) And it looks like the show has incorporated that. Does this hold true for the rest of the Endless as well?

[Fukui San]

Now that Season 1 is in the books, let's take a look and forecast what the rest of the series in the future will be like, gods of TV renewal willing. Based on the pace and the fidelity of the adaptation so far, here's how I see the series going. Spoilers ahead.

Spoiler

Season 1 was obviously Preludes and Nocturnes and A Doll's House, the first two trade paperpacks (TPBs). 

Season 2 will obviously encompass the fourth TPB, Seasons of Mist, which covers Dream's journey into hell, getting the key and the fallout thereafter. I'm interested in seeing whether they'll devote a whole episode two the two dead boys at the school. Additionally, the third TPB is Dream Country, which are four seemingly disconnected self contained stories, which I would think would have to be dispersed through the season.  The Midsummer Night's Dream episode is a must. The Calliope episode seems like it needs to happen given how pivotal Dream's and Calliope's son will be. If we don't get A Dream of a Thousand Cats we riot. The Urania mask one I can do without/maybe it's a segment of an episode?  Additional thought: Since we've cast a Johanna Constantine, maybe we move up her story to Season 2 to utilize her sooner than later? She's not needed much afterward. I'll be interested to see how much the term "Bottle Episode" is thrown about this season.

Season 3. I expect The Game of You to encompass this season. I'm kind of dreading the discourse around this storyline as the people who revel in the demonization of trans people will latch onto it. Additionally, how will this storyline, progressive for it's time, age? It may get flack from both sides despite their best efforts. Then we also get the disconnected stories in Fables and Reflections. I'm expecting that a few of them will be inserted in between The Game of You episodes rather than having a separate Fables and Reflections seasons or a Fables section of the season and a Game of You section. Of the Fables and Reflections stories, the Orpheus story is plot critical. The Johanna Constantine one will definitely be done. I'd really look forward to Three Septembers and a January (the Emperor Norton story), which is a good spotlight for Desire and Despair. The Parliament of Rooks is in some ways inessential seeming, but is a good spotlight on the supporting cast and has gossip about Dream's offscreen romance. The others are kind of maybe? Soft Places is the issue where Marco Polo meets Fiddler's Green, and is really the only feature for Fiddler's Green until he meets his demise. Also it'll echo a future issue. Ramadan and August are incredible but not essential plotwise and also seems expensive to make. The Hunt I'd be surprised if it got adapted. It seems inessential.

Season 4. Brief Lives, my favorite TPB. Also the most focused on one storyline. At eight issues, it could take some of the standalone episodes from Fables and Reflections. Anxiously awaiting the casting of Delirium.

Season 5. At this point, we have three TPBs left and, I'd anticipate, two more seasons. World's End establishes a group of random travelers stuck in a reality storm or whatever in a interdimensional inn, trading stories. The structure makes it possible to see this be smushed together a bit, two issues per episode or so, to fit into two or three episodes. And I'd guess this season would have the first half of The Kindly Ones. I don't think this season could do all of The Kindly Ones and Season 6 would have to be just The Wake. Maybe they end the season at the point that the Furies enter The Dreaming.

Season 6. The conclusion of The Kindly Ones and then The Wake.  The death of Dream, the funeral, and then a few disconnected stories to wrap up. The Hob Gadling at Renn Fair story will be worth looking forward to. If we get Soft Places from earlier then we'll get Exiles, the Chinese themed story. If we don't, then we won't here is my guess. And of course The Tempest will be the ending. I can't imagine Gaiman doing otherwise. If they made it to Season 6, then certainly he has enough sway to dictate that.

Edited August 10, 2022 by Fukui San

[Chicago Redshirt]

I don't think that there needs to be spoiler tags in here. At least in other parts of Primetimer, the general rule is if you're in a thread about an episode, everything should be tagged, but if you're in a thread that explicitly compares source material to the aired series, you are accepting the risk of being spoiled.

Anyway, we'll see how popular the show is and what the suits think. I would like to think that the show will follow the outline of the graphic novels much as you outlined. But I could also see that Netlfix might cut it way early, or may want to add beyond the 5-6 or so seasons it would run if they do basically two of the graphic novel arcs in a season like with S1. They could be creative and do entirely new stuff with Morpheus, a lot of one-shots in the vein of Twilight Zone, or focus on some of the established characters. I wouldn't mind seeing more of present-day Johanna Constantine or Hob Gadling, for instance.

[starri]

I imagine in a broad sense, they'd divide it into Preludes and Nocturnes/Doll's House, Season of Mists/A Game of You, and Brief Lives/Kindly Ones-Wake.  I wouldn't ultimately be surprised if they cut A Game of You, because that really does the least to advance the overall story, but they did go out of their way to show Barbie with Martin Tenbones, so it's at least been set up.  But I'd hate for them to jettison the short story collections.

[dankesean]

13 hours ago, Fukui San said:

Season 2 will obviously encompass the fourth TPB, Seasons of Mist, which covers Dream's journey into hell, getting the key and the fallout thereafter. I'm interested in seeing whether they'll devote a whole episode two the two dead boys at the school.

Honestly, if they're going to completely skip any single issue within that story arc, that's one of the more likely ones. It's not super plot important, aside from the whole 'the exiled damned are making trouble on earth' demonstration, it's doesn't feature the main cast at all, and, possibly important, Rowland & Paine have already showed up on Doom Patrol last season, so there may or may not be behind the scenes issues keeping those characters absent. Not that they couldn't just do what they did with Constantine if they really wanted to do it, especially if Death is a big hit with the fanbase like the reaction forum for "The Sound of Her Wings" seems to indicate.

And on that topic, there's also the possibility (if all things go well, the show is a palpable hit, and Netflix wants to pad the seasons) that there could be a season/spin-off miniseries for Death. I don't think either of her 4-issue miniseries can fill out an entire Netflix season by themselves, but they could be combined into one, somehow.

Edited August 11, 2022 by dankesean

[ItCouldBeWorse]

10 hours ago, dankesean said:

Honestly, if they're going to completely skip any single issue within that story arc, that's one of the more likely ones. It's not super plot important, aside from the whole 'the exiled damned are making trouble on earth' demonstration, it's doesn't feature the main cast at all, and, possibly important, Rowland & Paine have already showed up on Doom Patrol last season, so there may or may not be behind the scenes issues keeping those characters absent. Not that they couldn't just do what they did with Constantine if they really wanted to do it, especially if Death is a big hit with the fanbase like the reaction forum for "The Sound of Her Wings" seems to indicate.

And on that topic, there's also the possibility (if all things go well, the show is a palpable hit, and Netflix wants to pad the seasons) that there could be a season/spin-off miniseries for Death. I don't think either of her 4-issue miniseries can fill out an entire Netflix season by themselves, but they could be combined into one, somehow.

https://deadline.com/2022/04/dead-boy-detectives-ordered-to-series-hbo-max-1235002662/

Unless HBO doesn't follow through with the series, the Dead Boy Detectives won't be part of The Sandman.

Death is a very good choice for a spinoff.  Has anyone here watched Dead Like Me? It's a somewhat weird show (with Mandy Patinkin!) about reapers of the dead that has some similarities to how actual death is shown in The Sandman.

It's available to stream for free on Amazon Prime (and Tubi.) I would go into it unspoiled, and watch a few episodes before deciding if it's for you, as it has a strange mood about it. Also, many scenes take place in a diner, but there's no horror in this show. It's more of a death-based comedy. It's not for everyone, but I recommend it.

[Fukui San]

There were official Sandman spinoffs in the comics: The Dreaming and Lucifer.  The Dreaming followed the supporting cast administering different places in The Dreaming while treating the new Dream as an offscreen presence. It was very inconsistent. Lucifer was the loose inspiration for the TV series currently on Netflix. So loose, in fact, that a series faithful to the comics might as well be  a completely new series since the Netflix series basically adapted the idea "what if Lucifer ran a nightclub" and made it a procedural rather than a wild fantasy that could have a motley crew of outcast gods and goblins and weirdos board a Norse mythological ship into hell. I have no idea about contracts and legal rights, just spitballing. 

There were at least two Death miniseries. And a few later Sandman revivals, and probably more stuff that I don't remember. So plenty to draw from if this succeeds beyond everyone's wildest dreams. 

[QuantumMechanic]

I just ran across this Atlantic piece from a week ago.  Touched on some of the very stuff I've seen in the comments on the episode threads here, too:

Quote

That format does pose an additional challenge, though: how to keep audiences hooked? Devotees of The Sandman such as myself will have much to exult in with Netflix’s version, but I wonder what the show will mean to newcomers. The fantasy series is glossy and splashy with an exciting ensemble, which might be enough to entice audiences during these quiet summer months. But its protagonist is not easy to love, especially at first, and his motivations for much of the season are generally unknowable. That ambiguity is by design—so much of The Sandman’s arc is about the audience coming to understand Dream (played by Tom Sturridge) as he also comes to understand himself. But it relies on the viewer’s patience to stick with him through that process.

https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2022/08/netflix-the-sandman-tv-show-neil-gaiman/671062/

[Fukui San]

Quote

Devotees of The Sandman such as myself will have much to exult in with Netflix’s version, but I wonder what the show will mean to newcomers. 

Yes, for as much as I love the amount of fidelity the show has to the source comics, I look ahead and ask myself: "Are we really going to have a The Hunt episode? Prez Rickard? Are we really doing Prez Rickard? Urania the mask lady? Is that actually happening?" 

The Sandman comics sometimes feels like if someone took a 40 issue plot driven series and inserted 32 additional issues of fan fiction into it. Awesomely written fan fiction, but connected only tangentially into the ongoing "plot".

[Black Knight]

I've been doing a re-read of the comics after watching the show - I'm now partly through Kindly Ones - and it's been interesting to think about which shorts might make it in and which might not.

The Calliope short has to make it in, because she's Orpheus's mom, and it also is a way of showing how Dream has changed from the old days. And I'm sure they're going to do Ramadan, because that was the single most successful issue in the series' history. And Midsummer's Night because that's the most decorated issue in the series' history. And of course Orpheus's own story.

The others in the short-story collections likely will be skipped, though - which is all of Worlds' End, much of Fables & Reflections, and at least half of Dream Country. They might do the cat short as half an episode as an animated story, because that one is also so popular and they might like the idea of inserting a brief animated short as a departure from live action. Kinda like the Harry Potter movie.

[Chicago Redshirt]

One of the things I hope they do amp up in S2 is the horror aspect. S1 took out some of the scariest and creepiest moments from the first two arcs: the gift of eternal waking, John being threatened by the runaway dreams, Hell being less hellish, Rosemary being murdered by Dr. Destiny, "we're going to take turns."

[starri]

13 hours ago, Fukui San said:

There were official Sandman spinoffs in the comics: The Dreaming and Lucifer.  

Many more than that now.  They launched a line called Sandman Universe about five years ago, and have had a bunch of series an miniseries, although there's only one currently running: Nightmare Country, which is about the Corinthian.

In addition to Death: The High Cost of Living and Death: The Time of Your Life, Gaiman continued the story in The Dream Hunters, which is based on a Japanese folktale, the anthology Endless Nights, and Overture, which was a prequel.

It guts me that the severing of the DCU characters precludes us from getting an adaptation of "Facade."  Samantha Morton narrates and stars as Rainey Blackwell in the Audible drama, and it is heartbreaking.  Also, John Lithgow in "Three Septembers and a January."

We're also not likely to see Rowland and Paine, because HBOMax was developing a Dead Boy Detectives series for a while, although who knows if it will happen now.

[starri]

One change that I really liked was Hal going to New Jersey with Rose and Lyta (and landing hot Carl).  I always disliked that they had a falling out in the comic, because such a seemingly sweet guy turning into a total asshole seemed to come out of nowhere.

[SevenStars]

I have not read the comic, so I have some questions for those who have read it. Will this be first and last time we see Nada and does the comic said what she did to Dream that caused him to banished her to hell and not forgive her after 1000s of years ?

[starri]

Depending on how closely they follow the comics, we will eventually see their meeting and learn her fate in the present day.  

[Chicago Redshirt]

1 hour ago, SevenStars said:

I have not read the comic, so I have some questions for those who have read it. Will this be first and last time we see Nada and does the comic said what she did to Dream that caused him to banished her to hell and not forgive her after 1000s of years ?

They very well may deviate from what is in the comics some, but presumably will follow the general outline below:

We are told the gist of what happened through an African folktale. Nada was a queen who happened to see Dream and fell deeply in love with him, and vice versa. But on realizing that he was one of the Endless, she knew that calamity would result if they stayed together. So she rejected him. That caused Dream to banish her to Hell for having the nerve to reject him. Because he's a douche. At the beginning of what would be the next arc, Death makes him realize that was a douche maneuver and he vows to rescue her from Hell even if it means re-engaging with Lucifer. Long story short, he does rescue her, eventually apologizes, and although there is still attraction after all they have gone through, she opts to be reborn and to get to live a new life.

[Zuleikha]

I just re-read the Doll House after finishing The Collectors episode of the show. Weird as it is, I think the show made Rose too empowered a character for her story. For me, the story worked much better with as a fairly normal young adult, who is a little bit lost and overwhelmed by everything that's happening. It drew me in emotionally because I was actually worried for her, but it also let me get overwhelmed by all the weirdness.

I think having Rose confident and strong and pro-active and stubborn turns her into a completely different kind of character, who doesn't work in this story. She has nowhere to develop. Also, she doesn't really fit with the collection of misfits vibe because she doesn't seem like a misfit. She seems almost like a superhero, especially since the show keeps the graphic novel's delayed reveal that Morpheus has to kill the vortex to protect the Dreaming. 

I also don't understand why Gaiman rewrote Morpheus's relationship to Lucien, the other characters in the Dreaming, or the events of this arc to weaken Morpheus so much. He seems almost like a woobie. When I read the book, he is awe inspiring at this point. When he arrived at the cereal convention, it's this breath of first relief followed by the terrible awareness of what that means for Rose.

I get why the show made the other changes they did, but I don't think most of them ended up working. The only ones that I think worked was expanding the Corinthian and Jed's role throughout the story, especially the Corinthian playing nice with Jed. 

[quangtran]

These changes likely are the results of the demands of modern storytelling.

Modern girls aren't allowed to be damsels anymore, hence why Rose was a lot more empowered, was able to fight off the muggers this time and has given more agency in the story. 

Audiences and critics are also more conditioned to expects high stakes, hence Dream has been disempowered somewhat and Corinthian's blade managed to injure Dream this time and there was a threat of Rose taking his role.

[SevenStars]

14 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

They very well may deviate from what is in the comics some, but presumably will follow the general outline below:

  Hide contents

We are told the gist of what happened through an African folktale. Nada was a queen who happened to see Dream and fell deeply in love with him, and vice versa. But on realizing that he was one of the Endless, she knew that calamity would result if they stayed together. So she rejected him. That caused Dream to banish her to Hell for having the nerve to reject him. Because he's a douche. At the beginning of what would be the next arc, Death makes him realize that was a douche maneuver and he vows to rescue her from Hell even if it means re-engaging with Lucifer. Long story short, he does rescue her, eventually apologizes, and although there is still attraction after all they have gone through, she opts to be reborn and to get to live a new life.

Thanks for answering my questions. This is not a good look for Dream. I assumed she did something really horrible to him and that's why he banished her to hell. Humans or Endless men really can't handle rejection,  lol.

[SevenStars]

7 hours ago, quangtran said:

These changes likely are the results of the demands of modern storytelling.

Modern girls aren't allowed to be damsels anymore, hence why Rose was a lot more empowered, was able to fight off the muggers this time and has given more agency in the story. 
 

In this case it might have to do with both race and modern time because bw are usually not expected or written as damsels, simply because when they're written as damsels, the characters get more unreasonable hate than expected base on the storyline. So I think it might be a combination of them changing Rose's race and modern time. 

[Fukui San]

My daughter's been listening to Greek Mythology podcasts lately, and it's been a reminder that pagan gods by and large are a bunch of immature children with enormous amounts of power. They act for petty, illogical reasons and treat humans atrociously. Gaiman's Endless characters are much the same. If you're looking for sensible, grounded reasoning for actions there's pretty much only Death (and Destruction when we eventually get to him). 

We will learn throughout the course of a series exactly how bad of a boyfriend Dream is.

[ombre]

1 hour ago, SevenStars said:

Thanks for answering my questions. This is not a good look for Dream. I assumed she did something really horrible to him and that's why he banished her to hell. Humans or Endless men really can't handle rejection,  lol.

A few years back there was a really interesting article in The Atlantic about how power often lowers people's ability to empathize.  When your life doesn't depend on someone's emotional state many people simply stop picking up those cues.  One of those articles that sticks in your mind, but I've been thinking of it a lot while watching Sandman for exactly these reasons!  I can't remember the specifics of the comics well enough to know if that arc was in there, as well, but there seems to be a real emphasis on Dream learning how to be a decent "person" in this season.  

[QuantumMechanic]

(deleted)

Edited August 15, 2022 by QuantumMechanic
(totally messed up quoting, etc.)

[QuantumMechanic]

2 hours ago, SevenStars said:

Thanks for answering my questions. This is not a good look for Dream. I assumed she did something really horrible to him and that's why he banished her to hell. Humans or Endless men really can't handle rejection,  lol.

To be fair to Dream

Spoiler

a calamity did happen once they got together -- a fireball came down from the heavens and destroyed her civilization.

[SevenStars]

6 minutes ago, QuantumMechanic said:

To be fair to Dream

  Reveal spoiler

a calamity did happen once they got together -- a fireball came down from the heavens and destroyed her civilization.

You mean to be fair to Nada? But when you consider who Dream is, it make sense for him not to care about that type of calamity because he probably seen hundreds/thousands (?) Of these things in his lifetime. So to him, this calamity is nothing compare to his love. 😂😂

[dankesean]

On 8/14/2022 at 10:11 AM, starri said:

One change that I really liked was Hal going to New Jersey with Rose and Lyta (and landing hot Carl).  I always disliked that they had a falling out in the comic, because such a seemingly sweet guy turning into a total asshole seemed to come out of nowhere.

The falling out can still happen here; I think the impression was always that it was Hal finding success as Vixen LaBitch (and becoming a bit of a dick as a result) that caused the rift. If nothing else, being NYC-local will only make it more plausible for Hal to find that success with a new persona.

But at least he and Carl got it on, so yeah, that made me squee briefly. I wonder if Carl ever described the random hookup he had while apartment sitting and Hal thought the description of the whitehaired guy with glasses sounded familiar...

[quangtran]

On 8/16/2022 at 9:49 AM, dankesean said:

But at least he and Carl got it on, so yeah, that made me squee briefly.

Seriously, I was confused with that scene because I thought Hal was kissing Ken. This makes a lot more sense.

Back on topic, I think if they intend to finish this series properly then they should plan this as a 4 (maybe 5) season series, because I don't have faith that they'll keep this on the air for that long unless it is a monster hit. This will mean only telling the favourite standalones and I agree with the person above about cutting A Game of You.

[Fukui San]

It'd be a shame to cut A Game of You. But I can't deny Netflix has a track record of cutting short series for seemingly little reason. I'll be thankful for whatever we get if it's on the level of Season 1.

Edited August 17, 2022 by Fukui San

[QuantumMechanic]

I find it interesting to read the reactions from people who never read the comics.  I wonder how much of stuff like "Ugh, Dream is so unlikeable and like I XYZ character better.  What were the writers doing??" is due to 1990s vs today or comics vs TV or whatever.

Now sure, people have no obligation to have read the comics and the TV show needs to stand or fall on its own and I think it's totally fine for non-comic-readers to judge the show entirely on its own.  But what's the deal with this "the main character has to be likable", etc. attitude?  I'd agree the main character needs to be interesting.  But likable?  Not necessary so long as there's some growth.

Edited August 19, 2022 by QuantumMechanic

[Chicago Redshirt]

3 hours ago, QuantumMechanic said:

I find it interesting to read the reactions from people who never read the comics.  I wonder how much of stuff like "Ugh, Dream is so unlikeable and like XYZ better.  What were the writers doing??" is due to 1990s vs today or comics vs TV or whatever.

Now sure, people have no obligation to have read the comics and the TV show needs to stand or fall on its own and I think it's totally fine for non-comic-readers to judge the show entirely on its own.  But what's the deal with this "the main character has to be likable", etc. attitude?  I'd agree the main character needs to be interesting.  But likable?  Not necessary so long as there's some growth.

For the overwhelming portion of TV, the idea of a protagonist viewers are not expected to like does not compute.

There was a wave of TV starting in the early 2000s and some to today where the protagonist was particularly a douche. Things like The Sopranos, The Shield, Rescue Me, and Breaking Bad where the protagonist was a vile person at the end of the day. And even with those shows, you are still expected to like the protagonist somewhat.

[MisterGlass]

I don't know that Morpheus was unlikable at the beginning of the comics.  I think it was more that he was so Other that the audience didn't expect him to be nice.  In this series he is presented in a more human way, and that makes his motives and actions subject to human judgement.  He comes off as an odd mix of arrogant and naive.  It doesn't completely balance, but it's watchable.

It's a decent adaptation.  The John Burgess updates were especially good.  The timeline was hand waved for all the characters who were alive at the time of Dream's imprisonment.  But there is a particular scene I would change with a magic wand.  I wanted to be really touched by Abel's conversation with Goldie.  That is one of the moments in the comics that just got to me.  There was so much pathos in that moonlit still panel, with a pained, teary Abel and the innocent little gargoyle, wishing for better but not hopeful that it would come.  It was too blithe in the series.

[Zuleikha]

On 8/29/2022 at 8:00 PM, MisterGlass said:

 I think it was more that he was so Other that the audience didn't expect him to be nice.  In this series he is presented in a more human way, and that makes his motives and actions subject to human judgement. He comes off as an odd mix of arrogant and naive.  It doesn't completely balance, but it's watchable.

I wish the show had kept Dream's eyes. That is one of the main aspects that make him so clearly not human, and it's also distinctive. Delerium even commented on it at one point. Even if they couldn't get a good special effect going with CGI, they couldn't at least do all black contacts?

I also feel Gaiman lacked confidence in the story he originally told. Dream was so powerful and so unquestioningly in charge of the Dreaming in those early days that there was no confusion about what he was and wasn't in relationship to humanity. The show has weakened him in ways that I don't think make sense or were earned--like the way the show handled the fight between Dream and the Corinthian at the end of the Doll House, Dream seemed ridiculous.

[Chicago Redshirt]

I don't think Gaiman lost confidence in the story he originally told. I think that the softening of Dream is likely the result of Netflix executives who were worried that a story about an oddball stick-in-the-mud goth tyrant douchebag god would not pull in viewers. And Gaiman compromised to get the story made as best he can with Netflix-level cash.

Edited September 2, 2022 by Chicago Redshirt