Netflix's adaptation of The Sandman is remarkably faithful to the comics that inspired it, yet some changes were made to bring the story to life.
Warning! SPOILERS for The Sandman season 1.
Netflix's adaptation of The Sandman makes several changes in transforming the classic comic book series into a show. Many of these changes were due to the series inability to utilize certain DC Comics characters, while others were due to the limits of what can be accomplished on film - even with advanced CGI. Thankfully, the central story is untouched and the changes are largely cosmetic.
Originally published across 75 monthly issues and one special, The Sandman is regarded as one of the best comic book series of all time. It is considered to be the first great work of author Neil Gaiman, who also wrote American Gods and co-wrote Good Omens with Terry Pratchett. Expectations are high for the Netflix series, which came about after an effort to produce a Sandman movie with Joseph Gordon-Levitt failed to happen.
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Netflix's The Sandman has an impressive creative team with ample experience adapting comic books into live action. Apart from Neil himself (who oversaw Amazon Prime's adaptation of Good Omens), the show's production team also includes screenwriter David S. Goyer (who co-wrote the Dark Knight trilogy of Batman movies) and Wonder Woman screenwriter Allan Heinberg. With that in mind, it's no wonder that the show honors the spirit of the source material even while making some minor changes to it.
In the original run of The Sandman comics, the Corinthian was not introduced until the second major story arc, "The Doll's House." A nightmare created to act as a dark mirror to humanity, the Corinthian is an imposing figure, with teeth replacing his eyes. Played by Boyd Holbrook, the Corinthian takes a more active role in Netflix's The Sandman, helping the other antagonists to bind or battle Dream of the Endless while setting his own sinister plans into motion.
In the original Sandman comics, Roderick Burgess was a legitimate wizard and contemporary of real-world occultist and self-proclaimed "wickedest man in the world" Aleister Crowley. The character played by Charles Dance in Netflix's The Sandman has no magical abilities and never accomplishes any great magical works apart from accidentally capturing Dream of the Endless while trying to bind Death. He also has a more sympathetic motivation than proving his power as a dark sorcerer, seeking to resurrect his eldest son, who died during World War I.
In the original The Sandman comics, the helm, ruby and sand constituting the Sandman's tools were stolen from Roderick Burgess by his right-hand man, Ruthven Sykes, and his mistress, Ethel Cripps, who were revealed to be having an affair behind his back. In Netflix's The Sandman, a pregnant Ethel Cripps robs Burgess by herself, after he threatens to force her to have an abortion.
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In the original The Sandman comics, Dream of the Endless was held captive for over 70 years, from 1916 to 1988. Netflix's The Sandman adaptation increases the length of Dream's incarceration by three decades, with Dream finally making his escape in 2021, five years and a century after he was originally trapped by Roderick Burgess. While Dream is incredibly old and essentially immortal, the expanded time scale makes it all but impossible for any mortal to keep him captured. To explain this, the Netflix's show also establishes that Dream's physical presence increases the longevity of those mortals around him.
The son of Roderick Burgess, Alex is made into a more sinister character by Netflix's The Sandman adaptation. While still a largely passive figure, the show's version of Alex Burgess breaks a promise to release Morpheus once his father is out of the way. He also murders Dream's raven, Jessamy, and accidentally kills his father, who died of old age in the comics.
Left in a weakened state following his escape from Roderick Burgess' mansion, Dream is discovered outside the gates separating the Dreaming from the Waking World by the librarian Lucienne at the end of The Sandman episode 1. In the comics, Dream was discovered by Gregory the Gargoyle, who carried Dream to the House of Mystery to recover.
In the original comics, Goldie the Gargoyle was a gift Cain gave Abel in honor of his birthday. In Netflix's The Sandman, Dream gives Goldie to Cain and Abel, after unmaking Gregory the Gargoyle to gain the power he needs to summon the Hecate. This marks another change from the comics, where Cain and Abel surrendered their contracts of employment to empower Dream.
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Matthew the Raven was originally Matt Cable in Swamp Thing before joining the cast of The Sandman, being recruited by Dream of the Endless as a familiar during The Sandman: The Doll's House story arc. Matthew joins the cast much earlier in Netflix's The Sandman adaptation, being recruited by Lucienne in The Sandman episode 3 to act as Dream's spy and messenger in spite of Dream's insistence that he does not require a raven to help him anymore.
After John Constantine aids Dream of the Endless in recovering his magic sand pouch in The Sandman #3, he asks the Dream King if he might get rid of the recurring nightmares of the Newcastle Incident that plague him at night. The Sandman series' Johanna Constantine doesn't make the same request of Dream, but he offers to give her pleasant dreams in exchange for her help after she proves reluctant to assist him. He also reminds her of his bargain unbidden at the end of The Sandman episode 3, once his magic sand pouch is recovered.
At the time The Sandman premiered in 1988, there was a lengthy storyline in earlier DC Comics horror titles establishing how a civil war in Hell had occurred. This reportedly required Neil Gaiman to rework his story to account for Hell being ruled by a triumvirate of demons and fallen angels. By contrast, The Sandman show's version of Lucifer (Gwendoline Christie) is established as the one and only ruler of Hell. The Sandman episode 4 also deviates from the original comics by having Lucifer act as the champion of the demon Choronzon when Dream challenges him to a duel for ownership of his helm. This makes the insult offered when Dream wins the challenge far greater and gives the proud Lucifer a stronger motivation to seek Dream's destruction.
In the original The Sandman comics, Rosemary was a random woman whom John Dee forced to give him a ride to the storage facility where Dream's ruby was being stored before murdering her. In Netflix's The Sandman, Dee spares Rosemary's life and goes so far as to reward her by giving her his mother's protective amulet for being honest with him.
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The cast of characters in The Sandman episode 5 making up the denizens of the diner John Dee dominates with the dream ruby are changed up in several small ways. For instance, in the comics, the waitress Bette kept the stories she wrote based on her patrons a secret, whereas the Bette depicted in Netflix's The Sandman is open about being an aspiring author. Likewise, Marsh was a truck driver who frequented the diner in the comics, while the show makes him into the diner's short-order cook. The show also changes the dark secret involving Bette's son and Marsh.
In the comics, Garry Fletcher was an executive who married his wife, Kate, for her money. In Netflix's The Sandman, Kate is the executive and Garry her trophy husband. The show also draws a connection between Kate and Mark, the young man on his way to a job interview, that didn't exist in the comics by having his interview be with her company. This adds another level to the fight between Garry and Mark later in the story, with the show also changing up the ultimate victor.
In The Sandman comics, Dream was freed from captivity just in time to keep his centenary appointment with the immortal Hob Gadling. In Netflix's The Sandman episode 1, the longer period of time Dream spent imprisoned prevented him from making the meeting. Thankfully, the two were finally able to meet and affirm their friendship in The Sandman episode 6.
In the comics, Lord Morpheus (also known as Dream of the Endless) spies on Rose Walker through Matthew the Raven, manipulating her into helping him find the four rogue dreams that disappeared in his absence. Despite being the main character of "The Doll's House," Rose is a largely passive protagonist, to whom things happen without her having much agency. Netflix's The Sandman rectifies both problems by making Rose into a more active hero and Morpheus into less of a creep, with both characters working together to find Rose's long lost brother, Jed.
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In the comics, Unity Kinkaid was revealed to be Rose Walker's estranged grandmother and Rose Walker spearheaded the search for her missing brother while her mother stayed with the mother she never knew. This is changed up for the show, due to how much time passes in The Sandman episode 1. As a result, the adaptation introduces Unity Kinkaid as Rose Walker's great-grandmother and Rose's mother is revealed to have died at some point in the past six years, presumably to streamline the cast of characters.
In the comics, Lyta Hall and Rose Walker became friends in "The Kindly Ones" story arc, years after Lyta gave birth to her child. Netflix's The Sandman establishes the two women as best friends, with Lyta and Hector Hall described as the upstairs neighbors who basically adopted Rose after her mother's death.
Hector Hall's backstory in the comics is complicated, to put it mildly. The son of the Earth-2 version of Hawkman and Hawkwoman, Hector fought crime as a superhero called the Silver Scarab and was part of the team Infinity Inc. with his wife, Lyta, who was the daughter of the Earth-2 Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor. Hector died in the line of duty, but his soul was trapped by the nightmares Brute and Glob and put to work as a superhero called The Sandman in the false Dreaming they had built inside the mind of Jed Walker. This occurred before Hector was reincarnated and became the new Doctor Fate, as part of a reborn Justice Society of America. Netflix's The Sandman doesn't attempt to replicate any of this backstory, instead making Hector's second life as a ghost in Lyta's dreams an unintended side effect of Rose Walker's dream vortex powers.
Played with gusto by Stephen Fry (The Master of Laketown in The Hobbit movies) Gilbert is a larger-than-life figure, who dresses like an Edwardian gentleman and carries a sword cane. Both The Sandman comics and show introduce Gilbert by having him come to Rose Walker's rescue after she's cornered by muggers in a dark alley. In the comics, Gilbert's arrival was good luck, whereas in the show he states that he was on his way to attend Hal's drag show with the rest of the tenants of the boarding house Hal manages. (In the comics, Gilbert said he had not had the pleasure of seeing Hal's show yet.)
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In the comics, Brute and Glob were two members of the Major Arcana of the Dreaming, who went rogue and built their own little Dreaming inside the head of Jed Walker. Since Brute and Glob are minor but established DC Comics characters, Netflix's The Sandman replaces Brute and Glob with an original character named Gault, who is said to be a shapeshifting nightmare. The show also gives Gault a more noble motivation for her actions, seeking to give the abused Jed a refuge in his dreams.
The refuge Gault fashions in Netflix's The Sandman is a dream world where Jed Walker is a superhero called The Sandman, who protects the children of Earth from various nightmare creatures and supervillains. This role was taken on by Hector Hall's ghost in the comics.
In Netflix's The Sandman, Jed Walker is a victim of abuse, who was only adopted by his father's friends Barnaby and Clarice because of the monthly stipend they receive for acting as his foster parents. This is another example of the recurring horror theme, first introduced in The Sandman episode 5, "24/7," that often times ordinary humans are far more monstrous than the nightmares populating the Dreaming. This is certainly the case with Barnaby, who terrorizes both Jed and his wife, Clarice. This is a change from the comics, where both Clarice and Barnaby were depicted as abusing Jed Walker.
In the comics, Lucien the Librarian was one of the few dreams not to abandon their post in the Dreaming in Morpheus' absence. As the story of The Sandman progressed, Lucien took on a more active role in assisting in the management of the Dreaming, with Morpheus' open approval. Netflix's The Sandman changes this up a bit, introducing a conflict between Lucienne and Dream regarding the librarian stepping outside the boundaries of their assigned duties. This includes Lucienne taking a more active role in the research into Rose Walker's family and assisting Unity Kinkaid with finding a biography of the life she would have lived had it not been for the sleeping sickness that incapacitated her for the better part of a century.
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In The Sandman comics, Gilbert did not reveal his identity as the dream Fiddler's Green until learning that Rose Walker was a dream vortex from Matthew the Raven, hoping that by surrendering himself to Lord Morpheus he might somehow save her life. In Netflix's The Sandman, Gilbert returns to the Dreaming after spotting The Corinthian at the twisted cereal convention in The Sandman episode 9, "Collectors," fearing what he and his followers might do in the Waking World. In both cases, Morpheus finds himself reluctant to punish the noble dream for abandoning the Dreaming.
In the comics, the child predator called Fun Land tried to assault Rose Walker, thinking she was much younger than she truly was, but she was saved by Morpheus, who put Fun Land to sleep. Netflix's The Sandman put an ironic twist on this horrific scene, by having The Corinthian play the hero and stab Fun Land in the back while he was chasing both Rose and her brother Jed.
In keeping with his expanded role as the chief antagonist of The Sandman season 1, the teeth-eyed nightmare known as The Corinthian has a more detailed plan for dealing with Morpheus than in the comics, where he merely hoped to evade his creator. After rescuing Rose and Jed from Fun Land, the Corinthian tries to convince Rose that the Dream King is manipulating her for his own purposes while planning to kill her and that she can use her powers as a dream vortex to build a better Dreaming. While The Corinthian doesn't convince Rose to work with him, he still manipulates her into helping him unite his followers in a dream that could reshape the reality of The Sandman, weakening Morpheus enough that he has a chance of killing him.
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The Sandman season 1 is now streaming on Netflix.
Matt Morrison has been writing about comics since before the word "blogging" was coined. He got his start writing for the legendary DC Comics digital fanzine Fanzing, before receiving his own column, The Mount. Since then he has gone on to write for over a dozen websites, including 411 Mania, Comics Nexus and The Cult of Nobody. He holds both an MS in Information Science from the University of North Texas and a BFA from the University of Texas at Arlington. Known as a font of comic book history trivia, he has delivered lectures on the history of American Comic Books, Japanese Manga, Doctor Who, and Cosplay at over a dozen conventions and served as an Expert In-Residence for a course on Graphic Novels for Librarians at the University of North Texas. In addition to his work for Screen Rant, Matt is currently the Editor In Chief of Kabooooom.com and writes reviews for No Flying, No Tights – a graphic literature and anime review site aimed at teachers and librarians. He also maintains a personal blog –called My Geeky Geeky Ways – which hosts his extensive episode guide for the television series making up The Arrowverse as well as his comedic Let’s Play videos. What little spare time he has is devoted towards acting, role-playing, movie-riffing and sarcasm. You can follow his adventures on Twitter.