As a Moments subpage, all spoilers are unmarked as per policy. You Have Been Warned.
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Chapter 1: Sleep of the Just
- While it was always clear that Alex was never Roderick's favorite, just seeing him raise his cane at his son with Alex flinching makes you wonder what other abuse Alex has suffered under his father.
- Jessamy being killed by a shotgun blast is shown to us in full Gorn—her innards practically explode in front of Morpheus's prison glass, while her still-twitching carcass is shown as the Burgess servants try to dispose of it.
- The sleeping sickness. The first of it is shown as a father cheerfully telling his daughter to get ready for school, only to realize she's not waking up no matter what he does. Across the country, many people can be heard yelling for their loved ones to wake up and calling the ambulance in a panic. Then there are those who are awake at the hospital, with one woman begging for sleep of any kind. This went on for a hundred years due to Dream's imprisonment.
- Alex's "gift" of eternal slumber. He enters the dream an old man and slowly regains his youth, all while Dream sits on a chair and coldly glares at the man who had killed Jessamy. When Dream gives Alex his "gift", Alex is now in the form of his child self, and promptly falls asleep. In the real world, Paul and a nurse are desperately trying to wake Alex up as he thrashes in his sleep. Unbeknownst to them, he would never wake again.
- The state of the Dreaming when Dream finally escapes and returns there; the Dreaming just looks horrible, decaying, and lifeless all over.
Chapter 2: Imperfect Hosts
- Lucienne warns Dream that the Dreaming isn't the same as before he was captured, and she is immediately proven right. When Dream tries to enter the waters, initially confident he knows them well, dark hands reach out and drag him under. Lucienne's voice can be heard above the surface, calling for her lord. As he searches for his gifts, Dream is thrashed around in the currents like a ragdoll, with him realizing that The Dreaming doesn't recognize him anymore.
- In one dream that Morpheus enters, he briefly looks like he is about to be hanged on a set of gallows. He's just getting them to summon the Three in One but it's still disturbing.
Chapter 3: Dream A Little Dream of Me
- Johanna's recurring nightmares of the Newcastle incident. She tries to save a young girl, Astra, from getting dragged off to Hell but fails and is left holding Astra's severed arm.
- Constantine exorcising a demon from its' host results in the demon forcing its way out of the man's mouth and then ripping him off itself like a literal shed skin.
- Pretty much every time we see the effects of the Amulet of Protection. Which makes sense, considering where Ethel got it from.
- When Corinthian attacks Ethel while she's wearing it, he's liquified into some sort of goop and banished back to the Dreaming. It's possible to assume that this only happened because he's a Nightmare, and the effects might be different for humans who try to harm its wearer. They aren't.
- Furthermore, when Ethel gives it up to protect John, she immediately returns to her true age and dies in moments.
- The state that Rachel is in after having used the sand from Dream's pouch like a drug. While not quite as bad as in the comics, it's still disturbing to see; she's emaciated to the point her skull and bones are clearly visible under her skin. As Dream grabs the pouch from her hand, she is desperately clutching onto it and whimpers in pain when it leaves her hand.
Chapter 4: A Hope in Hell
- Jean-Paul Sartre once said that "Hell is other people"- well, in this show Hell literally is people. The gates to Hell consist of piled-up but still 'living' bodies. At one point Matthew flies up to try and find out where he and Dream are, only to immediately flee back to the ground when he sees that the trees surrounding them are fused with people moaning in agony. Dante's wood of suicide has never been shown so horrifically.
- On his way to Lucifer, Dream encounters the cell of his ex-lover, Nada. Although he admits he still loves her, he refuses to free her from her millennia-long exile because he has not yet forgiven her for "defying" him. The implications of Dream's long-lived vengeance appropriately horrify Matthew.
- The very creepy scene which unfolds as John tells Rosemary about his life while she drives him down a quiet highway at night. At first, the pair appear to bond over both having awful mothers, and Rosemary seems bemused by his claims that Ethel was a master thief. Then, John casually informs her that he's a murderer who's been locked up for thirty years. Rosemary's face quickly becomes a mask of horror as she realizes exactly what situation she's in.
Chapter 5: 24/ 7
- Pretty much the entirety of the episode is nightmare fuel. Neil Gaiman said this was one of the darkest stories he ever wrote for a reason.
- John Dee flexing the power of the Ruby, slowly forcing the diner patrons and staff to abandon their "lies." It's a slow-burn sequence, with little outward malevolence and no violence until the very end, but the scene is absolutely saturated with dread as the behavior of the characters subtly degenerates and John exerts more and more control over the diner.
- The moment where Bette finds herself suddenly forced to be brutally honest with John is subtle but incredibly disturbing for the look of deer-in-the-headlights terror on her face as she realizes that she's no longer in control. It's made even creepier for John's response, filmed in a distinctly off-putting Dutch Angle:I like this version of you much better, don't you?
- From the moment they enter, nobody in the diner is allowed to leave; Kate and Garry attempt to exit at one point, only to find themselves repeating their visit from the top as if they had only just arrived, complete with Bette welcoming them. After being unintentionally insulted by Mark, a distraught Judy tries to storm out, only to find herself being unwillingly drawn right back to her seat... and the wide-eyed look of "what the hell am I doing?" on her face only makes it seem even creepier.
- Oh, and when Judy takes her seat, she looks up and finds that John is sitting right in front of her.
John: Are you alright?[terrified silence]Judy: ...I don't think I am. - Marsh, under the ruby's influence, reveals to Bette that he likes going to her house not because he's interested in her, but because he's having sex with her son. He tries to justify it by saying Bernard is 21, but the implication that it's been going on for years makes it horrifying.
- The nightmarish climax of his visit to the diner, in which John throws a temper tantrum because his new utopia didn't turn out the way he wanted it to and brings out all the suffering and self-destruction that a world without lies could bring:
- Bette incinerates her novel-in-progress on the stove, holding her arms over the burners as she does so and ending up with third-degree burns running all the way up to her elbows.
- Mark nails his hand to the counter with Kate's help, then reaches for a saw to cut off his arm.
- Marsh is seen in the kitchen, chopping something up with a cleaver - and then we see that it's his own fingers. Gory enough, but he's slowly progressing up his arm with no hint of stopping.
- Judy decides to remove a tattoo from her wrist... with a knife.
- Kate is last seen reaching for a bloody steak knife and raising it to her throat before the scene fades into blackness.
- Oh, and every single act of self-mutilation is carried out without most of the victims indicating that they're in any kind of pain; the expressions on their faces are of pure effort and determination, even as Marsh continues hacking himself to bits and Kate reaches for the knife. The one exception to this is Bette, who is wearing a look of wide-eyed helpless despair as she slowly burns herself alive.
- Bette's last meeting with John in the wake of the massacre.Bette: [almost in tears] How is this a better world?John: You're still seeing it with your eyes. You need to close them. Embrace the darkness...
- John consults the Fates, here represented by the dead and mutilated Bette, Judy, and Kate. The sudden flashes of the Fates themselves and the trio's Creepy Monotone are frightening enough, but we also get some charming shots of Kate's gashed-open throat and Bette's empty sockets.
- The fact that this whole thing is not contained just within the diner and is in fact bleeding into the world outside. News reports playing throughout the episode indicate that John's influence is playing out across America, causing a subtle disturbance at first but gradually escalating to a full-blown state of emergency... and given that John was willing to enact horrific displays of self-loathing on the diner patrons and staff by the end, one can only imagine how bad it got out there...
Chapter 6: The Sound of Her Wings
- Whatever Dream did to Lady Constantine is literal nightmare fuel. Her eyes turn blank white as she sinks to her knees in terror, pleading with the ghosts of her past.
- Dream points out to Hob that there are worse things than Death, including pain and imprisonment- a fate he will become all too familiar with himself in a few centuries.
Chapter 7: The Doll's House
- When Despair gets excited at the prospect of a Dream Vortex, she digs her hook ring into her cheek. Complete with horrible squelching noises and a screech on the soundtrack.
- The fate of the teenage waiter, who is murdered by the Good Doctor. Imagine finding out your kid was murdered at work, their eyes torn out ON SHIFT and the killer got away with it (at least, until episode 10).
- After all the supernatural terrors, there is the very real horror of Jed Walker first being custodially kidnapped from his mother and sister due to his father's spite, and then disappearing into the foster care system while Rose is unable to track him down because social workers refuse even to tell her where he is. Meanwhile, Jed is being abused and exploited by his adoptive parents for profit.
Chapter 8: Playing House
- Hal's dream takes a dark turn when his drag queen persona removes her skin like a mask, revealing the gory, dripping muscle underneath.
- While Barnaby and Clarice deserve it for abusing Jed and not doing anything to stop it, respectively, the fact that they were killed by a stranger (in the form of the Corinthian) just after answering the door is still horrifying. The viewer doesn't see the murder occur, which makes it even worse.
- Jed cautiously comes up from the basement to find the house completely trashed. None of the Corinthian's other victims were shown to be found in such circumstances- whatever happened when the Corinthian attacked, it must have been exceptionally violent.
Chapter 9: Collectors
- In this world, serial killers are bold enough to organize a convention where they can talk shop and enjoy the company of like-minded individuals. And there are many like-minded individuals, all who claim to kill purely for the thrill of killing.
- And somehow, the even lighting and mundane tone of the sessions are far more terrifying than the dark, satirical chiaroscuro of the original comic book story.
- As Nimrod addresses the convention and explains the rules, namely don't "collect" anyone until the convention is over, one of the attendees loudly and jokingly says "Aww!" to the assembly's amusement. For a moment, Nimrod glares coldly at the interruption before hitching a polite smile onto his face. A chilling reminder that this old man can and has killed people for much milder transgressions.
- The Corinthian brings a child into the middle of this nest of vipers. He looks away for one minute, which is enough time for the pedophile serial killer to find and chat up Jed. If the Corinthian didn't catch and threaten Fun Land in time...
- Fun Land has a moment where he talks to another "collector" about where he hunts, which is heavily implied to be a large theme park. He happily reminisces about how there are always children wandering off and getting lost, who are so eager to meet someone friendly and kind. "There are quiet places to take them to, where no one will bother you until you're done."
- Besides the obvious presence of Fun Land, a killer is attending the con with the name tag "Hello Little Girl", and Rose also swipes the name tag of a killer whose moniker is "The Babysitter", meaning there are several "collectors" who specifically target children.
- Counts as a tearjerker too: After months of having a second chance at a life with her deceased husband, Lord Morpheus suddenly arrives and exorcises Hector's spirit (visualized as a horrifying dissolving sand skeleton) in front of Lyta moments before informing the sobbing widow that her unborn child automatically belongs to him since it was conceived in the Dreaming. One day, he will come for her baby. She doesn't take it well.
Chapter 10: Lost Hearts
- During the Corinthian's "keynote address" at the Cereal Convention, we are given a sneak peek at the collective unconscious of all the "collectors" in attendance. Facilitated by Rose's vortex powers going haywire, she and Jed are trapped in a hall of rooms separated by curtains—with each of the major attendees we saw:
- The Good Doctor is shown operating on someone, ostensibly to get their organs, while the victim is conscious;
- The Butcher is silent yet facially-ecstatic while literally chopping his victim into pieces like they're market meat; and
- Nimrod goes full-Ed Gein
and happily goes about processing his Genuine Human Hide in a sewing machine.
- In a bit of Laser-Guided Karma in this adaptation, a number of the attendees get some of their just desserts:
- Fun Land, who is a pedophile, doesn't get the benefit of Morpheus's dust and forgiveness in his sleep—he gets stabbed by the Corinthian while he's pursuing Rose and Jed.
- The attendees, as they leave, were subjected to a collective My God, What Have I Done?. The Good Doctor calls 9-1-1 in order to confess and turn herself in, while Nimrod calmly shoots himself in the head.
- Instead of making them feel insignificant and lost, Dream made the Collecters feel all the guilt, pain, and fear of their victims "until the end of time." He hit them with an eternal Penance Stare.
- When Dream confronts Desire about their plotting to make him unwittingly kill a descendant of the Endless, and warns them not to meddle in his affairs again, they take his threats in stride and are already planning their next attempt:"I really got under your skin this time, didn't I? Next time, I'll draw blood."
Chapter 11: A Dream of A Thousand Cats/Calliope
- The Siamese cat prophet losing her kittens, due to one of her owners drowning them, is both this and tearjerking; the man throws the sack containing the terrified kittens into a lake and we see the sack sinking into the darkness, while the prophet recounts how she actually felt the pain and fear of her children as they died.
- The fact that the segment ends in the most ominous ways, showing the little kitty dreaming of hunting and eating... something.
- Calliope is being held captive by two different authors for nearly a century, dehumanized and raped for the ideas they need.
- Unlike the comic, the series doesn't explicitly depict Madoc raping Calliope. Instead, it strongly implies it in an extremely ominous way, which is no less disturbing. Madoc spends hours sitting at his computer, unable to think of anything to write, growing more agitated and desperate as the deadline looms over him. He abruptly gets up from the computer and goes upstairs. The camera stays on the computer screen for an agonizingly long time as we hear Madoc walking to Calliope's room, unlocking the door, saying her name...then silence. The scene cuts to Madoc typing away at his computer, apparently wearing only a robe and with a small cut on his cheek being the only physical evidence of the violence. For extra creepiness, until this point, Madoc had seemed flawed but not malicious. His actions here show what he's truly capable of even though he initially appeared quite harmless and even sympathetic compared to Erasmus Fry...not unlike many real sex offenders.
- Richard Madoc, punished by Dream for his imprisoning and violating Calliope, is cursed with an abundance of inspiration...and no pen or paper. Nora and her friend find him with the tips of his fingers worn down to bloody bones, since he used his blood to write the ideas across an entire wall.
- Then, once Calliope asks Dream to release the affliction from Madoc, he does so but with cruel irony: by erasing what is implied to be any and all creative and inventive thoughts.
