🐱 Netflix’s The Sandman divides LGBTQ+ fans and sparks passionate debate on representation

https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2022/08/08/the-sandman-lgbt-netflix/

https://archive.ph/Wv2mB

Netflix has divided LGBTQ+ viewers with its high-stakes adaptation of The Sandman.

The Sandman, an adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s comic book of the same name, follows cosmic being Dream as he tries to regain his power after being imprisoned for over a century.

Like the source material, the Netflix series is filled with LGBTQ+ representation – but some viewers feel conflicted over the execution of the plots and the characters.


Some viewers raved about the inclusion of non-binary character Desire, played by a non-binary actor Mason Alexander Park.

Dubbed the “the non-binary love child of Lady Daga and Gillian Anderson,” by one fan, Desire has been a huge hit.

“Desire slayed so hard in The Sandman and i’m so happy to see a non-binary character with a non-binary actor <3,” wrote one fan.

However, some accused The Sandman of biphobia over the characterisation of Johanna Constantine (Jenna Coleman, playing a gender-flipped version of a comic book character named John Constantine).

“I get that humans are flawed whatever their sexuality and lots of relationships are messy or end badly, but does EVERY bisexual have to be a bad person in this show?!” one Twitter user said.


Other viewers disagreed with this take, arguing that including horrible bisexual characters doesn’t necessarily make a show biphobic.

“There are so many bi and pan characters on The Sandman that it is ridiculous to cry biphobia because one of them is selfish and ruthless. The show might be biphobic if all bi characters were portrayed that way. Instead, there is a deep, gratifying diversity among them,” said one tweet.

The Sandman has, of course, drawn predictable backlash over the mere inclusion of queer characters, as well as for casting actors of colour like Kirby Howell-Baptiste, who plays Death.

When Netflix announced the cast of the adaptation in 2021, Gaiman shut down bigotscomplaining that its characters weren’t all straight, cis and white.

“I give zero f**ks about people who don’t understand/haven’t read Sandman whining about a non-binary Desire or that Death isn’t white enough,” he tweeted.


He confirmed Desire is also non-binary in the comic books, adding: “But you’d have to have read the comics to know that. And the shouty people appear to have skipped that step.”

 

[breadandcircuses]

Was that the Hobbs arc where he's a peasant given eternal life to meet Dream at the tavern every 100 years, and she picks up on the legend? I don't remember chapter/book names for the most part, but that's where I remember her from. That should've kicked off a spin-off series, I'd have read more of that shit

Yes, it was.

It's a bit more complicated then that. Death decides not too take Hobb, but since Dream convinced her, he has too meet him, tge same day. Every 100 years. It's the best single issue story.

I wonder, since the Corinthian is a villain, if we get the Brilliant Cereal Convention Arc.

Edit: Never mind. They did and it's awful.

 

[Tasty Tatty]

Ok, but what about the plot?

 

[Ser Prize]

> Panders to the mob
> Gets ripped apart by the mob for made up reasons anyway

You'd think they'd learn.

 

[Ser Prize]

It wouldn't be a Netflix production if they didn't nig up a major white(literally ghost white) character. View attachment 3580670 View attachment 3580667

They did that shit with Domino in Deadpool, too.

 

[theshitposter]

catparty and his another shill post. people keep their adblockers up to avoid this kind of trash. i curse you with early erectile dysfunction

 

[Standardized Profile]

I have no plans to watch the series, but I saw some clips on YouTube. Half the characters had been transformed into black women. Men, women, old timey British upper class, and of course redheads, all must be black women. Lucien? Black woman. Death? Black woman. Unity Kincaid? Black woman. Unity's granddaughter Rose? Black woman. Random nurse that Dee kills? Black woman. It was distracting.

Has Neil stopped pining for redheads and embraced the gingercide? Is this a tacit rejection of his still-technically-married wife?

 

[St.Davis]

My sister mentioned intending to watch The Sandman when I was walking my dog the other day. I'm glad that my gut reaction to every show she decides to like is "It is shit" has continued to be accurate.

 

[Airbrushed Van Art]

Meh, Gaiman was always a bit pretentiously woke. Nearly all of his male protagonists were spineless losers who were upstaged by ladies all the time.

 

[Crazedking]

you know i just recently started watching it. My favorite episode was episode 5. The one that contain the least black woman. Why are black woman inserted literally everywhere? Get some other minority for godsake.

But back to episode 5. I actually found it hilarious. The dyke woman beat her girlfriend, The older grizzled male the waitress liked actually was a pedophile that raped her son. The black trophy husband was a degenerate bisexual coomer that immediatly resorted to violence after his wife fucked a new boytoy and he sucked the pedo's dick. It was actually kinda hilarious how the lgbt were all terrible people there.

 

[Ken Rosenberg]

I have no plans to watch the series, but I saw some clips on YouTube. Half the characters had been transformed into black women. Men, women, old timey British upper class, and of course redheads, all must be black women. Lucien? Black woman. Death? Black woman. Unity Kincaid? Black woman. Unity's granddaughter Rose? Black woman. Random nurse that Dee kills? Black woman. It was distracting.

Has Neil stopped pining for redheads and embraced the gingercide? Is this a tacit rejection of his still-technically-married wife?

They have only one trick that they insist on using again and again.

 

[Ser Prize]

Meh, Gaiman was always a bit pretentiously woke. Nearly all of his male protagonists were spineless losers who were upstaged by ladies all the time.

Don't forget having Thor be replaced by his black son.

 

[The Token Ethnic]

These people just want to keep shoving Mason Alexander Park down our throats.

They're using him as a cursed relic to ruin any live action adaptation of a beloved series. He was annoyingly bad in Cowboy Bebop.

 

[Haramburger]

They did that shit with Domino in Deadpool, too.
View attachment 3580913

I remember that, a nigress stunt double died because of that casting lol

 

[kcbbq]

It's absolutely fitting that death would be black. Murder is their primary skill.

 

[cybertoaster]

"passionate debate" its just marketing speak for "deranged autistic screeching"

This might literally be the worst an adaptation has ever been done.

But

The plot is fine

Then its not the worse, the boys series completely eviscerated the original with a plot thats already irrelevant because trump is no longer in office.

 

[Matt Damon]

Anyone still trying to appease the woke mob in 2022 deserves everything they get.

 

[Chad Holdenford]

You just wait, when they reach the parts with Shakespeare and Emperor Norton, they'll be black women too.

 

[The Feline Solution]

Watched the first episode a couple of days ago and it was pretty meh. Never liked Gaiman's high falutin' prose that much and the comic was all about the artwork for me, which gets almost completly lost in this adaption. Not going to watch more than that first episode.

I do think the guy who plays dream is well cast though, and his early Cure hairstyle makes me nostalgic for the days of innocence and goth makeup.

That's the only real positive thing i have to say about it, too. After catastrophic casting choices in the likes of Preacher or The Boys they finally casted an actor as the main character that looks like his comic equivalent. Urban in The Boys would be spot on, too, but they did have to make him have a manly-man beard for no reason, fuck that.

It wouldn't be a Netflix production if they didn't nig up a major white(literally ghost white) character. View attachment 3580670 View attachment 3580667

I already knew before watching that they niggerfied Death, but come ooon... worse than Ruth Nega as Tulip.

 

[Irrelevant]

How does Netflix handle the trans character getting left behind and dying because she's not a real woman and can't escape through the moon magic portal with the other women?

 

[MirrorNoir]

Isn't Johanna Constantine supposed to be John's ancestor in the Victarion age from the Men of Good Fortune story?

Yes but Netflix wasn't granted a temp license to use John (who appears in an early Sandman issue) as Warner had pretty much yanked the character from usage in all media projects due to JJ Abrams wanting to raceswap him for a new Constantine project he was working on for Warner.

The "workaround" was to use Johanna and have her have an identical descendant instead of rewriting the part with a generic replacement character.

How does Netflix handle the trans character getting left behind and dying because she's not a real woman and can't escape through the moon magic portal with the other women?

They'll come up with some OC plot thread to have Wanda not be killed off, or merge the adaptation of Sandman with Death's mini and have Wanda chasing after an amnesiac Death.