 Hi everyone, this is Chih-choh. Welcome to my channel and welcome to another comic book reading. And what we're going to do today is read Sandman number 8, the first appearance of death from the second Sandman volume that came out in, began in January 1989. And the writer for this, the creator for this is Neil Gaiman. And in collaboration basically with Sam Keith and Mike Dringberg, my apologies for not pronouncing that correctly. They came up with this universe and the way Sandman began, the reason Sandman came to be was basically, it was sort of a, I don't know if it was a byproduct, but it basically came to be because of the UK invasion, during the UK invasion of artists, writers and artists and creators that hit the DC universe in the 1980s. And Alan Moore was really sort of one of the pioneers for this as was Grant Morrison and Neil Gaiman and a lot of other British writers and creators, and artists that came out during that period. And this is Sandman number 8. I'm going to crack this open and hopefully we will lose the glare on it, because I have this in mylar. And this is the first appearance of this character here, death. And we're going to get into a little bit of history of the universe that basically Gaiman created, Neil Gaiman created, which is extremely in depth, very intricate universe. The mythology on it is brilliant. It's that par with every other great mythology throughout history that human beings have created. And that's saying a lot, right? And as you can imagine, there's a lot to talk about here. So this is going to be sort of a little introduction to the universe that Neil Gaiman created and the character here that we're going to read the first appearance of, right? And the way it came out was basically DC Comics, right? Had an idea to re-envision the Sandman character that was really created in the golden age of comics. The first appearance came out in 1939, I believe. And basically that character had certain attributes of the Sandman character that was sort of reintroduced, revamped in 1970s and 1974 by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, right? And what basically happened was DC Comics approached Neil Gaiman and they asked him to reimagine the Sandman character and try to create a series around it. And Neil Gaiman, just so you know, he was a British writer and his fame, he basically acquired a lot of fame from this series and he's published a tremendous amount of comic books and a tremendous amount of books based on this universe as well as other fantasy science fiction universes that he's created, okay? I know sort of jumping around a little bit, but there's a lot there to unpack and we're going to try to tackle some of that, okay? So this is the first appearance of Death, okay? Basically created by Neil Gaiman and Mike Dringeberg, right? Because Sam Keith that initially was involved with the Sandman books, he basically worked on issue number one to five and after that he left the series and Mike, I won't pronounce the name, but Mike was basically brought on to work on the Sandman universe with Neil Gaiman and Mike basically worked on 11 issues and there was a lot of other artists and pencilers and inkers that worked on this series as well. There were basically three to four creators that stayed with the series, all 75 issues for the whole run. One of them was obviously Neil Gaiman that wrote this series, right? Envisioned the series. The other person was Todd Klein which did the lettering for the series and the lettering for the series is absolutely brilliant. I'll give you a taste of some of the artwork that we're talking about here. Okay, this is the first straight paperback. I don't know if it's the first print of it or not. I should be able to find this out. I don't know if it's the first print. It might be the first print, but that introduction copy, that cover on completion, I don't know if this is the first print but basically this is the type of artwork that we're talking about. It is absolutely brilliant, magnificent. It might have been a little rougher at the beginning because the universe was just starting to be created. And this is Sam Keith's work that we see here and it's only for the first five issues but what you end up seeing with the lettering. Let me find a good panel for you for the lettering about where we see dream talking. And it was groundbreaking as far as the lettering is concerned because basically the first character that we're going to take a look at or the character that we're going to take a look at right now is death. And death is part of a family, siblings that are called the endless and there's seven endless characters. There's seven siblings that occupy this universe and occupy basically their realm, which is called the dreaming. And what they ended up doing for this series was basically for each of the seven endless characters and the characters were basically called dream which is the main character of the Sandman universe and dream is this character right here. Also known as Morpheus. Morpheus, I believe so anyway. What we're going to refer to him is dream. For each of the siblings from the endless Todd Klein came up with different word balloon styles. So dream had this black background, white lettering with a little white surround on it. And each of the seven siblings had different type of lettering on them and the seven siblings are known as dream, death which is first appearance in Sandman library that we're going to read. Destiny, desire, destruction, despair and delirium which was also known as delight. Also went by the name delight. So here is dream talking and the lettering is unique especially for dream and this sort of comes into play towards the end of the Sandman series. I've read spoilers unfortunately. I mean take a look at this. This is classic, classic Sam Keith. Look at that beautiful, beautiful artwork. Absolutely magnificent series. So Todd Klein that the lettering for this series he was with it from issue number one all the way to issue number 75 as far as I know, okay. And the one person that really contributed a fair bit to the comic book in terms of its uniqueness was Dave McKeon and Dave McKeon did all the covers for all 75 issues of the Sandman series. So there was a brilliant consistency for this universe that Neil Gaiman created, okay. And just to let you know, one more thing I'd like to mention because I mentioned about Alan Moore, right. And if you recall we did a, I put out a video regarding sort of a local television program I used to watch at university during the early 1990s and it was called Prisoners of Gravity and Prisoners of Gravity was a series that sort of local television series that was available in Ontario on a local TV channel that was basically about science fiction fantasy comic book genre talking about all the possibilities of our society and some of the characters and just basically universes being shared through science fiction fantasy and the comic book genres, right. And in that series that I believe ran for about five years or so you can take a look at the video we put out talking about that series with Commander Rick, right. But in that series, Commander Rick interviewed Neil Gaiman a few times or a couple of times at least and he cut parts of those interviews into multiple videos, right. Multiple segments, right. But he had a couple of in-depth interviews with Neil Gaiman and I remember in one of those interviews he asked Neil Gaiman how he got into comic books and how it is he thought about creating comic books coming up with the SAMA Universe and Miracle Man and stuff like that and how it was taking over from Alan Moore and I recall him mentioning that and I'm going by memory here I wasn't able to track down that video. There was a lot. I went down the rabbit hole with this reading because I really wanted to do it justice, right. Because if anybody, if you read this universe the SAMA Universe it deserves to be portrayed in the right light which is something that I'm trying to do give you the history of the creator DC Comics how it played out in the comic book industry which was extremely important and how it was that came to be, right. And basically Neil Gaiman in that interview this is something that he mentioned. He stated that he was at a train station with his father and I'm going by memory here so don't quote me on this if you can please track down that video and I will if I track it down I will link it in the description of this video he stated that he was in a train station with his father waiting for the train to come and while they were waiting he went into a local convenience store and he picked up an issue of Saga of the Swamp Thing by Alan Moore and I believe he mentioned it was a first issue of Saga of the Swamp Thing by Alan Moore not the first issue that Alan Moore took over from the previous writer Alan Moore in the first issue was sort of finishing off the story from the previous writer but issue number 21 I believe it's issue number 21 of Alan Moore Swamp Thing and if you haven't read this series this is basically the first two trades of Alan Moore Swamp Thing it collects issue number 21 all the way to number 34 I believe if I'm not mistaken let's check this out let's make sure we're correct on this this one is the second one it collects issue number 28 to 34 and there's multiple printings of this I believe this is the first printing and this one is the first printing and this collects issue number 21 to number 27 and Neil Gaiman mentioned that the first time he really appreciated what comic books were capable of is when he picked up this issue Saga of the Swamp Thing by Alan Moore and the other creators which is Steven Beset and John Toth-Libbon and he read through this and it blew his mind and that planted a seed for him where he really went on the course to create comic books, to write for comic books and this series as an aside is absolutely magnificent it is a must-read for any comic book aficionado anyone who's interested in science fiction, fantasy anyone who's interested in lore, mythology and basically humanity in our society absolutely brilliant I just wanted to lay that out there just to give you a feel of where Alan Moore where Neil Gaiman has come from and what he was the footsteps he was following and he did a magnificent job magnificent job on everything that he did and his masterpiece as many would agree was Sandman so this is issue number 8 this is what we're going to read now just to give you a little history of the comic book medium and how Sandman played out how important it was for the comic book industry and this medium that we share information artists and creators create contests for us to consume now Sandman came out a year after Hal Blazer number 1, Hal Blazer was introduced DC Comics was printing some comic books Swamp Think was one of them Hal Blazer was one of them Sandman was one of them Animal Man, Doom Patrol were two other ones printing some series titles that were more mature related but one thing that was going on back in the 1990s, 1980s it started off in the 1950s and we've talked about it and that's the comic code authority censorship in comic books and all of this came out in the golden age of comics where a book was really saying that comic books were polluting children's minds and a whole bunch of hysteria broke out and people freaked out and there was comic book burnings and boycotts and there was congressional hearings and what not and we covered a fair bit of that information in a previous video we did or two videos we did one of them was talking about the comic code authority and reading the code itself so DC Comics was printing some comics which were a little bit more mature related so they saw the tides turning so what they ended up doing was under the control of DC Comics they came up with a new imprint which was called vertical this name right here and vertical exists right now to this day it's an imprint of DC Comics sort of a subsidiary of DC Comics where they print more mature content and what DC decided to do during that time and this was in 1993 where the vertical imprint came to be what they decided to do was create the vertical imprint and release all the titles that were more mature under the vertical imprint and that included Sandman Doom Patrol Animal Man Black Orchards and a whole bunch of stuff and just to show you how important this vertical imprint is to the comic book medium and to a lot of readers including myself because death is one of the most beloved characters in the DC Universe it is extremely important and there's a lot of people that got into reading comics because of Sandman because of Neil Gaiman's work and this is sort of a trade paperback that I picked up a while ago, I'm not sure when this was printed I believe I picked this up at a discount bin of all places when was this printed and this sort of gives you a history this trade paperback is called vertical vision artwork from the cutting edge of comics so they came up, DC Comics came up with this imprint to sort of put all the titles that were not this was printed in 2000 all the titles that were sort of more mature related under the vertical title and basically this book trade paperback is really nice actually if you look at your comic book history it sort of goes through and breaks down what was going on with vertical comics and DC comics at the beginning and then sort of the different phases of things kicking in all the way to trans metropolitan everything that's being put out right now from preacher and whatnot and it goes through and it gives you a layout of the first few books actually a lot of the books up to 2000 I guess that they were printing under the vertical imprint and this is Swamp Thing and this is brilliant and Swamp Thing I believe went under the vertical imprint with issue number 47 or might have been Sandman that went into the vertical umbrella with issue number 47 and this is Swamp Thing I mean brilliant artwork and brilliant storytelling this is Hal Blazer and as you know Hal Blazer as far as I'm concerned was one of the greatest titles ever created and this is Dave McKeon did a lot of covers for Hal Blazer as well and this is one of the covers this is one of my favorite covers from Hal Blazer Hal Blazer number 61 done by Glenn Fabby and you can flip through this I believe Sandman is the next one that they talk about Sandman is the next one that's covered in this trade paper back shows you some of the artwork talks about some of the history some of the artist creators Sandman is another title that came out that was based on the dreaming being the universe that the endless their home basically and the endless are basically the character death being one of the seven siblings of the endless they're basically beyond gods they've existed since the beginning of time and they basically have certain power that they use based on the function that they have been assigned to be right books of magic was absolutely magnificent as well and this was written by New York and I love the books of magic especially the first the prestige format that came out I believe it was three or four prestige format right so the endless are basically people consider them to be natural forces and they have a certain function in life and their lives cannot end unless they want their lives to end and that has occurred a couple of times in the endless mythology so we won't continue flipping animal man was absolutely magnificent as well especially when Grand Morrison's animal man I guess you would call this so that's the vertical vision if you can get your hands on the trade paperback you'll give you a nice history and a sort of chronological order of how important vertical comics was to the comic book medium and just on the point of vertical comics now vertical comics the imprint came to be in 1993 and that trade paperback came out in 2000 so we have a seven years of history in that trade paperback talking about what transpires since 1993 and the way DC comics released vertical title the imprint was basically by releasing a death miniseries this is the first issue this is the second issue and I have the third issue as well they released the death 3 issue series and number 3 is buried somewhere and at the same time they were releasing this they converted all the titles that they were going to release under the vertical title with the vertical logo on there which included Sandman with issue number 47 included animal man swamp thing and whatnot so death was really the starting point of vertical comics and the special that they had DC really pushed this imprint this series and the way things were going to unfold just to let people know that this was not going to abide by the comic code authority the incentive that they gave comic book retailers at the time was that if they had ordered 25 issues of the first vertical imprint for each of the titles they would get a special death platinum issue death platinum of number 1 so it was a sort of incentive cover of death number 1 what was called the platinum death number 1 and retailers that ordered at least 25 issues of each of the first vertical titles they would get a copy of death number 1 and I have a copy of that unfortunately it's not in amazing shape but that's another story that we'll get into at some point most likely so there's 3 issues miniseries and this was a fantastic little miniseries and as far as where death has gone since Sandman now Sandman the story arc existed outside of the main DC Universe for quite some time they crossed over with some of the vertical titles but death made her first appearance in the main DC Universe with action comics number 894 and this is the artwork for the first appearance of death in the regular DC Universe and should we crack this open take a look at how death looked like in this well it looked like that but basically she and I've read this I got this in a previous comic book and I showed it to you I hadn't had this before and let me just take this off let's put the tape here and let's take a look at this basically the story of this is Lex Luthor is dying dead on the verge of death meets him because death is basically sort of reimagining of the death character that we know of in mythology and her role is really to be present when someone dies and when someone is born so her power is sort of to help in the transition of life to a certain degree I'll read you a couple of things that I want to read you quotes that I came across when I was going down the rabbit hole for this but this is sort of the artwork for this comic book and you can get this fairly on the cheap I've seen it go for $2 or $5 if you go and buy it now on eBay it's more expensive it's just the auctions that you can get it on the cheap if you're lucky enough so keep that image in mind because when we read Sandman number 8 it's the same character but it's a little heavier to a certain degree and each artist has their own sort of reimagining of the character and just one more note regarding death before I read you a couple of quotes that I want to read you regarding this book that is just recently this year I guess it's been in the works couple of years for DC Comics basically DC Comics released their first issue of what is called the dreaming and I believe there was 3 number 1 issues telling different stories telling different stories there were standalone comics but it's basically bringing the Sandman universe into the fold of the whole DC universe and this was issue number 1 of the dreaming the Sandman universe entering the realm of the DC universe where they've announced that they're going to be creating a lot of new characters and bringing back some of the older characters and it's going to take some of the secondary tertiary characters that were introduced in the dreaming series which was I believe 60 issues and expanding on them so just DJ's basically opened up a whole new universe with tremendous potential that we're going to have the pleasure to read and I still haven't read this one yet so I can't tell you what's really going on in this and I didn't really want to give any spoilers to myself so I didn't really look up to see what the story was that was being shared in this standalone so aside from that let me put these guys away and what we're going to do, we're going to crack open Sandman number 8 and I'm just hoping that I covered as much as I can in this short little introduction to the DC universe or to Neil Gaiman's Sandman universe that he created and this comic book as far as Greek goes I'm not sure if this is the issue that I've read when I bought it because I have a handful of copies of this I loved Sandman when it was coming out but this comic would be considered to be there's a little bit of coloring I don't know if it's a smudge but where I guess right there but this would be considered a 9.2 if you were generous you would give a 9.4 if you weren't generous you would give it a 9 so this is graded at near mint near mint minus maybe near mint plus I believe is 9.6 so it's not a 9.6 not in my book anyway maybe some people will grade it as 9.6 I doubt it and the back cover I would give this a 9.2 personally near mint minus if you weren't being very generous at all you were being extremely hard and unforgiving you would give it a very fine near mint which is 9.0 now before we get into the reading of this let me read you a couple of quotes because I was going to summarize who this character is and the endless but I want to read you and where this character came to be and this character came to be from a real life person so let me read you I printed some quotes here my apologies I'm going to read this to you but I think it's important to read these to you and my printer still I haven't fixed it up yet but it works now regarding the endless which death is one of them the seven siblings that have been around since the beginning of time they have existed for billions of years and from some accounts they will come to be they will only end when this universe ends and they will come to be when a new universe is created right here's a quote this is in Sandman volume 2 number 48 and this is destruction which is one of the endless explaining who the endless are right the endless are merely patterns the endless are ideas the endless are wave functions the endless are repeating motives the endless are echoes of darkness and nothing more and even our existence are brief and bounded none of us will last longer than this version of the universe and that's one of the endless saying who the endless are and here's another little write up from who death of the endless is death of the endless came into existence shortly after the first life forms appeared in the universe she would function as the embodiment of death until the very last living thing died and after that she was destined to put the universe to rest death is both lord and personification of all death and life death meets with the recently deceased and guides them into their new existence unlike most personifications of death she also visits people as they are born evidently only she seems to remember these encounters and in terms of immortality of the endless like all endless death can only be heard besides if an endless is destroyed is personification and powers are instantly transmitted to another person who must become the new embodiment of the aspect death is really a natural force of function that death has to be and here's another quote regarding the origin of death according to Neil Gaiman the initial visual design of death was based on a friend of Mike Tringenberg's named Cinnamon Hadley and let me read you this quote from Neil Gaiman and Mike is basically the artist that took over with issue number he inked issue number 1 to 6 and he took over the penciling work from issue number 7 I believe and this is Neil Gaiman talking about death death is the only major character whose visuals didn't spring from me that credit goes to Mike Tringenberg in my original salmon outline I suggested death look like rock star Nico in 1968 with the perfect cheekbones and perfect face she has on the cover of her Chelsea girl album but Mike Tringenberg had his own ideas so he sent me a drawing based on a woman he knew named Cinnamon Hadley the drawing that was later printed in Sandman 11 and I looked at it at the immediate reaction of wow that's really cool later that day Dave McKeon and I went to dinner in Chelsea at the my old dutch pancake house and the waitress who served us was a kind of vision she was American had long black hair was dressed entirely in black black jeans t-shirt etc and wore a big silver anchor on a silver necklace and she looked exactly like Mike Tringenberg's drawing of death end quote and the person that death was sort of created the visual Cinnamon Hadley she passed away at the age of 48 January 6th this year in 2018 and at the time when she passed away hit my radar I ended up reading the trade paper back again issue number 1-8 of Sandman but here is I'll provide the links to this website in the description of this video but here is an interview that was conducted by Cinnamon hopefully I'm pronouncing that right and this is the question that they asked her right how did you get involved with Neil Gaiman and this is her reply and I'm quoting right now Mike Tringberg the original artist for the Sandman was a good friend of mine who could use me as a character for a comic book I said sure I didn't know anything about comics and I didn't know it was even anything special I certainly had no idea it would be what it is now funny story about 3 years after Mike asked me if you could use my likeness I was living in Houston having moved from Salt Lake City and I was at a friend's house my friend told me his favorite comic was the Sandman and showed me an issue when I opened it I saw a picture of myself staring back at me it was one of the two photographs actually used and just inked over I said oh my god that's me I had no idea I was in the Sandman and I had even forgotten about being asked by Mike as the model I thought that was important to share with you guys and what we'll do right now is have a read through Sandman but there's one other thing I want to show you and I've shown you this in a previous video that we did when I showed you my graded comic book collection I have maybe eight of them and three of them are issue number one two and three of Sandman that's how important this series is to me and many other people and as far as I'm concerned that's how collectible it is and I bought these as far as I'm concerned on the cheap cheap cheap and these prices here they're Canadian so this comes out to about $78 $80 US so this is Sandman number eight and number one graded at 9.4 for those of you that like graded comics I thought you'd get a kick out of this here's Sandman number two graded at 9.4 and check this out I paid $50 Canadian for it basically around $40 US a little bit less here is Sandman number three graded at 9.6 that cost me $40 Canadian which is around $28, $30 or $32 Canadian or US my apologies right and these are three of the prides in my collection as well and I do have the original Sandman series fairly deep so I thought what we do now since we've done a nice little intro to this is have a read through this and what I'm going to do as well there's a pretty in-depth introduction at the beginning of this and we're going to read the first page of it and the last paragraph of that introduction because it sort of gives you a summary of where we are and just to give you a heads up here actually I'll show it to you, I'll show you the panels after we do that reading in the trade paper rack maybe but a brilliant cover, absolutely beautiful the cover again by Dave McKeon take a look at this publisher, publisherial publisher editorial I guess, Janet Kahn president and publisher DC Comics let's read the first couple of paragraphs of this but I want to read you mainly, I'm going to read you some of these things sort of the quotes and I want to read you this first page sort of that builds up to the story here, okay but I haven't read this yet so let's just read the first couple of pages a couple of paragraphs of this ok I walked into Mike Gold's office and stopped short, there on his desk was a thrilling piece of artwork Hawksman Visage resonated resonated from out of the background bold, imperious primal and all his primitive hawk gear the burnished golds of his helmet pulsated against the basic field of midnight blue this was a character to be reckoned with, hawk world will be in store so this is sort of giving you let's check this out this is sort of talking about what DC Comics is releasing I guess, right so we'll skip that part because it's not really related to the Sandman universe and we've got a fair bit of reading to do in this, right Sandman goes beyond their wildest dreams so these are some creators that have commented on Sandman so let's read, well there's Alan Moore here for sure Steve Bissetta's work with Alan Moore so who's this guy Ramsay Campbell, author, sacred, stiff incarnate, hungry, moon, the influence let's read that first one, okay the theme and territory of dreaming are as vast as the imagination of whoever deals with them and I couldn't wish for better guys than Neil Gaiman and his collaborators their Sandman is clearly an adventure for them and a treat for the rest of us unpredictable as a dream, it should be a cause for rejoicing for all those who value the fantastic, right here's Alan Moore okay, with Sandman mainstream comic book fantasy finally moves from enchanted forests populated by elves and barbarians towards the haunted contemporary dreamscape of Jonathan Carroll or Clive Barker, bizarre and fascinating that's a pretty high praise for Alan Moore Steve Bissetta, Sandman is the latest and most playful entry in DC's horror trilogy Swamp Thing and Hellblazer, honorably preceded and dark, merciless journey into the dream plane written with precision, wit and vision forget the golden age Sandman Neil Gaiman's Sandman is here to stay agreed, agreed, agreed even though he liked the golden age Sandman and what Kirby had done, right Clive Barker, what does Clive Barker say Neil Gaiman is a star right, I can look at some of these who else should we read fantasy author, wow this is high praise there's a lot of praise on this let's read the first page intro in the beginning, but of course we never see the beginning we come in the middle after the lights have gone down and try to make sense of the story so far whisper to our neighbors, who's he, who's she have they met each other before, we get by in this case let us imagine our neighbor to be to be tall, rope perhaps and old, monkish garments his face hidden in the shadows of his cowl he smells of age and dust, not unpleasantly and in his hands he holds a book as he opens the book, leather bound undoubtedly and every word in it, traced meticulously by hand, we hear the click of metal and realize the book is chained chained to his wrist, never mind we have seen strange things in dreams and fictions are merely frozen dreams linked images with some semblance of structure, they are not to be trusted no more than the people who create them are we dreaming, possibly but the man in the robe talking, his voice is like the rustling of old parchment in the library late at night when the people have gone home and the books begin to read themselves we strain to listen, the story so far and this part of it goes into what has transpired in Sandman 1 it was not enough that Roger Berger was a man, he was a vain one and presumptuous, he was not contempt with riches or with the leadership of the old order of ancient mysteries, although the order was in no wise ancient, having been founded only 16 years earlier at the return of the century by Berger himself he desired notoriety among his peers and he craved physical immortality the year was 1916 in the world outside the great war dragged on and a funny ring, his Sussex house Derrick Berger conceived the plan he would capture death, bind the reaper and death that he is talking about here is the death, the first appearance that we are going to read but this is occurring in Sandman 1 with an invocation with a stolen grimoire he performed a rite of summoning I suspect he was in true surprise when his invocation bore fruit when a figure took shape in the circle in the basement of his manor, it was not death the man in the circle was dressed in black his head hidden by a helm carved of bone and glass and metal fires danced in the velvet darkness of his robe around his neck hung a precious stone a ruby and by his side was a leather pouch drawn tight at the top by cords, but did Berger's know then what he had got, did he guess at the forces that had already weakened Morpheus the lord of dreams, that Berger's chance of summoning had provoked the final straw to someone, something already tried tried almost beyond endurance ok, now what's being explained there is what is being shown in Sandman the first few pages of Sandman that's number one, the one that I have graded and I have other copies of it as well showing this, showing this he does the magic invocation and dream appears and that is what is being explained and the text goes through and explains what has occurred so far up to issue number eight, which this issue is happening, and keep in mind this person that captured dream was really trying to capture death now, let's go to the text here and let me read you this paragraph here ok, we are still listening to the story waiting for some kind of conclusion when our neighbor closes his book, the cold chains that bind, blind destiny to his book, Ching quietly the story of course, far from finished but we know we will get no more of it, from this source and this comforted, we take our leaves, the mists are rising and it is time to be getting back we come in the middle watch for a time, leave before the lights go up, if there are no beginnings then there can be no endings we are alone in the darkness, every answer prompts another question and things are happening all the time that's all you need to know for the time being trust me, the story so far maybe it's all we can ever hope for number eight, the writer Neil Gaiman artist Mike Dringenberg Malcolm Jones III colors by Robbie Bosch associate editor Art Young editor Karen Berger the sound of her wings and this is dream here the person we saw that was captured let's take a look at the artwork hey mister, someone calls out that was a killer catch man totally wicked, can I have the ball back no, this? here sitting kicks it thanks, you want to play ball? no, no, thank you I am feeding the pigeons, dream says that's cool, what are you doing death says feeding the pigeons you do that too much, you know what you get that's a line from Mary Poppins I love that movie you ever see it? there's this guy who's literally a banker and he doesn't have time for his family or for living or anything and Mary Poppins, she comes down from the clouds and she shows him what's important fun, flying kites, all that stuff super, super fragilistic expend the cautious, super fragile I could never say this when I was watching Mary Poppins super fragilistic expend the cautious what dream says? pigeons sitting on his head super cali fragilistic expialidocious super califragilistic expialidocious, that's great literally, fabulous word it means, you know, great wonderful kimchi, gnarly death says peachy keen waga waga waga vroom, yay it's a cute movie, maybe not everybody's thing but you know, dick van dykes British accent defies belief, oh, it's a jolly old dyke when you marry pence penis you know, cute jolly, old dyke when you marry Poppins jolly, that's Mary Poppins only when you marry Poppins I can't understand those words he's a little sad okay, so what's the matter? death asks so what's the matter, Dreama? or death asks what do you mean, Dreama? what's the matter? I know something's wrong I mean, look at you, sitting there moping it isn't like you perhaps it isn't I don't know what's wrong but you're right something is, something is the matter when they captured me imprisoned in their box I had just one thought, revenge by the time I freed myself my original captor had gone the way of mortals and I took my vengeance on his son it felt, it felt fine I suppose but it didn't feel as satisfying as I'd expected in the interim my dream world had fallen apart I needed my tools long since stolen and scattered one by one I found them eventually I found them the pouch was relatively easy to regain the helmet I challenged the demon dared the hordes of hell face down Lucifer himself ah that left only the ruby the ruby was a human had been using it I hate to think what toll it must have taken on his mind or his soul we fought in dreams the stone no longer mine was sucking me into its fabric it was terrible and thinking it was my life he was crushing he destroyed the ruby he destroyed it it freed me I freed everything it freed everything of me that was in the stone I got it all back I was more powerful than I had been in eons I returned the human to the madhouse you see until then I'd been driven I had a true quest a purpose beyond my function and then suddenly the quest was over I felt drained does that make sense I had been sure that as soon as I had everything back I'd feel good but inside I felt worse than when I started I feel like nothing you asked there you asked I'm sorry maybe I don't have an answer have you finished? that says yes could have called me you know I didn't want to worry you dream says I don't believe it let me tell you something dream and I'm only going to say say this once so you better pay attention you are literally the stupidest most self-centered appallingest excuse for anthropomorphic personification of this or any other plane an infantile adolescent pathetic specimen feeling all sorry for yourself because your little game is over and you haven't got the balls to go and find a new one on the head what was that like a water bottle I don't believe this dream you're as bad as as desire or worse didn't occur to you that I'd be worried silly about you hey the scream comes from the side the ball's flying towards them again I didn't think dream says that's exactly it you didn't think you lummox you overgrown bubble headed boop she catches the ball oh she's pissed look at this that is angrier dream wow the person that kicked the ball says give me strength that says killer catch you're as mean a ball player as your friend here he's not my friend that says he's my brother and he's an idiot just feeding the birds dream says just feeding the birds look I can't stay here all day I got work to do can you come with me here and sulk I don't mind either way I'll come with you I suppose don't do me any favors so hey fox like you want a soda could I see you again sure franklin you'll see me again soon okay how did you know my name my names franklin or somewhere else soundless we travel no heads turn to mark our passing the churning crowd parts as we walk through it looking everywhere else but not at us in the world of the waking of the living we move silent as a breath of cool wind as we pass them people shiver and look away mutter to each other feels like someone walking over my grave I heard one man say like someone just walked over my grave violin music echoes down the stairwell sounding frail and out of place I recognize the tune although it is being played very badly I heard it last in London 200 years ago these are dreams thoughts we know because of can you rocker romani can you patter flash can you rocker romani can you fake a bush guys singing yes I can patter romani harry can you I don't hear nobody come in the guy says that was death replying right I don't hear anybody come in can I patter romani not so good but I can make a bush means to play the fiddle I'm not real romani the guy says and romani is the correct word for gypsy used to play the restaurants and clubs when I was younger scarf around my head you pick up scuff stuff I'm no gypsy I'm a yid an old jewish dying lonely in new york yid I believe is yiddish yes I know who you are harry do you know who I am you you're no not yet please yeah I know who you are he says excuse me something I got to say always used to wonder if I would but you know hey what day hey shama yusrael adona alaha nu adona elhood here oh israel the lord our god the lord is one and I think he just passed away he said his prayer right there beside death watching himself I look so empty I look so old he says it's good that I said the shama my old man always said it guaranteed you a place in heaven if you believe in heaven so I'm dead now what he asks now is when you find out harry death says draws him close from the darkness I hear the beating of mighty wings oh there's a wing in the background I thought he was sweet didn't you sweet I do not know perhaps dream replies my sister when I was captured it was not me they wanted it was you yeah I know what death says come on I don't want to miss the next one afternoon nobody wants comedy they want to drink in peace make us animations do their deals Esme has to fight for every laugh she gets it beats it beats waiting tables that's the comedian I guess right next person that's going to brands are sweating seriously don't you ever wonder about batman how he got started I can see him over breakfast saying to his wife morning hun listen I got something to tell you I quit the job at the ad agency so what are you going to do now Ralphie I got it all figured out I'm going to dress up like a bat and fight crime you're going to what Ralphie have you talked this over with your analysts and what about Robin now that kid she continues but if they had captured you the consequences dream masks that still continuing on from the conversation they told her that it was her that they were looking for to capture from Sandman number one that we found I want to hear this that's the sentence you're the punchline about Robin what was the build up to the punchline what about Robin that kid was hey my bell reach out and kill someone and this deep voice says well there's more here more where that came from might have missed the punchline they like her waves of approval of sweet laughter wash over her now she's going places yake she's a scream I think she gets electrocuted yeah touching the microphone yake those assholes I don't believe it that screw win mic was live those cheap no good who are you she asked the porps I just realized every comedian's nightmare dying on stage he he she says I thought you were really funny that replies no but I would have been she says why wouldn't I have had a few more lousy ears I would have made it to the top why she asked I'm sorry Esme your time was up come here honey I hear the sound of her wings I dream again he's just telling it along no one here gets out alive the background graffiti says gets me down too mostly they aren't too keen to see me they fear the sunless lands but they never but they enter your realm each night without fear us and I am far more terrible than you my sister dream says we don't know if anybody died here I swear that's a stevie reyvon hat stevie reyvon used to wear a hat like that I wonder if some of these characters are stars of the past ucha ucha ucha I have to fix her up or him up but is that all there was is that all I get the baby says look now right yes I'm afraid so death replies that's all the baby gets just a few days or a few weeks I guess the sound of wings dream says mother comes back in look bufu mama's got you something lovely honey stores the crib drops the milk does her function about humanity their attitude to my sister's gift is so strange why do they fear the sunless lands it is as natural to die as it is to be born but they fear her dread her feebly they attempt to placate her this page out most likely a suicide a drowning an accident old age and murder dreams make no promises take a look at this love the details in this art dreams make no promises let's continue with this page but they fear her dread her feebly they attempt to placate her they do not love her many thousands of years ago I heard a song in a dream a mortal song that celebrated her gift I still remember it death is before me today like the recovery of a sick man like going forth into a garden after sickness and that's in quotation marks so is the song that dream is remembering death is before me today like the recovery of a sick man like going forth into a garden after sickness oh this is an overdose death is before me today like the odor of of Myron like sitting under a sail in a good wind death is before me today like the course of a stream like the return of a man from the war galley to his house death is before me today like the home that a man longs to see after years spent as a captive that forgotten poet understood her gifts my sister has a function to perform even as I do the endless have their responsibilities I have responsibilities I walk by her side and the darkness lifts from my soul I walk with her and I hear the gentle beating of mighty wings dream talking to death you have taught me something I had forgotten I thank you my sister to me man over here the guy says they're back at the start by the fountain with the kids playing soccer to me man over here he says that's what family is about death replies the dream thanking her little brother listen I've got the head back soon I see you death says just one last appointment and then I have to go you have given me much to think about dream says he says that death looks away yo Franklin the kids playing yell out they throw the ball yo Franklin I'm telling you man she said she'd see me again soon she knew my name that's one bad lady get the ball bug brain this friend says ball bounces in the streets lambs on the brakes whoop Franklin friends yell out oh no look at the face of the lady devastated bounces right to dream and death again right wow when that car came out I thought I was gone for sure that's what you thought that's what you thought death says hey it's you when you said you see me again soon I didn't think you meant this soon hold that thought Franklin see your dream don't be a stranger okay waves goodbye now death says talking to the boy now before you say anything else you better come over here there's something you may you may be ought to see she walks up to the accident goodbye sister dream says there is much to do in my kingdom much to restore much to create but that can wait I have found the soul as I thought sought though not in the way I imagined from dreams I conjure a handful of yellow grain I throw the grain into the air and I hear it the sound of wings brilliant and the things with Sandman is spreading sand around but it's grains that is spurting around beautiful beautiful beautiful and the pigeons are flying again the sound of wings that we got introduced to at the beginning right with the sound of wings and the pigeons absolutely beautiful story we'll step back very nice story as for the comedian in here she didn't realize Batman has never been married he almost got married and that's Sandman number 8 the first appearance of death fantastic story I hope you enjoyed and if you like that read most definitely check out this series it is well well worth reading that's it for now and I'll see you guys in the next video