Netflix Announces Neil Gaiman's The Sandman Is Canceled, But Pretends It Was Always Intended To Be A Final Season
Netflix announced The Sandman will be coming to an end with Season 2. While it’s obvious they are quietly ending the show because of Neil Gaiman’s involvement, their bizarre advertising campaign acts like it was always intended to end this way.
Neil Gaiman faced a slew of cancelations this week with Dark Horse Comics announcing they would be removing Anansi Boys from their upcoming publication schedule, Terry Pratchett’s estate assuring Good Omens graphic novel backers Gaiman would not be getting any funds from the campaign, a stage production of Coraline being canceled in the U.K., and his agent dropping him.
However, the woes for Gaiman don’t stop there as Netflix began their advertising campaign for Season 2 of The Sandman, the adaptation of his infamous work from DC Comics. However, upon inspection of the marketing images, it’s interesting to spot that they’ve relabeled the season “the final season.”
Fans and media have speculated that the show has indeed been canceled, with Variety writing an article on the topic. It would make sense given the allegations by eleven different women to date regarding Neil Gaiman’s sexual assault.
Neil Gaiman was rocked in January with an interview with his former nanny Scarlett Pavlovich for New York Magazine detailing graphic and horrific details on her claims of sexual abuse against the American Gods writer.
Part of the odd situation about the Neil Gaiman story is how these details have been well-known for nearly a year because of the work of Tortoise Podcast and Fandom Pulse detailing the abuse allegations against Gaiman.
Moreover, women have been warning about Gaiman for years with nine women now making allegations about him, according to recent reports, and he’s given signs through his works with his creepy fetishes inserted into books like The Sandman, as well as his virtue signaling about his polyamorous degenerate lifestyle with Amanda Palmer that led to personal problems for the author over the last several years.
As far as Sandman, the first season came out in August 2022, and it did not receive a renewal at that time. Netflix is notorious for commissioning two seasons of a show (or one season split into two) and seeing how an audience reacts before going further.
It’s possible that Netflix never intended to renew The Sandman because of low ratings, but with the scandals, it becomes easy to label it a final season and wash their hands of the show without having to make any apologies.
However, the showrunner Allan Heinberg told Variety, “‘The Sandman’ series has always been focused exclusively on Dream’s story, and back in 2022, when we looked at the remaining Dream material from the comics, we knew we only had enough story for one more season. We are extremely grateful to Netflix for bringing the team all back together and giving us the time and resources to make a faithful adaptation in a way that we hope will surprise and delight the comics’ loyal readers as well as fans of our show.”
It appears as if the marketing campaign is intended to ignore Neil Gaiman’s involvement and the controversies to act as if the show exists on its own and was always intended to end this way.
How will it work for Netflix? There is not much buzz surrounding people wanting a The Sandman season 2 thus far. We’ll see how this strategy works out for them.
What do you think of Netflix canceling Neil Gaiman’s show The Sandman? Leave a comment and let us know.
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... and the world was not one penny poorer for its loss.