Some of the Endless are more dedicated to their tasks than others. The younger Endless, especially Desire, are known to play games with mortal lives. Destruction, often called "The Prodigal", abandoned his duties altogether. If one of the Endless is destroyed, then he or she will be replaced by another aspect of their role, but this does not occur if they are simply absent or inactive. In such cases, the aspect of existence supervised by that member of the Endless becomes more random and chaotic. During this time the Universe may attempt to replace that member by putting some of their essences within a mortal, as it did with Wesley Dodds, who received a fraction of Dream's soul while Dream was imprisoned. The story of Death is a haunting one set on an island off the coast of Venice, where a disillusioned soldier on leave recalls his brief encounter with Death as a child, and his second encounter with her as they crash the idyllic party of some decadent immortals who think themselves immune to death. The artwork by P. Craig Russell is precise, evocative, and pleasing, which is no surprise as he also did the legendary “Ramadan”. In 1988, a new monthly comic came out that took an old DC character called the Sandman and transformed him into Morpheus, also known as Dream. He was part of the Endless, a pantheon created from human visions of universal forces; Despair, Death, Delirium, Destruction, Desire and Destiny were his siblings. Unlike so many super characters, the Endless had very human traits. The first few issues took the readers through a melange of different narrative experiments and subtle world-building, until issue eight, when we were first introduced to Dream's sister, Death, and the world of the Endless was established.

Delirium’s story, “Going Inside,” is closer to a traditional narrative, but only by a degree. It’s chaotic and unsettling, and pushes the reader away with its uncompromising approach to image-making at the expense of direct storytelling. Collects:“The Last Sandman Story” from Dust Covers: The Collected Sandman Covers, The Sandman: The Dream Hunters (prose and comics version), The Sandman: Endless Nights, and Sandman Midnight Theatre #1, and supplemental material In contrast to popular visions, Death was a really cute goth who enjoyed her existence; she duly helped to capture the comic-reading public's imagination until the end of the run at issue 75 in 1996. The individual comics were gradually collected into complete storylines in the graphic novels, introduced by writers such as Stephen King, Peter Straub and Clive Barker, which helped The Sandman do the supposedly impossible: cross into mainstream reading consciousness. It received acclamation from luminaries such as Norman Mailer while one issue, A Midsummer's Night Dream, went on to win the World Fantasy award.This story is about several mentally unbalanced people who are brought together on a quest to save Delirium from herself. It's possible at the end of this story that Delirium is somewhat healed in some fundamental way; at least two of the people involved in her rescue are also at least partly healed. Daniel/Dream, Dream's raven Matthew, and Barnabas (Delirium's dog protector on indefinite loan from Destruction), also appear as part of the rescue mission. This directly follows and relates to Delirium's story, and features her as well. A female archaeologist who has constant dreams and visions of variations of a post-apocalyptic world is exploring an Italian peninsula which appears to hold artifacts from the future (they find pennies dated 2019—I was so glad to have found this volume now, while the future in the story is still the future!). The most sci-fi of the stories, in a way, I really enjoyed it, although Destruction's role was rather minor when compared to the other chapters so far.

He did not create the path you walk. But the movements of atoms and galaxies are in his book, and he sees little difference between them. Crazy Homeless People: At least a couple of the "crazies" Dream recruits to rescue Delirium from her own head are homeless. Dream, the character most closely associated with Gaiman, gets rather shorted here, as his story features an ensemble cast. This is a story from the past, when Dream was more apt to love. The Endless meet up with the stars to plan the future. Dream brings his girlfriend, a young from from a planet we'll hear more about in other times. Meanwhile, Despair woos a red sun into tragic plots, and Desire does what he does best. I'm a bit surprised Gaiman tries to link the Endless to the DC universe Canon--he even mentions in the first trade of Sandman that when he tried to do that, he felt he failed. This is a story designed to show why some of the things happened the way they did in the series, and I'm not sure that was needed. It's a very clever tale, however. Yet it's not a real story about Dream. After reading almost all of Neil Gaiman’s fantastic run on the “Sandman” series (to the point where I called the year 2012 “The Year of the Sandman” since I had spent the year reading the Sandman comics), I wanted to read Neil Gaiman’s latest story on the “Sandman” series, “The Sandman: Endless Nights,” even though The Sandman, Vol. 10: The Wake was actually considered the final story arc in the “Sandman” series. “The Sandman: Endless Nights,” which is also a Bram Stoker These are nice tales of the Endless for those who wanted more. But they're just that--more. They aren't the type of writing that makes a person who doesn't normally read "edgy" comics sit up and take notice the way that Sandman changed how I read comics. This is an encore from a man who's doing other things. Because he's so good at writing, they are still good stories. They just aren't what I've come to expect from Gaiman, and I don't think that was his fault. He felt it was time to write more Endless stories. I think he may have stretched that desire a bit too thin here. If we get more Endless, I'd prefer it to be in the form of a one-shot, so that the best idea is what we get. I'd love to read more, too--but only if it really needs to be said. (Library, 01/08)Scheherezade Gambit: To avenge the men who killed her husband, Kara keeps them distracted all night with her beauty, skills, and flattery, until the men of her village return and slaughter them. Near the beginning of the habitability of the universe, Dream and his new paramour Killala of the Glow travel to a meeting of astronomical phenomena, wherein Killalla is astonished to identify the delegates as the very stars, galaxies, and dimensions which comprise the cosmos. At an encounter with her world's own sun, Sto-Oa, Killala and the star fall in love at the behest of Desire, while Dream watches. Here, Death is an unmerciful character and Delight has not become Delirium; whereas the defection of Killala begins Dream's long-standing rivalry with Desire. The first aspect of Despair also appears in the story, quite different in appearance and more sociable than her latter aspect. Delirium: Going Inside": Delirium gets lost in her realm, and Dream II calls mentally ill individuals to find her. Art by Bill Sienkiewicz. Decapitation Presentation: Both Kara's husband and his father were decapitated by rival clans, who then present their heads to the villagers.

It is unknown how Night came to exist. She is the mother to the Endless, but has little interest in her children. The Endless are merely patterns. The Endless are ideas. The Endless are wave functions. The Endless are repeating motifs. The Endless are echoes of darkness, and nothing more... And even our existences are brief and bounded. None of us will last longer than this version of the Universe." Despair I is seen convincing Rao, the sun of Krypton, to create life on an unstable planet so that a Sole Survivor (who will eventually be Superman) can despair.I admit that this one tied into the wider DC universe too strongly for me to fully appreciate, so it's my least favorite in the collection—I like my Sandman to be self-contained. This is the earliest story in the Sandman chronology, set near the beginning of the habitability of the universe—Delight has not yet become Delirium, Death is unmerciful, and we see the genesis of the rivalry between Dream and Desire. The story is narrated by the Sun to the Earth, long before the evolution of life on it, and the illustrations involving space were by far my favorites, while I really disliked the look of Killalla of the Glow's face. The Endless seem to have some rules regarding the way they experience their existence with some definite taboos if they wish things to go as they would prefer. Going Inside, Delirium’s tale, was marginally more readable than Despair’s chapter, but I still find Delirium the most tedious of the Endless. The game just isn’t worth the candle, trying to read through Gaiman’s attempt at creating a tale about madness — too much work for too little payoff. Bill Sienkiewicz’s art, at least, is interesting. All seven stories are written by the comic's author, Neil Gaiman. Each is drawn by different artists. They are: Also, if your local library has a graphic novel section, there’s a good chance that The Sandman is part of their collection.