tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3139769202527811820.post530765066166431158..comments2024-01-01T23:38:43.414-08:00Comments on The Oncoming Hope: Re-Blogging Sandman: Issue #1 Sleep of the Justtheoncominghopehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03471519506797609837noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3139769202527811820.post-78344777116540722732011-04-29T17:28:33.447-07:002011-04-29T17:28:33.447-07:00Finally just reread P&N. So, catch-up will beg...Finally just reread P&N. So, catch-up will begin. I really do enjoy the way he introduces Dream. You're filled in about him (at least somewhat artificially) by that void in the world he left. I hadn't remembered much of this (as it was years, too, since I had read it). <br /><br />One of the more striking images in the first chapter - for me - was the frame-by-frame aging of the captors. You see them aging and the people around them changing. It's the flow of life around Dream that struck me. To him, really, this is normal. As an immortal, this happens all the time, but the readers are given a taste of it through this artfully convenient setting. As Dream would normally be among the immortals or in and out of dreams, trapping him forces the reader to see time as he might see it, passing effortlessly by. <br /><br />As the waitress says in the later volume of P&N, if you let the story run on long enough, it will always end in death. We just get to see the story moving rapidly along that way. Fascinating to reread, I must say. Love the visuals and the storytelling.<br /><br />- PeterAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3139769202527811820.post-22845445313732425552011-03-22T03:45:27.364-07:002011-03-22T03:45:27.364-07:00It does indeed appear in Good Omens, as well as Pr...It does indeed appear in <i>Good Omens</i>, as well as Pratchett's Discworld stories (where it's also known as the <i>Necrotelecomnicon</i>). <br /><br />I live in hope that Teresa Nielsen Hayden will one day resume her own <a href="http://bit.ly/fGeSOs" rel="nofollow">readalong</a>. After finishing the first and only installment, I can see why she might not have the time on her hands.<br /><br />I'm amazed to find I'm still missing details that are staring me in the face. I thought those prison guards looked familiar...Timhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01146596310417716160noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3139769202527811820.post-81860413878871685592011-03-21T17:09:16.970-07:002011-03-21T17:09:16.970-07:00Ha! Oddly enough, I mention this in post #2 or #3,...Ha! Oddly enough, I mention this in post #2 or #3, about how Morpheus is a bit of a blank slate that gets filled in slowly across the series.<br /><br />You're right though, about how it should be a mess, but isn't. Gaiman is in full control of the plotting from the start, even when he has to accede to publisher demands on various other points.<br /><br />I have a lot more appreciation for this issue than some of the other issues in P&N. It's allowed to be enigmatic, since it's the introduction.<br /><br />(also, I do believe the paginarum fulvarum reappears in Good Omens?)theoncominghopehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03471519506797609837noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3139769202527811820.post-91631666802359182082011-03-21T17:01:09.520-07:002011-03-21T17:01:09.520-07:00I'm coming back to this after a gap of five ye...I'm coming back to this after a gap of five years. It's better than I remember. I always think of <i>Preludes</i> as the bit to slog through before the good stuff starts, but there's so much here to enjoy. <br /><br />The striking thing is how much we don't learn about the Sandman from the first issue. We know he's that he's powerful, and proud, and ruthlessly vengeful. Clearly he plays some important role in the cosmic order of things, but is he the hero or the villain? <br /><br />For that matter, what kind of book is this going to be? The first issue has an act of brutal revenge (eternal waking), gross-out horror (headsplosion!), and a Lovecraftian cult that's frequently close to pastiche (with that dread grimoire the <i>Paginarum Fulvarum</i>, or as we know it: the <i>Yellow Pages</i>). That mixture of tone is reflected in the artwork. It should be a mess, and yet it's not. It's more like a bundle of unresolved possibilities - a cat shut in a box. <br /><br />After thirty pages and seventy years have passed the box is opened. The prisoner is loose - and would you believe, he takes the form of a cat?Timhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01146596310417716160noreply@blogger.com