The Sandman Season 2: What We Can Expect from Netflix Series
The Sandman Season 2 is all set to start filming next year. There is another world waiting for us when we close our eyes to sleep… a place called the “Dream Realm”. where Sandman, Lord of Dreams, gives shape to our deepest fears and fantasies. The character, perhaps the most important creation of the British novelist and screenwriter Neil Gaiman (award-winning all-round narrator who has worked both in the field of American superheroes and on original subjects), has reached a vast and varied audience in thirty-five years of editorial life, thanks to its breadth of vision, the fascination aroused by characters and events, the refinement of the language and the cultured references to world history and folklore expressed in a way that is both enchanting and never banal.
This is not something easy to adapt into a live-action. Still, Netflix, working directly with its author, has succeeded in the impossible, creating a faithful and, at the same time, intelligently reworked version, literally conquering audiences around the world in the summer of 2022. Since then, the ten episodes (plus the animated special) of The Sandman have been seen and reviewed continuously by old and new fans, who are clamoring for the continuation of the events: where are we at? Gaiman recently confirmed that production has resumed and that “good things are coming”… and we’ll have to be patient a little longer.
The Sandman Season 2: Gaiman Speaks
Gaiman explains: “We never know where dreams will take us. Thirty-five years ago, the first issue of The Sandman came out and set many people and characters on paths that seemed, even then, so unlikely as to be impossible. At the time, most comics featured superheroes. Sandman, it wasn’t. It was nothing that had been seen before, but magically (with magic consisting of hard work, youthful arrogance, and a few key figures who believed in that vision) we had the opportunity to tell the story I had in my head and bring Morpheus and the rest of the Eternals to life.
Just over thirty-six years ago, in October 1987, the worst storm in at least five hundred years left my house without power and my family trapped in our little village by fallen trees, and I invested my time writing the assumptions for the first eight issues of Sandman. Thirteen months later, in November 1988, the first issue of Sandman hit comic bookstore shelves. Like those who follow a path in the garden of Destiny, I look back and see no clear path stretching behind me. At times on this journey, going back has felt impossible, and I don’t think I could have imagined the impact these characters would have on people or the world. When I look at the path ahead, however, I see no darkness. I see how the world of The Sandman continues to grow and evolve and take new forms.
This week we officially resumed production on the next sequence of The Sandman stories for Netflix. Brilliant showrunner Allan Heinberg, along with the endless array of people in front of and behind the cameras, are building something infinitely special, and bringing these stories to life in a way that once would have been unimaginable. A journey is about to begin and will take us from the Garden of Destiny to Hell, from the Heart of the Dream to ancient Greece and revolutionary France, and from there to places that not even I can imagine on the screen. I’ll be patient. Good things will come”.
What Can We Expect From Season 2?
What do these words tell us? For those who don’t already know Sandman they certainly can’t help but be cryptic, but from the clues cited and from the fact that we know the serial is an adaptation that isn’t afraid to dare but is always very much based on the original work, we can certainly guess at least from which comic books Gaiman will include the new episodes. First of all, a clarification: so far there has never been official talk of a “second season” but rather of ” new episodes “. Does this have any value? In a certain way yes, given that the events of the first installment of episodes did not have the same process and a horizontal plot that concluded and awaited a new beginning: the next ones will continue the story as it was already progressing, without chapters waterproof.
Sure, Dream has returned to his kingdom and has (momentarily?) defeated Lucifer, but not all the mistakes have been rectified, his Eternal brothers still have a lot to say and Hell is in turmoil… plus the return of all the characters important characters seen in the first season, many others will be introduced in the new episodes, inspired by the comic narrative arcs of “The Season of Mists”, “Short Lives”, “Thermidor”, “The Song of Orpheus”…
Orpheus is one of the first characters whose presence has been leaked: he is the son of Morpheus and Calliope and will probably boast a fair amount of importance in history. Speaking of family, here come the other members of the Eternals: Destiny, Delirium, and Destruction, with their heavy load of burdens… There will also be no shortage of “Sandman versions” of some of the most famous deities of the classical world: both Norse mythology and the Hellenic will be affected. And if the latter was almost obvious, given the origins of characters like Orpheus, which lead us back to characters like Persephone, Eurydice, and Hades, not so obvious, for those who don’t know the original comics, would be the inclusions of Thor, Odin, and Loki, decidedly more faithful to the Nordic myths than what we have seen, for example, in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
The names of the new cast members have not yet been confirmed: we are unlikely to see a revival of voices/faces taken from the Amazon audio drama (as did not happen for the first season) but several names of actors are circulating (not very well known, in truth ) seen on set in undisclosed roles: Indya Moore, Ruairi O’Connor, Charlotte Bate, Daphne Alexander, Amber Rose Revah, Esme Creed-Miles, Barry Sloane…We don’t know when we will be able to view the new episodes: realistically, not before autumn 2024. In the meantime, we will be able to console ourselves with the Dead Boy Detectives series, which features the two supernatural detectives Edwin Payne and Charles Rowland born in the pages of Sandman and who we have already seen at work in Doom Patrol. Now they will have a series of their own (reboot unrelated to their appearance in the Doom Patrol serial) which was originally supposed to air on HBO Max but was recently diverted to Netflix, effectively falling into The Sandman canon, although we’re unlikely to see it – at least for now – some very specific direct references.
