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alt title(s): Sandman The Sandman is a Comic Book series (later collected in a series of graphic novels) by Neil Gaiman, chronicling the story of Dream of the Endless and his six siblings who act as Anthropomorphic Personifications of base ideas in The DCU. Sandman is also the name of a Golden Age (later, Silver Age) superhero (see below).
It is notable for its epic overarching plot. Over the course of a decade, every tiny detail in the comics must be watched. Minor characters from the first books are big players later on. Foreshadowing from as far back as the second volume comes into play in the last. Morpheus's complicated plan to evolve himself borders on Xanatos Roulette, but the sheer power and meticulous nature of the character make it believable that he could manipulate primal forces to work around him, and have a safety net set up and ready for when it is over.
The Endless are:
- Destiny: He knows all, and only does what destiny says. A Deus Ex Machina for the series, he intervenes only when his Book of Destiny says he should. Usually, this involves shaking up his family.
Destiny continues to walk... He is holding a book. Inside the book is the universe.
- Death: The Grim Reaper and a Perky Goth. A generally kind and upbeat woman, though not always - billions of years ago she was rather coldly pragmatic. Everyone meets her twice: at birth she gives the breath of life and everyone, from stars to gods, sees her once more.
Death: It always ends. That's what gives it value.
- Dream: The Lord Shaper. Personification of dreams, creativity and his realm helps shape its opposite - reality. Can change his appearance, while he is always male, people may see him differently, usually as member of their own ethnic group, (in the case of Fairies) their own race or their own species, for example with cats.
- Morpheus: The main protagonist of the series - thin and pale-skinned with black hair and black eyes that mirror eternity; gloomy and melodramatic, has great belief in duty and rules. All-powerful ruler in his domain of dreams, less powerful outside. Had love affairs with several women (including a witch, a goddess, and the queen of the realm of Fairie) over the aeons, but all except the most brief affairs (i.e. with Bastet, goddess of cats) ended badly. Sentenced his lover Nada to an eternity of imprisonment in Hell for hurting his pride, and finally forgave her only after 10,000 years.
Nuala: You... you want them to punish you, don't you? You want to be punished for Orpheus's death?
Dream: ...
- Daniel: The second incarnation of Dream, clothed all in white, with white hair. While still obsessed with rules and duty, Daniel is a lot less gloomy than his predecessor, and has a weak spot for his mortal parents, who he eventually gave permanent positions in the Dreaming.
Daniel: Sometimes I suspect that we build our traps ourselves, then we back into them, pretending amazement all the while... Tools, of course, can be the subtlest of traps. One day, I know, I must smash the emerald.
- Destruction: Prefers to think of himself as the personification of change, he abandoned his realm and is now on the run from his family. Warrior Poet. Likes to try his hand at creating various forms of art, sucks at everything he tries. Character design based on BRIAN BLESSED.
Destruction: The Endless? The Endless are merely patterns. The Endless are ideas. The Endless are wave functions. The Endless are repeating motifs. The Endless are echoes of darkness, and nothing more. We have no right to play with their lives, to order their dreams and their desires. And even our existences are brief and bounded. None of us will last longer than this version of the universe.
Delirium: Except our sister.
- Desire: The personification of longing and lust. An androgynous shapeshifter, shifts between male and female form. Greedy, manipulative and held a long running rivalry with Morpheus that eventually (in a roundabout way) led to Morpheus' death in the war with the three Fates (the Kindly Ones) and Dream's evolution to Daniel.
Rose: Are you going to hurt me? Kill me? Mess me up?
Desire: No more than usually; No; And perhaps a little. But only with Love.
- Despair
- The First Despair: Not much is known about her, except that she was murdered by someone whom she afflicted. Taller than the second Despair, with more colour in her skin and red tattoos. Notable for convincing Rao, the Anthropomorphic Personification of the Kryptonian sun, to create a life-bearing planet, even though it would be doomed to destruction. However, it didn't turn out as she'd planned; she intended for there to be a single survivor, 'to remember, to mourn, to despair'... except that single survivor grew up to be Superman, who isn't particularly noted for giving in to Despair.
Daniel: The person who was responsible for the death of the first Despair will take the rest of eternity to die. Only then will his pain cease... and he had better cause for what he did than you.
- The Second Despair: Short, fat and ugly, grey skinned, with sullen eyes, goes around naked. Impulsively tears her skin with a hooked ring, the sign of her office. It has been speculated that this incarnation of Despair was the punishment of the person who killed the first one.
Despair: Today he's sitting in their family room, realizing that his life is over, wondering if he has the courage to physically end it. He doesn't. Isn't it beautiful?
- Delirium: The youngest of the Endless. Used to be Delight, the personification of joy and happiness, but changed to Delirium long before the onset of the story for reasons unclear. Has differently-colored eyes and hair continually changing in color and style. Can create anything she imagines and warp reality, including a person's memories.
Delirium: Not knowing everything is all that makes it okay, sometimes.
Beware - Major plot spoilers The issues of the comic book series were collected into:
- Preludes and Nocturnes: A society of mystics plan to capture Death and grant themselves immortality. But mortals are rarely as powerful as they think they are, and only one of the Endless is bound by rules and laws that they can control. Instead of Death, they capture Dream. After seventy years in their cage, Morpheus escapes, and seeks to repair the damage caused by his absence, and battle those who profited by it.
- The Doll's House: In Dream's long absence, some of his creations have entered the Waking world. Fiddler's Green, the kindest and most gentle of dreams, has moved in with a group of young and unconventional people. The Corinthian, Dream's most prized nightmare, has started a cabal of serial killers. And the twin nightmares Brute and Glob have trapped two superheroes in the mind of a young man: the pregnant Hippolyta Hall (The Fury), who for years has been unable to give birth to her son, and the superhero Hector Hall (Silver Scarab), who has been tricked into thinking he is The Sandman, defender of Dreams. Morpheus deals with all these renegade dreams and other things. He tells Hippolyta that her son, who is to be named Daniel, having gestated for so many years within dreams, is his property, part of himself, which he will one day come to claim. We are also introduced to Hob Gadling, a man in a pub in 14th-century England who declares that he shall become immortal, simply by not dying. Death and Dream, who witness this and are amused by his force of will, decide to see how it works out for him. And Dream gains an immortal companion.
- Dream Country: A series of stories of those touched by The Endless.
- Season Of Mists: Dream, convinced by his family that condemning a past love to an eternity of torment for turning him down was a little harsh, descends into Hell to ask for Lucifer to release her. The challenge, which seems at first like it will set off a war between Hell and The Dreaming, has a very different outcome. Lucifer quits, no longer willing to play rival to a God who set him up, and hands the Key to Hell — the single most valuable property in all creation — to Morpheus. And every being in the universe wants it.
- A Game Of You: Barbie has lived a strange life, since the break up of her marriage in The Doll's House. But nothing this strange, as a creature from her dreams tracks her down and pulls her back into her childhood fantasy. But a dark entity has taken over, and there is a strange realism to this new dream. Introducing the character Thessaly, who was spun off into her own series.
- Fables And Reflections: A series of stories of mortals touched by The Endless, most central to the plot are the woeful tale of Orpheus, son of Morpheus, and that of the babe Daniel, the child of Hyppolyta who has the ability to wander in and out of the Dreaming at will.
- Brief Lives: Delirium misses her kindest brother Destruction and enlists Dream to help her find him. But a prodigal Endless is hard to track down, and the only one who could grant such knowledge has a terrible price for Dream to pay.
- Worlds' End: A great wake for giant gods is being held and in the tiny inn at the end of the world the patrons pass their time with stories of how each of them were touched by The Endless.
- The Kindly Ones: Hippolyta Hall believes Dream has stolen her child Daniel, as he promised to do years ago. The death of Orpheus, the help of the scorned Thessaly and the determination of the heroine formally known as The Fury allows the true Furies, The Three Faces Of Eve, The Kindly Ones to set their sights on Dream. The most powerful beings outside of the Endless have cut Morpheus's string of fate and descend on the Dreaming to claim what is theirs by ancient law. Morpheus has a choice, really the only choice. Evolve or die. The child Daniel takes his true place in the world.
- The Wake: The Endless mourn and evolve. After finding out about the death of Morpheus, his oldest friend. Hob finally meets Death again.
The series has been followed by a number of one-off sequels and side stories, also by Gaiman:
The series has spawned a number of Spin Off series by other writers as notable characters from the books tell their tales. These include:
- The Thessaliad and Thessaly, Witch for Hire - Stories that center around Dream's former lover and assassin. Written by the man who wrote Fables.
- Lucifer: After quitting his job as lord of hell, Lucifer sees what the world has in store for him.
- The Dreaming - Short stories revolving around characters from Dream's realm, most frequently Cain and Abel, Lucien, Matthew, and the Corinthian.
The Sandman is also the name of a series of superheroes, the most famous of which was Wesley Dodds. Sandman is characterized by his longcoat, fedora hat, gas mask, and use of a giant syringe-like gas gun filled with sleeping gas (hence the name). Sandman was created in 1939, the same year as another Badass Normal character wearing a certain Bat-Themed outfit... The Sandman and Batman had a lot in common: A lack of real superpowers and acting as detectives and using gadgets like grappling guns to fight crime. The Sandman was quite popular in the Golden Age of comic books, lasting well into the Silver Age where he fell into obscurity. Neil Gaiman's Sandman books later brought the character back into the limelight with DC releasing in the 1990s Sandman Mystery Theatre, a series of adventures of the titular hero set in the 1930s. The death of an elderly Wesley Dodds is used as opening of the critically acclaimed comic Kingdom Come
The Neil Gaiman series provides examples of:
- A Form You Are Comfortable With: This happens a lot.
- All Myths Are True
- Aloof Big Brother: Dream himself, particularly to his little sister Delirium; Destiny, the eldest brother, is more taciturn than aloof.
- Anthropomorphic Personification: The Endless
- In Endless Nights we meet the Anthromorphic Personifications of stars unbeknownst to the heroine, she falls in love with her own planet's sun. Said heroine is implied to be one of the originators of the Green Lantern Corps.
- Beat Still, My Heart
- Boat Lights: Delirium's eyes
- Byronic Hero: Dream
- Cain And Abel: Dream and Desire; Cain and Abel themselves live in the Dreaming.
- Cardboard Prison: Arkham Asylum, in the first Story Arc.
- Character Title
- Choosing Death
- Crossover Cosmology: The sheer number of gods and pantheons.
- Dark Age: This series began on the tail of the Dark Age of comicbooks.
- Death Takes A Holiday: Subverted and played straight. In the first book Dream is captured by mistake by mystics trying to imprison Death. In a later tie-in book Death takes on human form and wanders the earth for a day, a tradition she performs once every century.
- Depending On The Artist: Lucifer briefly was hit by this, and Doctor Destiny had his appearance dramatically improved by his second penciller.
- Desperately Looking For A Purpose In Life: Destruction
- Disproportionate Retribution: Nada. Oh my god, Nada.
- Dream Within A Dream: The main character being the lord of dreams, this comes up a lot.
- Driven To Suicide: Element Girl. She's happy she gets to die, although it's implied that she could have turned her life around if she wanted to.
- Dying Dream
- Enemy Civil War: The various wars in hell, more apparent in Lucifer.
- Environmental Symbolism
- Exiled From Continuity: With the exception of Destiny, who predates the series, the Endless rarely appear in The DCU proper, for several reasons.
- Eye Scream: Most notably The Corinthian, although Doctor Destiny has a particularly graphic moment during Preludes and Nocturnes.
- Fisher King: The Endless are their domains.
- Gay Bar: The bar where Delirium accidentally approaches a Perky Goth who she thinks is Death.
- The Grim Reaper: Averted by Death (who isn't grim and doesn't want to carry a scythe, even when formally dressed).
- The Hecate Sisters: As they have always been portrayed, variously as the fates, the goddess Hecate and The Furies (or The Kindly Ones, as they like to be called) are also an aspect of The Three Faces Of Eve, literally. When they see the embodiment of Eve herself in the Dreaming, they refuse to hurt her, since in a fashion, they are her.
- Historical In Joke: many
- I Have Many Names
- Important Haircut: Sort of; the person getting the haircut is Lucifer, and instead of cutting his hair he has Morpheus cut off his wings.
- Inn Between The Worlds: Worlds End
- Jerkass: Much of the driving force of Morpheus' character development over the series is the realisation that he's actually
a bit of a dick, and hides this behind duty and responsibility. He eventually causes the events that lead to his death because he realises he can't change without death and reincarnation.
- Legacy Character: There have been several earlier DCU heroes called "The Sandman"; over the course of the series, each is shown to have been inspired in some fashion by Dream.
- The Legions Of Hell: Lucifer's decision to abdicate isn't entirely popular among them.
- Lighterand Softer: The story that Abel tells Daniel is a child-friendly version of how he and his brother came to live with Morpheus, complete with utterly adorable little chibis of Death, Dream, Cain, and Abel.
- Mama Bear: Lyta Hall
- Meta Guy: Matthew, Eve's raven and Dream's second in command.
- Miss Conception: Hazel really should have known better
- Multicolored Hair: Delirium. Usually.
- Names To Run Away From Really Fast: If you're a mortal, anyone whose name starts with a "D", plenty of other big names (with original owners) to run away from. Lucifer and Azazel to name just two.
- Thessaly. It won't help, she'll still hunt you down and tear you into a million pieces (if she's in a good humour and even if you happen to be a deity), but you might get another couple of days to put your affairs in order.
- Nightmare Fuel: Lots of it, both literal and figurative.
- Olympus Mons: In the first issue, Dream is captured by humans.
- One For Sorrow Two For Joy
- Orphaned Punchline: "...looking for rabbits, vicar?"
- Painting The Fourth Wall
- Pale Skinned Brunette (Death and Dream)
- Pals With Jesus Good old Hob Gadling.
- Perky Goth: Death
- Rage Against The Reflection
- Reality Warper
- Satan: a partial subversion, in that Lucifer abdicates the throne of Hell after getting sick and tired of humans constantly using him as a scapegoat and thinking he deals in souls (which isn't true).
- Second Chance: the Corinthian, sort of.
- Self Inflicted Hell
- Serial Killer: a whole convention, most memorably The Corinthian
- Shakespeare In Fiction: Dream inspires him, and asks for two plays (A Midsummer Night's Dream and The Tempest) in return.
- Shape Shifter Guilt Trip: Loki tries this on the Corinthian; it doesn't work.
- Shape Shifter Showdown: To get back his mask, Morpheus had to fight Chronozon in a ritualized shapeshifting duel.
- Shout Out: To other DCU, Vertigo, and Gaiman characters;
- from Terry Pratchett, who has collaborated with Gaiman (his Endless are called Sleep (Dream), Sulk (Despair), and Snuff (Death))
- Also from Dave Sim in Cerebus: Swoon (Dream), Snuff (Death), Sulk (Despair), Sleaze (Desire), Kay Sarah Sarah (Destiny)
- One panel in "World's End" shows a character wearing a bloodstained smiley-face pin.
- Stay On The Path
- Sunglasses At Night The Corinthian. Justified, in that he has tiny mouths with razor-sharp teeth where his eyes should be.
- Trickster: Loki, among others
- Unspoken Plan Guarantee: Subverted; the plans for what would happen if he were captured or killed in Hell are never needed. (Though it's speculated that the plans he would have used if he fell in Hell are the same that came into place during his confrontation with The Kindly Ones.)
- Viewers Are Geniuses: Gaiman, on his sponge-like capacity for folklore, myths, and religions: "As a kid I thought everyone knew Adam had three wives and [I can't remember the rest]..."
- Warrior Poet: Destruction. He's horrible at it, though.
- Well Done Son Guy: Most of Abel's troubles stem from his desire to live happily with his mad brother, Cain.
- What The Hell Hero: Death, among others, calls Dream out on his less-than-noble acts, such as imprisoning Nada for ten thousand years.
- Even Delirium does it - when Dream tells her that cursing a man to feel as if insects are crawling on his skin "forever and ever" is too harsh, Delirium retorts that "you've done lots worse. Lots and lots and lots."
- Who Wants To Live Forever: Hob Gadling really does.
- In fact, just about every long-lived character with any character to speak of averts, inverts or subverts this trope, with one exception. A 15-thousand-year-old lawyer's last words are "NOT YET!"
- Considering he lived fifteen thousand years only to die because he happened to be the unlucky sod who got hit by falling bricks, his aggravation is somewhat understandable.
- Xanatos Gambit: Most of The Kindly Ones was Dream setting up a series of events that would let him be punished for killing his son while setting up Daniel as a replacement.
- You mean most of the entire series. Setting up Daniel started right from the beginning, shortly after the events of the first plot arc.
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