Over the years, there have been numerous attempts to turn Neil Gaiman’s immensely popular graphic novel series “The Sandman” into a movie or streaming series, and it’s finally happening, with Netflix giving us a lush, moody and ambitious adaptation that occasionally skirts the borders of camp with its lofty monologues and fashion-forward shenanigans but remains entertaining and involving throughout.
“The Sandman” opens with Tom Sturridge’s Morpheus, aka Sandman, aka Dream (we’ll just stick with Morpheus here), explaining that while humankind insists on calling the Waking World “the real world, as if your dreams have no effects on the choices you make…. there is another life that awaits you when you close your eyes and enter my realm, for I am the King of Dreams and Nightmares.” All right then! This opening is accompanied by some beautifully rendered visuals of the metaphysical realm known as the Dreaming, which is simultaneously familiar and unsettlingly strange.
