Death: High cost of living review
I still haven't forgiven the Netflix Sandman series for having death be so callous about Nada being in Hell (suggesting that it's been so long so Morpheus should just leave her there even though she knows it's wrong for her to be there).
So I went into this with a bit of a chip on my shoulder.
This is the final episode of The Sandman Netflix series, a bonus episode focussing on Death.
There are few random changes I don't quite understand. Why swap out Death eating a hot dog for a veggie flat bread? That seems like an odd change. Also why not set her day off in America like it was in the comics? I get that the UK isn't big on our "Gourmet" hotdogs but "Make mine with everything" is a better joke with a hot dog than a veggie flat bread.
Also I think the writers of The Sandman Netflix series accidentally showed their literary ignorance.
For starters, I get the metaphor, but TV shows of the last twenty or so years keep confusing what a soul is, and spending most of the episode deliberately misleading the audience about what Mad Hettie's soul is, is unnecessarily confusing.
And more importantly it should have been her heart that they had to retrieve because that was a deliberate reference to the fairy tale "The Giant who had no heart." (Sometimes retitled "The Heartless Giant.")
This particular story (The Giant who had no heart AKA The Heartless Giant) was adapted in Jim Henson's The Storyteller. The Storyteller was going to have a revival with Neil Gaiman's involvement. It's now probably shelved but John Hurt, who who starred in The Storyteller, was going to voice Morpheus for a never-completed Batman the animated series episode written by Paul Dini.
It's kind of sad that the writers of The Sandman Netflix series didn't understand the fairy tale reference or use it.
The loss of Foxglove (Donna) as the musician was noticable if you're familiar with the comics. It added to my disappointment that A Game of You was not adapted.
I also dislike that apparently Death was summoned (and didn't realize it). The only reason Roderick Burgess succeeded in summoning Morpheus is because he was weakened by the events of The Sandman: Overture. This is why his helm is battered when he lands in Roderick summons him to his circle. It is because when Morpheus first disappeared from The Corinthian in that first episode it was because of the events of The Sandman: Overture, (which Neil Gaiman originally promised would be adapted). A scene from Overture is carved into the gates of horn.
If Morpheus hadn't been weakened he would not have been able to be summoned. And Death should never have been able to e summoned.
I'm not too keen on the implication that The Endless don't have free will. The entire point of Destruction's story (or at least one part of it) is that they do have free will. He chose to leave.
Death being summoned to bring back someone who has died has been done before, such as when Anubis was summoned in an episode of Disney's Gargoyles.
I never quite liked the idea that Burgess only tried to summon Death in the first episode was because he wanted to resurrect a dead son. Wanting clout and power was enough motivation for a character like him.
I know this show tries to be "Grounded in reality' But it was originally set in the DC universe and "Once they're gone they can never come back" doesn't feel right when characters being resurrected was addressed in canon.
It occurred to me while watching this episode that The Sandman TV series entirely erased all reference to reincarnation being a posthumous option. Lucifer (TV show) did this too. Why? What's with the quietly erased acknowledgement in the concept of reincarnation?
I am disappointed she didn't buy the replacement ankh to show that it's not the specific ankh that has meaning, it's the symbol itself. An ankh means life, more importantly it means eternal life.
(Also you can get real silver that cheap if you know where to look.)
Why is the version of Death that comes for Death just her? Why is she not at least dressed as Charon the ferryman? (Woman) That's why there are the two coins after all, it's to pay the way.
And yet again there is that ham-fisted, annoying, and pretentious "moral" that "Life only ha value because it ends."
If you can only value life because it ends… you don't really value life.
We, as mortals, don't perceive stars burning out and turning into black holes. To use the stars in the night sky, the ocean, and moon, and promise of future sunsets, is eternal. We may end, these things don't (at least not within hundreds, if not thousands, of our life times) and yet we value the ocean, the stars, the moon, the sunsets. Things that will be there long after us- we still value them. Things we perceive as eternal- we still value.
If you can't value life except in knowing it will end, I don't think you really value it. And frankly, I'm tired of this "Moral" and it's so contrary to the existence of Hob Gadling.
It's not bad but I warned you I would pick it apart.
Also this episode may have answered the question for some fans on if Death spilt family blood. No. She is Death, she's not the cause of Death. She's the soul transport. That is all. And like all Endless she represents a thing and its opposite. The Ankh represents life. They don't really tell you this in the show but she's also present at births.
So yeah, those are my thoughts of Death: The High cost of living TV adaptation. I liked the ending of Sexton's story, that was sweet.
For those who don't know, Sexton is actually an old word for Gravedigger. Charles Dickens actually has a story called The Goblins who Stole a Sexton, which was sort of an early prototype for what would become A Christmas Carol.
The more I think about it, the more annoyed I am that both the Lucifer TV show and The Sandman Netflix series erased all reference to reincarnation being a possibility. Why? Because it undermines their hamfisted "moral" about life only having value because we only get one? Or because they think we're too stupid to understand multiple afterlives?
Come to think of it, why didn't they show Orpheus whole and in Elysium during The Sandman: The Wake? That felt kind of important.
All right, I guess that's that.
