Three weeks ago I started watching The Sandman on Netflix. I got through the first couple episodes (of 10 episodes) where The Sandman (aka, Dream) finally frees himself from over a century of confinement in the Waking World. Dream (Thomas Sturridge) returns to The Dreaming World and finds it in shambles because of his 106 year absence. With the help of Lucienne the Librarian (Vivienne Acheampong) and a raven (voiced by Patton Oswalt), Dream first seeks to recover his instruments of Power: his bag of Sand, his helm, and his ruby.
This seems like the beginning of a Quest, but the plot changes as new characters show up. The most menacing is The Corinthian (Boyd Holbrook), a Nightmare who has escaped the Dream World to spread death in the Waking World.
Then there’s Dream’s descent into Lucifer’s (Gwendoline Christie) realm of Hell. We learn about the other powerful entities: Desire, Death, Despair, and Delirium.
Several other plot lines pop up. The most compelling is the vortex that can destroy the Waking World and the Dream World. A young woman named Rose Walker seeks to find her brother, Jed, who is being abused by a foster family. But, The Corinthian seeks Rose Walker, too, to use her vortex power to free himself.
Like a dream, sometimes The Sandman doesn’t make sense, is confusing, and lacks coherence. Although the production values are very good, the rambling plots and shifty characters make this series a chore to watch. I wish Neil Gaiman wrote the script . GRADE: C
I guess I liked it better than you did. The acting was good (I especially liked David Thewlis). The look of the comics was carried over very well. I would give it a B at least.
It has done well but may not get a second season due to its high cost and Netflix’s cuts.
Steve, not only has Netflix made cuts in programming, so has HBO: “HBO Max cuts ‘Sesame Street’ content, ‘Infinity Train,’ in removal of 36 titles from its streaming platform this week.”
I should finally read more than few bits of the comics first.
Todd, some of the criticisms of the Netflix THE SANDMAN involve “changes” from the original comic series.
I really enjoyed this. Having read the comics probably helped, because I understood all the story beats as they occurred, and wasn’t confused as to what was going on — as some people new to the story seem to be.
One problem with The Sandman has always been that the first story arc — seven issues of the comic, four episodes of the show — is probably the weakest of the whole run. It sets up so much that it’s essential, but Gaiman was still feeling his way. Then comes the wonderful, wonderful “The Sound of Her Wings,” an issue that I reread frequently. Kirby Howell-Baptiste does a good job of portraying Death, but I doubt there’s an actor alive who could match my mental picture. (One day, on a long drive, I tried imagining different people in the role, past and present, and came up with only one real possibility: Isabella Rossellini.)
The second arc, The Doll”s House, is where things start to kick into gear. I thought Boyd Holbrook was great as the nightmare serial killer The Corinthian, though visually the show didn’t capture the horror that his eyes had teeth very well.
The recent drop of a bonus eleventh episode leads me to believe this is all we’re going to get, as I think this episode was being saved for the second season. My worry is that it’s been decided that there won’t be a second season, and there was no reason to hold it back any more.
Jeff, I agree with you on the 11th Episode of THE SANDMAN. It seems to signal the end of the series on Netflix. Perhaps some other streaming service will pick it up like THE EXPANSE.
I knew in five minutes it was not for me. The assumption that all watchers are familiar enough with the comics to follow a complex plot is probably a mistake.
Patti, even being familiar with the original comic series didn’t quite make much of a difference in translation of a print work into a film series. Plenty of critics of THE SANDMAN on Netflix complained about the pacing. I liked the cast and the high production values. But, it quickly became apparent that THE SANDMAN was NOT going to be a series like STRANGER THINGS that would attract a large audience which Netflix was hoping for.
Jackie is like Patti so we skipped it too. I read a few of the comics but in no order, just the ones a friend sent me. I’m not a big fantasy guy either.
Jeff, much of THE SANDMAN takes place in the Real World. I prefer the fantasy worlds myself.
Sandman came out well after I quit reading comics but I may give this a shot. I’m at the tail end of my annual summertime insomnia and the episodes are short enough that I could watch/doze through this if it looks as good as people are saying (the production staff said they designed this as a sort of love letter to Michael Powell so I’m intrigued for that reason alone).
Given that you grade more honestly than most critics (who grade as generously as a community college instructor) I’d say your C is a more accurate grade than the As and Bs I’ve seen elsewhere. If you decide to give up on the show you might want to at least check out the bonus episode that dropped. It’s all animated, stand alone movie and is getting a good buzz.
I’d be surprised if it gets another season. I think the days of lavish streamer spending are coming to an end. Virtually everyone, including Disney, is losing money by the tanker load. TV is going to look a lot more like it used to very soon again.
Byron, the business models of streaming services all have a basic vulnerability: subscribers. If the number of subscribers falls, it doesn’t matter about the quality or the cost of programming. Losing money results.