Gaiman, Neil: The Sandman: Endless Nights
The Sandman: Endless Nights (2003)
Written by: Neil Gaiman
Cover Art: Dave McKean
Illustrated by: Various
This will be my last Sandman-related review for a while, as I'm a wee bit burnt out on The Dreaming and all it entails. So now my daily issues are The Walking Dead, but you won't get my thoughts on that until the end of the year. ;)
The premise: ganked from BN.com: Featuring the popular characters from the award-winning Sandman series, THE SANDMAN: ENDLESS NIGHTS reveals the legend of the Endless, a family of magical and mythical beings who exist and interact in the real world. Born at the beginning of time, Destiny, Death, Dream, Desire, Despair, Delirium and Destruction are seven brothers and sisters who each lord over their respective realms. In this highly imaginative book that boasts diverse styles of breathtaking art, these seven peculiar and powerful siblings each reveal more about their true-being as they star in their own tales of curiosity and wonder.
Review Style: Short and sweet with no spoilers. In fact, I almost lumped it in with the year-end comic review you'll see in December/early January, but since this was never published as individual issues, I decided to review it here. No LJ-cut.
I like this collection on premise: a story featuring on each of the Endless, with different artists illustrating each story. But the stories themselves often left something to be desired (har-har). Of the seven, I found Death's tale, Desire's tale, and Destruction's tale to be the most fully realized and compelling (though Destruction's story wasn't fully resolved and had me scratching my head a little). Death's tale I'd already read in The Absolute Death, and I'll say nothing of it except I like the story and liked the art, but I did not like the rendering of Death. Desire's story was fantastic. I can't pinpoint why specifically, but I loved it. Destruction's was just fascinating, and while it left many unanswered questions, I was pretty engaged.
Dream's tale and Delirium's tale had a lot of promise, but I feel these stories had the same problem that many Gaiman short stories often do: cool premise, lacking execution. I felt I was missing a LOT of context and explanation for Dream's tale, but maybe it's one I need to re-read should I ever re-read the Sandman series itself (however, I learned through other reviews that part of my problem is the tale uses DC universe characters, and that perhaps is the problem, because short of the Endless, I was familiar with none of them). In Dream's, I did like seeing each of the Endless as they were so many thousands of years ago (and I loved the rendering of Death), and the bit of Sol was fun. :) As far as Delirium's story goes, it's got some beautiful moments of art, especially when we see Delirium for the first time, but I'm still not sure what happened and how the rescue worked.
Despair's tale simply didn't work for me. I get the point of fifteen portraits of Despair, but it taught me nothing new and seemed to be a good excuse for some weird-ass art. Destiny's tale was just a waste of space. I read that Gaiman had to make the story elementary to adjust to the artist's limited facilities (in that the artist was ill), but someone else ended up taking over. I understand Gaiman wanting to work with particular people, but what a waste. Destiny's story is nothing but a picture book bio and therefore a disappointment.
My Rating
Glad I Borrowed It: This isn't something you should read unless you've already read The Sandman, and then, it's really not something you should spend money on unless you're a total fangirl/fanboy for this universe and/or Gaiman's work. This is something that's best read borrowed, so you can say you read it, but not feel cheated when you discover that not all of the stories are up to Gaiman's best work. It's got some great art in it though; however, that doesn't make up for the lack of storytelling in most of the sections. Sad, but true. :(
Cover Commentary: It's kind of eye-catching, but not enough to really grab me. I'm pretty sure that's Morpheus beside the mask, and I know for a fact that on the back cover, that mask/face is Death. I liked the checkered, rainbow mask on the front, but I'm not sure who that's supposed to represent (Delirium?), if anyone at all.
Next up: Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld