List of The Sandman characters
Along with the titular character and his siblings, The Sandman includes a large array of characters: inhabitants of the Dreaming, various deities, angels and demons, faeries, immortals and witches. Some characters appear in The Sandman, some in spinoffs like The Dreaming and Lucifer, and others in earlier stories that The Sandman was based on as well as the podcast and the Netflix TV series. Their stories occur in the DC Universe, generally tangentially to the mainstream DC stories.
The Endless
The Endless are a family of seven anthropomorphic personifications of universal concepts, around whom much of the series revolves. They are the children of Mother Night and Father Time. All debuted in the Sandman series, except Destiny, who was created by Marv Wolfman and Berni Wrightson in Weird Mystery Tales #1.From eldest to youngest, they are:
Destiny
Death
Dream
Destruction
Desire
Despair
Delirium
Time
Time is the personification of time and the father of the Endless. He resides in the Realm of Time and was the one who gifted Destiny with his Cosmic Log.In the Netflix series, Time is portrayed by Rufus Sewell.
Night
Night is the personification of night and the mother of the Endless through Time.In the Netflix series, Night is portrayed by Tanya Moodie.
Dreams and nightmares
These inhabitants of the Dreaming are often ordinary human beings who later became either dreams or nightmares.Cain and Abel
Cain and Abel are based on the Biblical Cain and Abel, adapted by editor Joe Orlando with Bob Haney and Jack Sparling , and Mark Hannerfeld and Bill Draut . They were depicted together in Abel's first appearance, and parted to their respective Houses at the end of the story. Although Cain would abuse Abel, he was not shown killing him until Swamp Thing vol. 2 #33. In Elvira's House of Mystery #11, Cain expresses shock at having killed his brother in recent times. In the same issue, a contest-winning letter establishes that Cain and the House exist both in the dream world and the real world, and that only in the dream world does Cain continue to harm Abel. In The Sandman, Cain is shown to kill Abel quite often. In issue #2, Lucien calls this unusual and recent.Originally, they were the respective "hosts" of the EC-style horror comic anthologies House of Mystery and House of Secrets which ran from the 1950s through 1983—Cain debuting in House of Mystery #175 and Abel in DC Special #4 and House of Secrets #81. During the 1970s, they also co-hosted the horror/humor anthology Plop!. They were also both recurring characters in DC's Elvira's House of Mystery.
In 1985, the characters were revived by writer Alan Moore, who introduced them into his Swamp Thing series in issue #33, retelling the Swamp Thing's original origin story from a 1971 issue of House of Secrets. Gary Cohn and Dan Mishkin included them in the pages of Blue Devil in 1986. Jamie Delano also occasionally used them in a cameo role in his title Hellblazer.
In Gaiman's Sandman universe, the biblical Cain and Abel live in the Dreaming at Dream's invitation. This is based on the verse in the Bible which says that Cain was sent to live in the Land of Nod. They live as neighbors in two houses near a graveyard: Cain in the broad House of Mystery and Abel in the tall House of Secrets. According to their appearance in Swamp Thing, the difference is that 'a mystery may be shared, but a secret must be forgotten if one tries to tell it'.
Gaiman's Cain is an aggressive, overbearing character. He is a thin, long-limbed man with an angular, drawn face, glasses, a tufty beard, and hair drawn into two points above his ears. He has been described by other characters as sounding "just like Vincent Price".
Gaiman's Abel is a nervous but kind-hearted man. He also has a stammer. He is somewhat similar in appearance to Cain, with a tufty beard and hair that comes to points above his ears, though his hair is black rather than brown. He is shorter and fatter than Cain, with a more open face. It is eventually learned that the only time he does not stutter is when he is telling a story or when he is dead.
Cain kills Abel frequently and in many brutal ways, whereupon Abel later returns to life. He often expresses hope for a more harmonious relationship with his brother.
Cain and Abel own a large green draconic gargoyle named [|Gregory], who also made his debut in House of Mystery #175. In the first appearance of the characters in Sandman, issue #2, Cain gives Abel an egg that soon hatches into another gargoyle, a small golden one. Abel names the gargoyle "Irving". but Cain insists that the names of gargoyles must always begin with a "G.", and Abel renames the gargoyle "Goldie", after an invisible/imaginary friend to whom Abel told his early House of Secrets stories. A letter in issue #91 was attributed to [|Goldie], who claimed that it was herself depicted on the cover of issue #88.
They shelter Dream until his strength is restored following his 72-year-long imprisonment. In the fourth story arc, Season of Mists, Cain is sent to Hell to give a message to Lucifer because Cain is protected by a curse that would deter Lucifer from harming him. Cain and Abel also aid [|The Corinthian] with the child Daniel during The Kindly Ones, the penultimate story arc of the series. Abel is one of the victims of the [|Furies] in this series and is brought back to life by the new Dream at Cain's request.
In the podcast, Cain and Abel are voiced by Michael Roberts and Kerry Shale.
In the Netflix series The Sandman, Cain and Abel are portrayed by Sanjeev Bhaskar and Asim Chaudhry respectively.
The Corinthian
The Corinthian is a nightmare created by Dream, of human appearance but with two small additional mouths in place of his eyes. He enjoys eating the eyeballs of people he kills.The first version of the Corinthian is destroyed by Dream while speaking at a "Cereal Convention" for spending several unsupervised decades on Earth as a serial killer, and it is shown in The Sandman: Overture that Dream intended to do this before his imprisonment.
Near the end of the series, Dream creates a second Corinthian, altering his personality to be obedient and useful rather than homicidal. In a later story in The Dreaming, the second Corinthian is haunted by the actions of the first.
In the podcast, the Corinthian is voiced by Riz Ahmed.
The Corinthian is portrayed by Boyd Holbrook in the Netflix series, having a more expanded role before the Doll's House arc. He is shown to manipulate circumstances regarding Ethel Cripps' death and behaves in a much less hostile way to Jed Walker, appearing to not desire to harm him. He is also shown as gay or pansexual in the series, often having sex with his male victims before killing them.
Eve
Eve is a special character who has been seen in the Lucifer series and is depicted as living in a cave in The Dreaming.Fiddler's Green
Fiddler's Green is the personification of a place in the Dreaming which all travelers dream of someday finding. It sometimes assumes human form and goes wandering under the alias Gilbert, a kindly, portly man who resembles G. K. Chesterton in appearance and behavior. As "Gilbert", Fiddler's Green accompanied [|Rose Walker] to find her brother Jed and gave her the means by which to summon Dream to rescue her from danger at the Cereal Convention that the Corinthian was speaking at. Afterwards, Fiddler's Green thereafter returned to the Dreaming and resumed his true form before Rose. He was killed by the Three in The Kindly Ones and refused to be resurrected by the new Dream as his death will have no meaning. Dream allows Fiddler's Green to return to the dead.In the podcast, Fiddler's Green is voiced by Ray Porter.
In the Netflix series, Fiddler's Green is portrayed by Stephen Fry. This version of Gilbert has a slightly smaller role than in the comics, but still accompanies Rose to the Cereal Convention. Following Corinthian's defeat, Fiddler's Green returns to his true form upon returning to the Dreaming.
Gate Keepers
A Wyvern, a Griffin, and a Hippogriff are the gate keepers of Dream's castle and are also referred to as the Guardians of the Gate. The wyvern was more land dragon-like and had no dragon wings until later appearances, the griffin also had a lion mane and has all four legs of a lion, and the hippogriff was depicted with a winged horse-like appearance. The gate keepers often intercept anyone from entering Dream's Ghost Castle. They derive all their power and authority from Dream so when Dream was captured and lost his power, they could no longer guard or protect the Dreaming.Their first comic book appearance was in "Dream of a Thousand Cats" where the Siamese Cat had to get past them in order to see the Cat of Dreams.
In issue #24, the Guardians of the Gate see a lot of envoys showing up at the Ghost Castle in light of Lucifer's abdication. The Griffin sends a message through his statue in the throne room to inform Dream about it and that the Guardians of the Gate can't keep them all back. Dream instructs the Griffin to tell his fellow Guardians of the Gate to let them in.
Delirium later runs into the Guardians of the Gate where she is briefly picked up by the Wyvern when she tried to enter Dream's castle.
After the Griffin was destroyed by the Three in their Erinyes aspect, the new Dream did not recreate him. Instead, he asked the Gryphons of Greek myth to send one of their own. The Queen of Gryphons dispatches a Gryphon of Arimapsa to replace the Dreaming's Griffin. When Matthew meets this Gryphon and informs him of being the only Griffin of his land to meet the new Dream's requirements, he informs Matthew that his land of Arimapsa is somewhere far from the Dreaming. The Guardians of the Gate state to Matthew that they have been sent by the new Dream to attend Dream's wake, but opted not to leave their post.
In the podcast, the Wyvern, the Griffin, and the Hippogriff are voiced by Harry Myers, Ray Porter, and Tom Alexander.
In the Netflix series, the Wyvern, the Griffin, and the Hippogriff are shown on the castle with the Wyvern voiced by Nonso Anozie, the Griffin voiced by Diane Morgan in season one and by Jo Martin in season two, and the Hippogriff voiced by Tom Wu in season one and by Paul Rhys in season two. The Wyvern resembled his mythological depiction and the Griffin is a female. Their roles in the animated episode "Dream of a Thousand Cats", the confrontation of the envoys, and Delirium's encounter with them remain intact. Unlike the comics, the Kindly Ones' Erinyes aspect tried to kill the Griffin by aging her bones only for Dream to come out and heal her.