But it’s also the audiobook’s biggest weakness. The Sandman in audiobook is an adaptation where nothing has been lost in translation, except the opportunity to make a story about eternal stories more timeless. I also continue to be fascinated by the places in which Gaiman's descriptions and the final art don't quite match up. I more than understand the desire of a living author to keep any less-than-pleased thoughts about a coworker's work quiet, but I did also appreciate the one place where it slipped through, in a comment that the demon Azazel as it originally appeared in issue #4 looked like a "floating potato." Yeah, Azazel's look is definitely stronger here!

Sandman Series by Neil Gaiman - Goodreads The Sandman Series by Neil Gaiman - Goodreads

And listen, I've known for years that fans loved this series, that it was one of the most critically acclaimed comics ever created. With all due respect to Alan Moore and Grant Morrison, it was Gaiman's Sandman that created the legacy of DC's Vertigo imprint, one that has proven impossible to live up to over the years. Even the many prose works Gaiman has released in the years since he completed his original Sandman run have not really, despite a broadened following, resulted in anything close to its equal. But I’ll firmly pass if that means we’re going to be revisiting the “A Game of You” arc without any considered updates made to the character of Wanda, a trans woman whose identity is denied at every turn — including by a god of the feminine! — until she dies along with most of the cast and her bigoted family buries her in a suit and with a short haircut, under a stone with her deadname on it.If Sandman in a lot of ways embodied the Goth culture that permeated the end of the millennium, it becomes increasingly relevant in its depiction of such characters as Wanda, a transsexual whose story unfolds late in the volume, a mere subplot in some respects, but emblematic of Gaiman's ability to pierce at the very heart of his topics in ways few others have managed in the quarter century that has since passed with increased awareness and tolerance of the whole LGBTQ community. Well, my complaints about the first volume of The Annotated Sandman hold true for this one as well:

Sandman Comics and Graphic Novels How to Start Reading The Sandman Comics and Graphic Novels

It may seem odd to call The Sandman (audiobook) an adaptation. Audiobooks are, after all, translations: readings intended to preserve an unaltered text. But The Sandman isn’t a book, it’s a comic book, and its audiobook isn’t just translating textual words to spoken ones. It’s an adaptation masquerading as a translation — it’s a product of writers and audio artists making choices about how to present purely visual information. It would be a disservice to the many artists who crafted the comic to pretend otherwise. The flaw of the audiobook is that it’s an adaptation where the creators don’t make enough choices. But the Sandman audiobook is a fresh new creation, and the choice to re-create inessential instances of rape, homophobia, and queer tragedy — especially when working directly with the series’ original writer — simply reads as callous. Gaiman himself has said that he would change aspects of the comic if it were written today. Audible’s edition doesn’t. Image: Neil Gaiman, Mike Dringenberg/DC ComicsThe audiobook itself is beautifully produced, and from the casting announcement, it should come as no surprise that the voices are, on the whole, extremely good. I was particularly pleased by Taron Egerton as John Constantine, Bebe Neuwirth as the Siamese Cat, and, of course, the chocolate-voiced James McAvoy as Dream. Ironically, the biggest sore thumb in the cast is Neil Gaiman himself, in the role of the Narrator. Image: Neil Gaiman, Kelley Jones/DC Comics This issue is reprinted in Essential Vertigo: Sandman #1, Millennium Edition: Sandman (Volume 2) #1, Sandman: Preludes and Nocturnes and The Absolute Sandman, Volume One. Reference is made to Brute and Glob in this issue. Brute and Glob were two nightmares that often worked alongside Garrett Sanford, the Silver Age Sandman. They were regularly featured characters in Sandman #. They make their first Post-Crisis appearance in Sandman (Volume 2) #11. That evening, Alexander Burgess goes to sleep. In his dreams, he is confronted by the Sandman. Unable to gain revenge against the man who first imprisoned him, he instead decides to mete out vengeance against the son. He curses Burgess with Eternal Waking - an endless nightmare wherein he experiences terrific horrors which conclude when he wakes up screaming - only to discover that he is actually still asleep, and the self-perpetuating cycle repeats itself over and over. Burgess lapses into a coma. This is the first time that the Three Witches are presented as an interchangeable single entity; The Three-in-One. In previous appearances, they have always been presented as separate individuals.

Sandman Vol 2 1 | DC Database | Fandom Sandman Vol 2 1 | DC Database | Fandom

I didn't realize I did not add an entry for this book, and that I am only updating my reading list after finishing the entire Sandman series. Given the wide variety of characters, and the various storylines that connect, I had to look up what arcs were in this collection. "A Game of You" was in this volume and for that entry alone, this book receives 5 stars. This issue establishes that many of the host characters from DC's various horror anthology titles of the 1970s are denizens of the Dreaming. Cain was the host of House of Mystery, while his brother Abel was the host of House of Secrets. The Three Witches were the featured hosts of The Witching Hour and Lucien was the host of the short-lived Tales of Ghost Castle. Another character that makes a cameo appearance in this issue is that of Raven Woman. Raven Woman is later revealed to be the Biblical Eve, who herself, was the hostess of Secrets of Sinister House. Eve, Cain and Abel were also recurring characters in the humor title Plop!. Meanwhile, ninety-year-old Ethel Dee visits Arkham Asylum in Gotham County. She speaks with psychiatrist Doctor Roger Huntoon regarding her son, John. John is the super-villain known as Doctor Destiny. Huntoon reluctantly allows her to visit John. Dee is in a terrible physical and mental state. He tells his mother that they "took his dreams" away from him.One passage states that Unity Kinkaid dreams of a "tall dark man". On the surface it appears as if Gaiman is describing Morpheus, but it is also possible that he may be describing Desire. Desire's connection to Unity Kincaid is revealed in "The Kindly Ones" story-arc later on in the series. Take the character of Judy, a doomed lesbian woman on the outs with her girlfriend, who appears in one issue only. Did we need to keep the detail that the first queer couple in the story is physically abusive? Did we need the multiple fleeting, florid references to the brutalization of queer, underage, male sex workers? Did we need to create an audioscape of a man “nervously” raping the muse Calliope? Or to painstakingly, without edits, retell the plot-inessential one-shot story “Facade” — the moral of which can be read as “Suicide isn’t tragic if you’re freakish enough”? And could we have taken a second look, perhaps, at the suggestion that “it” is just as appropriate a pronoun as “he,” “she,” or “they” for Dream’s genderfluid sibling, Desire? Image: Neil Gaiman, Colleen Doran/DC Comics The Sandman was written and set between 1988 and 1996, and was undoubtedly informed by contemporary events like the AIDS epidemic in America and England. Its treatment of queer people as sympathetic victims, rather than deserving ones, can be seen as progressive in its time. In that context, it’s perhaps easier to dismiss the comic’s use of homophobic statements as villainous chatter, easier to file its depiction of queer lives as often brutish and short under the umbrella of “contemporary realism.” Fortunately, Gaiman isn’t always the Narrator, and even when he is, the audiobook still has lovely stretches of achievement. The whole opening arc comes off great — the cameos from John Constantine, original Sandman Wesley Dodds, and superhero Mister Miracle are bright highlights. The series also shines in adaptations of Sandman’s single-issue tangent tales, like that of the accidental immortal Hob Gadling, the dreams of cats, and the original 1605 production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.