Neil Gaiman reveals he spent last 30 years preventing Sandman adaptation

Writer Neil Gaiman has said he spent the last 30 years preventing interpretations of The Sandman, but feels the upcoming series is the “adaptation of their dreams”.

The new dark fantasy drama series is based on Gaiman’s beloved award-winning DC Comics series and is set to air on Netflix from August 5.

It will follow the people and places affected by Morpheus, the Dream King, as he mends the mistakes he has made during his vast existence.

Gaiman told the PA news agency on the red carpet for the UK premiere of the series: “I spent the majority of the last 30 years stopping adaptations of Sandman and hoping that they didn’t happen.

“So all of a sudden, here we were actually making an adaptation of Sandman and it was the adaptation of our dreams.

“We had the money to make it, we got to put together the cast of our dreams, and that it was just a matter of not messing it up and I really don’t think we have messed it up.

“I’m really proud of what we’ve made so it’s been awesome.”

The writer added one thing that fans will be familiar with but new viewers might find “very strange” is that no episode will be like one another.

He explained: “Some of them are going to get really dark, some of them are going to be warm and human and inspiring.

“Some of them are you’re going to go to Hell, and you’re going to go to a serial killers convention but you’re also going to wind up in a little London pub once every 100 years from 1389 onwards, watching the Sandman Morpheus meeting a friend in a pub, and it’s just not going to be the same thing but it’s always going to take you to places you’ve never gone before.”

Tom Sturridge will star as Morpheus with Gwendoline Christie playing Lucifer Morningstar, the ruler of Hell.

Kirby Howell-Baptiste, Lourdes Faberes and Joely Richardson will also all star in the series.

The Sandman TV series is set to air on Netflix from August 5.