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Sandman
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I’d quibble with a few things, here and there. The first couple episodes were a bit heavy on that sort of “gentlemen, as you all know, we are cops” sort of exposition with Lucienne and Dream. A few scenes would’ve done better for a couple more seconds before the reveal. Abel’s murders are a bit less visceral than I would’ve liked. Some of the visual direction in hell wasn’t as strong as I would’ve liked. I wish they’d kept Alex’s Eternal Waking.
There are some other things that are active improvements over the book. Dee is a much stronger antagonist overall, and the way his arc is handled makes Ethyl’s amulet a much more integrated part of the story. Having Lucifer stand as Choronzon’s champion makes their antagonism much more personal. Introducing Merv and Matthew earlier is better because Merv rules and Matthew a) makes the “Dream and his raven” thing integrated from the start and b) lets Matthew take the useful narrative role of “clueless newbie who needs to be exposited to.” Integrating Rose and Lyta from the start is going to pay off in later seasons (knock on wood and curse the name of Netflix). Gregory was a much more clear and present narrative beat than Cain and Abel’s letters of commission, even if I hope Dream brings him back for later seasons.
I also liked how they really integrated the Corinthian in both the Burgess and the Vortex plots, making it feel a lot more unified overall. And I loved their take on Kirby’s Sandman.
I’m biased because I’ve loved the comics for at least twenty years, but overall, I loved this. Every casting choice was perfect and I want to see more.
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@insomniac I’d be inclined to agree with you re: the heavy handed exposition in the first couple eps, except that oh my god after we watched them I still had to explain all that shit to my dad that the show had just painstakingly explained. It just goes to show, I guess…
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I love it, great adaptation, 9/10
1 star deducted for bad styling. Lucifer is the worst offender, in the cheap PVC outfit and the TERRIBLE HAIR COME ON, but I also had a really hard time with Joanna Constantine’s intro outfit. Def could have gone with a different costume designer imo
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@insomniac I’d be inclined to agree with you re: the heavy handed exposition in the first couple eps, except that oh my god after we watched them I still had to explain all that shit to my dad that the show had just painstakingly explained. It just goes to show, I guess…
Oh, for sure–Sandman is a lot of fairly high-concept fantasy being delivered quickly, I completely understand that you need to do a lot of exposition.
I just dislike the specific method of “character A tells character B something both characters already know,” no matter how dramatically it’s done. Between the two, I’d say stick with Dream’s voiceover to deliver exposition,; that makes no pretense of being anything but speaking directly to the audience to fill us in on what’s what and doesn’t make me wonder why Lucienne’s exposition isn’t being responded to with “…yes, I know. I’m Dream.”
It’s not a dealbreaker or anything, and I really do understand that exposition is always hard to pull off well. Moreover, in this case it is fundamentally not for me (I know the Sandman cast better than some branches of my own extended family, I don’t need an exposition). Like I said, a quibble, something that I felt could have been better in the first two episodes.
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I quite enjoyed the first season.
One minor thing - it’d have been cool (but probably legalities prevented it) to see some of the Sandman-inspired characters crossing over by the actors who played them in other shows. Lucifer and Mazikeen, John Constantine, etc.
It was really fun though. Probably the best comic book adaptation I’ve seen, and for a title I never thought was filmable.
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@Arkandel yes yes yes all this.
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I quite enjoyed the first season.
One minor thing - it’d have been cool (but probably legalities prevented it) to see some of the Sandman-inspired characters crossing over by the actors who played them in other shows. Lucifer and Mazikeen, John Constantine, etc.
I have to disagree there. Doing that would be trying to place the Netflix show into some shared universe of continuity with the other shows referenced (Lucifer, Constantine, etc.), which I think would actually distract from the Sandman show overall. I think that’s at least one of the reasons they leaned into Johanna Constantine rather than John, because he’s recognizable from other media. (Something that was overall a rare occurrence in the Sandman comics, even though they were part of the DC universe.) I doubt it was legalities that prevented it – I’m pretty sure there were times people asked Gaiman about the Lucifer actors and he indicated that the Sandman show was simply a separate thing.
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@Arkandel I don’t especially want those kinds of Easter egg castings in the series, but somewhat related, I would have died of joy if Etrigan had made an appearance.
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(Something that was overall a rare occurrence in the Sandman comics, even though they were part of the DC universe.)
True to a point, but less so in the instalments being adapted for Season 1.
Off the top of my head, the DC legacy characters who were involved in Preludes & Nocturnes and The Doll House included:
Wesley Dodds (1939 Sandman), Cain, Abel, Gregory, John Constantine, the Etrigan, Hell’s Triumvirate (borderline, since all the characters are public domain, but the triparty rule was the result of other DC titles so I’m counting it), Scott Free, J’onn “the Martian Manhunter” J’onnz, Dr. John “Destiny” Dee, Dr. Jonathan “the Scarecrow” Crane, Destiny, Matthew, Brute, Glob, and Hippolyta and Hector Hall (filling in the role of 1974 Sandman).
Also, while not present in the story, the absence of both the Bogeyman and the Family Man from the Collectors’ convention are plot-relevant, and caused by their deaths in Saga of the Swamp-Thing and Hellblazer respectively.
(Edited because I got the titles backwards. Feh.)
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@insomniac said in Sandman:
Also, while not present in the story, the absence of both the Bogeyman and the Family Man from the Collectors’ convention are plot-relevant, and caused by their deaths in Hellblazer and Saga of the Swamp-Thing respectively.
TIL. Huh. That’s a really cool detail.
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@insomniac said in Sandman:
Saga of the Swamp-Thing and Hellblazer
Incidentally, I would love to see television adaptations of these. Someone tell Eric Kripke and/or Rockne S O’Bannon.
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@Arkandel Yeah, Sandman does a really good job of including these sorts of details without making them necessary to know about for the story to work.
That the other two biggest Vertigo titles had both recently done a serial killer plot also probably does show a point about the idea of the serial killer convention that doesn’t quite translate to a 2022 adaptation. Not that it doesn’t work in the show, but the media landscape today isn’t quite as inundated with serial killers as it was in 1990 (and even more in the years after, with the film adaptation of Silence of the Lambs premiering in '91) so that part of the joke–of there being so many serial killers that they’d hold a convention–doesn’t quite hit the way it did in earlier readings.
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I am such a wuss. I haven’t watched the show in a week because the end credits of episode 8 involves showing a tarantula’s legs creeping up from behind the graphics and I can still feel giant spiders crawling on my back or poking over the top of a chair to caress the back of my neck.
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I loved this overall, but I was baffled by the casting for Rose Walker. This is Vanesu Samunyai’s first acting role, and you have to extend some grace for that, but I honestly found it awkward and immersion-breaking to watch her often blank expression, carbon copy line deliveries, and the way she was completely unphased by the insane things happening around her while literally everyone else was giving their all, and I wish they’d chosen someone with more experience and range considering how important the character was to this season. Otherwise, basically 10/10!
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I honestly found it awkward and immersion-breaking to watch her often blank expression, carbon copy line deliveries, and the way she was completely unphased by the insane things happening around her while literally everyone else was giving their all, and I wish they’d chosen someone with more experience and range considering how important the character was to this season.
I hate to say it about any actor who seems like a decent person, let alone a kid, but yeah.
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@GF Frankly this is the same as any other child actor. For example you can’t put the boy who played Jed on the stage next to a veteran stage actor like Stephen Fry and not expose him. But that’s why directors need to protect young actors in important roles through what they are given to do.
In retrospect I wonder how much they plan to expand the cast in future seasons. There are a lot of characters we haven’t seen yet, including half of the Endless.
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@Arkandel I vote for Jason Michael Lee as Destruction. Bring in some of that Earl vibe to the job.
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@Wizz Yeah I sadly have to agree. This isn’t a universal thing for
childyoung actors; I thought that Jed’s actor was actually notably more engaging, despite being younger than her. But I think Rose’s actor was a bit underwhelming, and contributed a little to my sense of the back half of the season taking a lil dip. -
Are we referring to 21 year-olds as child actors now?
I do agree that it feels like a little more experience will do her well, though I did actually like her quite a bit for the role.
I have bigger qualms about how some of the representation was handled, at least in the first half. Not great when every queer person is a villain and every poc is subservient. Like, they’re not major qualms, I think the show righted some of this by the end of the season, but it was enough to give me pause.
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@Selira I think criticizing Sandman - of all shows - over its representation of race or sexual/gender orientation is probably unfair.
But more specifically many of its villains were white old men. Many of its best and most powerful characters - like Death - were POC. Other major ones were gender-flipped (Lucifer, Constantine) compared to the comic. Several very sympathetic characters weren’t straight.
