#The Sandman: A Game of you

[kamwashere]

just read sandman a game of you. my life is irrevocably changed now.

#dare i say… a game of you >>> season of mists #listen i am saying this as a hob stan #season of mists was meh #i do love how miserable dream was throughout it #BUT MY GOD A GAME OF YOU WAS JUST AMAZING #i love love love when there’s world building outside of dream’s story arc #love it when there’s a different point of view #didn’t really enjoy comic version of a doll’s house but i love that it wasnt in dream’s perspective #idk if theyre adapting a game of you but PLS PLS i need my girls back #the sandman #the sandman: a game of you #the sandman spoilers #kamwashere

[celestialmega]

#comic books #comic book #comics #Colleen doran #Neil Gaiman #sandman #the sandman #the sandman: a game of you #the sandman a game of you

[thenightling]

For those who were confused by The Sandman: A Game of you

I recently found out some people got confused by the storyline of A Game of you so I’ll write it out, simplified here. 

Barbie is the character who had been ironically married to a guy named Ken in The Doll's House. She’s divorced from him now.  Now she's living in a boarding house with a lesbian couple (Hazel and Foxglove AKA Donna), Larissa AKA Thessaly (secretly an immortal witch), and Wanda (a trans woman).

Barbie used to have a fantasy world she'd escape to called "The Land."  It's a bit like Wonderland, or Oz or The Labyrinth from Jim Henson's The Labyrinth if you're familiar with any of those. A "villain" named The Cuckoo has taken over this fantasy land.   One of Barbie’s friends from The Land, Martin Tenbones (A large, furry creature), comes to The Waking World to try to find Barbie. He hasn’t seen her in a long time and he wants to deliver her the Porpentine (actually the rose quartz dreamstone).  This jewel allows the wearer to control The Land, much like how Morpheus controls the majority of The Dreaming.

*This part is only revealed in The Sandman: Overture.  A long, long time ago Some Old Gods tried to take over The Dreaming and chained Morpheus in his own dungeon.  Morpheus called out to each of his siblings one at a time for help.  One by one they refused as they were much prouder and meaner back then. Delight was in the middle of “changing” into Delirium so she couldn’t help.  Finally Morpheus was forced to call on Desire who sent him a lover, Alianora.  Alianora had helped free Morpheus and kill The Old Ones.  From their bones Morpheus made his helm.  Over time Morpheus and Alianora fell out of love and Alianora had no where else to go so Morpheus gave her a skerry (a small island) out in the distant part of The Dreaming.  He also gave her the rose quartz dreamstone so she could govern it.*

Now it’s many centuries later and lots of women have used this Skerry as their fantasy land.       Martin Tenbones unfortunately gets killed just as he finds Barbie. 

George (who also lived in the same building as Barbie, Hazel and Donna AKA Foxglove, Larissa AKA Thessaly, and Wanda) turns out to be a minion of the cuckoo and is not quite human anymore (if he ever truly was).  He sends terrible nightmares to all of the women to prey on their insecurities. For Hazel it’s because she’s pregnant from a one night stand and she doesn’t know how to tell Foxglove (Donna).  For Wanda the dream is about being forced to surgically transition because she’s not being accepted as a woman (the audio drama changes it to just fear of surgery, period).  

Barbie is in some sort of coma.  

Thessaly (being secretly a two-thousand-year-old witch) figures out that George isn’t what he seems and that he is causing their nightmares.  So she kills him, cuts off his face and nails it to the wall... as you do...   She then calls his soul back to the face to force him to tell them who he’s working for and why.

 The group decide to rescue Barbie and use forbidden magick to open a way to physically enter The Dreaming- something you’re not supposed to be able to do.  In the original comic Thessaly claimed the Goddess of the moon would not accept Wanda because she’s not a “Real” woman.  Some readers mistook this as fact, that it was Neil saying Wanda isn’t a real woman. In reality this was just Thessaly being what we’d today call a TERF. Remember, she’s really a very old woman and a bit of a bitch.  

The thing about the moon not accepting Wanda is NOT in The Sandman audio drama at all.  In that version Wanda stays behind to watch Barbie because someone needs to guard her. Foxglove finds out about Hazel's pregnancy and the two decide to raise the baby together.

 After Hazel, Foxglove, and Thessaly enter The Dreaming, a terrible storm hits the boarding house where they lived. Wanda sees a homeless woman who is mentally unwell (she has a serious fear of dogs) and who had previously been rude to Wanda.  But Wanda rescues her from the storm anyway and dies trying to save her. 

Meanwhile in The Land The Cuckoo wants to make Barbie destroy the porpentine (dreamstone) because The Cuckoo accidentally got trapped in Baribe’s fantasy world as her villain.  She (the Cuckoo) cannot leave it until the stone is destroyed.  The Cuckoo spends most of the story in the form of Barbie as a little girl.   It should be noted that the characters in The Land refer to their God as "Murphy." This, of course, is actually Morpheus, but over several thousand years his name got distorted in The Land / The Skerry (island).

One of Barbie’s anthropomorphic muppet-like animal friends (a bird creature) betrays her other animal friends and even pretends to be the Cuckoo to slow down Barbie’s friends. The bird was in The Cuckoo’s thrall. Thessaly kills the bird.  

Barbie does, indeed, destroy the dreamstone while under the influence of The Cuckoo.  This gets Morpheus’s attention.  Morpheus arrives and draws all the characters and settings of The Land back into himself and (though Thessaly REALLY wanted to kill the Cuckoo for what she did) Morpheus tells Thessaly to let her go.  The Cuckoo takes off and flies away.

While uncreating The Land Morpheus meets up with Alianora and they have a friendly conversation.  She may or may not be a ghost, it’s hard to tell.  But he clearly still has some feelings for her and calls her ”Old Love.”

Morpheus scolds Barbie’s human friends for entering The Dreaming unnaturally (physically) and implies he’ll leave them there forever but at the same time he tells Barbie that he owes her a boon. He is pretty much heavily hinting that she should use the boon to save her friends, which, of course she does. 

One by one everyone wakes up / returns to The Waking World however behind the scenes Morpheus and Thessaly become lovers.

Barbie attends Wanda’s funeral where Wanda’s bigot family misgender her and deadname her the whole time, including on her tombstone and sadly this still happens with a lot of trans kids.  Barbie places a Weirdso comic on Wanda’s grave.  Weirdso (a stand-in for Bizzaro) was Wanda’s favorite character.  She also writes Wanda’s true name on the headstone in her favorite lipstick.

While dreaming Barbie is visited by Death and Wanda. Wanda is in a pretty dress and finally has the feminine features she always wanted, proving she was always and truly is a woman all along and that the bigots have always been wrong.  

And that’s pretty much it.     

#The Sandman #Sandman #The Sandman: A Game of you #The Sandman A Game of you

[cornsword]

Happy International Women’s Day

#the sandman #sandman #neil gaiman #shawn mcmanus #a game of you #wanda #international women’s day #comics #vertigo #vertigo comics #karen berger

[three--rings]

You know one thing that occurred to me watching Sandman so far is that someone out there is going to watch this show and be like “ugh why did they have to put so much gay shit in it, this is just typical of 21st century woke politics cluttering up everything” and not realizing this is just how the comic was in the 19fucking80s.

There’s a reason us baby queers attached so hard to it when we were in our teens, okay?

#okay except for Johanna Constantine because it was originally john constantine and therefore a straight relationship #but like they're both bisexual canonically so that's not a win for the straights #the sandman #sandman netflix #wait until a game of you

[stardusted-bookworm]

"Hob?"

Hob Gadling smiles, eyes tired. He loves that voice so much.

"Hullo, Dream." Even to his own ears, his voice sounds slurred, tight with exhaustion.

"It has been many a night since I've seen you in my kingdom last. Are you well?"

Hob chuckles. How far they've come. "Yeah, I'm all right, love. It's just been difficult for me to sleep recently."

Dream hums, seemingly upset on his behalf. "Your new neighbor."

It wasn't a question and yet he answers it like one.

"Yeah." He sighs. He doesn't know if he has the strength to continue.

The bed dips gently as Dream settles beside him. Hob hopes this liberty will go unpunished as his head rests upon his friend's shoulder. Dream briefly stiffens before relaxing, accommodating the new touch with relative ease.

"She's young," Hob continues. "My neighbor, I mean. But these walls are thin, and after a couple nights, it becomes difficult to stay asleep when all you can hear is the clicking of a keyboard and shouting at a video game."

Silence reigns over the apartment for but a moment. Then, the noise Hob had talked about begins to fill the space.

He smiles. So tired, he's so tired.

A hand threads through his hair, gentle, soothing.

"Sleep, my friend. I have you. None will disturb you as long as I am here."

And what could Hob do but listen? Dream guides him down until he was resting on his lap. Lithe fingers continue to brush through Hob's hair, lulling him to sleep.

The best and most continuous night of sleep he's had in such a long time.

#how i imagine it ends: #dream: don't worry. your problem has been taken care of #hob *joking*: you didn't kill her did you? #dream: *suspiciously silent and sipping tea* #hob *concerned*: you didn't kill her did you? #dreamling #hob gadling #dream of the endless #sorry if this is bad #it's mostly a vent bc i am also kept awake by the sounds of loud gaming #first post for this fandom <3 #the sandman #ace writes #my writing

[writing-for-life]

A Game of You—Shawn McManus

#the sandman #sandman #dream of the endless #morpheus #sandman x art #sandman art #shawn mcmanus #a game of you #sandman march mania #congrats Shawn #and I have to give it to you: #I truly believe you are the sandman artist who most understands how desperately Murphy needs a laugh #because you’re always trying to sneak in a little smile or smirk #or put him in situations that are totally absurd #queue crew

[jazzy-a]

You ever read a fanfic and immediately go:

"F*ck You!" *clicks bookmark* "..I'm keeping this forever."

#the sandman #death note #red vs blue #demon slayer #stranger things #tmnt 2012 #yu-gi-oh #shadow and bone #avatar the last airbender #hazbin hotel #game of thrones #Oh fanfiction...you get me everytime #legend of zelda

[orionsangel86]

SANDMAN SPOILERS

(Im a slut for spoilers)

Soooo we got Tom, Kirby, and Indya Moore filming in a graveyard. There is a mysterious red book. Clearly set in modern times. Indya looks very glamourous and at one point is holding hands with Death.

So my speculation is that this is Wanda's graveyard scene (its not announced but it does look most likely that Indya will be our Wanda? Maybe? Who else could this be?). The presence of Dream and not Barbie however is rather interesting. Then again we know that Wanda is getting some form of expanded/combined role so perhaps this is a deviation from the comics? Who knows!

Still its exciting. Credit to the *gag* Daily Mail *gag* for doing what they do best and spying on film shoots and celebrities.

#the sandman #sandman season 2 #sandman season 2 spoilers #im relieved at least that it looks like Game of You is being adapted in some form #but maybe in a slightly different way? #dream of the endless #death of the endless #wanda sandman

[celestialmega]

#comics #comic book #comic books #Shawn McManus #Neil Gaiman #sandman #the sandman #the sandman: a game of you #the sandman a game of you

[jack-the-fool]

Dream: "Did I hear you say you have no intention of ever dying?"

Hob: *internally* "Weird pickup line but not the weirdest i've heard"

#you can't tell me that's not what he was thinking #hob was game from the jump #the sandman netflix #the sandman #dream of the endless #hob gadling #dreamling #off topic but apparently we can edit tags now? hallelu #sandman dream #sandman hob #jack.txt

[rosenkranz-does-things]

I know this is not a typical Sandman fanart, but I really want to see Wanda's story adaptation. So I did a lil comic redraw

#the sandman #death of the endless #sandman netflix #a game of you

[two-hands-toward-the-sun]

and to be completely honest i don’t even think the majority of the show!sandman fandom on tumblr would even like a game of you! dream barely shows up. there aren’t really any (human) male characters to ship, only—qué horror—canonically queer women. hell, who’s the white dude people are gonna latch onto? fuckin’ george, the asshole whose face gets sliced from his head, brought back to life, and nailed to a wall while the rest of his corpse hangs out in the bathtub? and aside from the tumblr fandom, imdb ratings went down significantly when season 1 pivoted to focus on rose, and reviewers complained about how there wasn’t enough of dream. multiple factors point to the idea that a game of you would have an extremely disappointing audience response, and unfortunately that might reinforce the idea to executives and such that people don’t want to see wlw stories at front and center. and our girls deserve so much better than all of this potential bullshit. so i would in fact prefer for a game of you not to get adapted in full, because it would break my heart a little to see people hate on it.

#the sandman netflix #the sandman #the sandman comics #a game of you

[im-not-corrupted]

Oh I would adore to hear about bygone sin, I’m obsessed with that fic! (🤘five-and-dimes)

Of course!

Chapter five is actually mostly complete! I say mostly because I haven't begun edits yet, and I'm still incredibly unsure whether it's what I need it to be. But once I finish stuff for the Sandman fic exchange, I'll start edits.

”Dream,” he murmured, and he seemed—unsure. Nervous. “I know I asked already, but are you—are you sure you’re alright?” When Dream didn’t reply, he lowered his voice. It was but a whisper, now, shared only between the two of them. Perhaps, in another circumstance, Dream might’ve found it…somewhat intimate. Perhaps. ”It’s okay if you aren’t,” Hob assured him. “You’re allowed to not be okay.” He tensed again. That, there—that was anger, flashing bright red and ugly, but it was familiar. It was heated, melted away the remnants of fear that gripped him when that glass shattered like it did, and he glared up at Hob Gadling, who simply stared back, unafraid. Later, he’d wonder when that had happened. When Hob Gadling became unafraid of him. When they had grown familiar enough to warrant only a soft sigh, one that sounded almost disappointed. For now, though—for now, he allowed himself to ask through gritted teeth, “Why would I not be alright, Robert Gadling?” To not be is a weakness, Dream wanted to add. Do you think me weak? He thought of his hand, bleeding from a knife wound, and the tenderness with which Hob cared for him. He thought of the comfort offered and bestowed upon him as though it was so easy. It was not the suggestion of weakness that inspired anger, not really. It was the knowledge that, in the end, Hob Gadling was right. Dream was weak—he relied so heavily on these meetings that he attended only to repay a damned debt, he sought out Hob’s company not because his presence was owed to the other man but because, somehow, Hob had started to…to represent something.  Warmth. Friendship. Care, which was the most baffling out of all of them. Hob offered all these things easily, simply, as though Dream was deserving of such things. As though he thought him worthy of it. He was not. He was not, but he was too selfish to deny it for himself. Those warm welcomes, the way Hob continued to hold open the door to his apartment above The New Inn even though Dream still didn’t understand what led him to do so, the soft smiles tender touches be was offered—they meant too much, and he was terribly selfish. Too much so to consider letting this go.

#the sandman #dreamling #dream of the endless #hob gadling #dreamling fic #the sandman fic #morpheus dream of the endless #eris writes things #my fic #like atonement for a bygone sin - fic #wip title tag game #five-and-dimes #fun fact: you are the sole reason chapter five is in its half-done state five-and-dimes #you asked about it the last time i got tagged in this game and it prompted me to finish the rest of the chapter lol

[thesandwomen]

i love wanda so much. her favorite color is tacky flamingo. she wants to know how you milk a soybean. she Cannot Be Seen with a cute frog mug. her vocabulary and voice are so distinctive on the page. her coffee always tastes like something died in it but she can make a mean chocolate soufflé. when she was little she wanted to be grow up to be a bizarro. she may not always be kind but she is absolutely compassionate. she’s snarky and lovely and vibrant and vulnerable and certain of herself and a wonderful gem in the sandman’s cast of vivid characters

#full of love for her!!! #wanda the sandman #the sandman #the sandman comics #a game of you #the sandwomen sing

[writing-for-life]

Death & Wanda—Caitlin Yarsky

#the sandman #sandman #death of the endless #Wanda Sandman #a game of you #caitlin yarsky #queue crew