Previously on The Sandman….

Yes, we have to go back to the first season with Lyta Hall (Razane Jammal). She gets pregnant in the Dream world, and technically she is one of four parents to a baby named Daniel. The second of those two parents is Dream / Morpheus (Tom Sturridge) going through a lot. That’s because this is his show. A lot also happens during this second and final season, as Morpheus finally says goodbye to Destruction (Barry Sloane). A meta farewell tour, the Kindly Ladies also cut Morpheus’s thread of life, which brings viewers up to speed. The main crux of this second half is whether Morpheus fights the Kindly Ladies to stay alive or to die.

Dream tries to get help from his father Time (Rufus Sewell) but that won’t work. The Kindly Ladies then rope Loki (Freddie Fox) to kidnap Daniel, pulling a switcheroo on Lyta. They convince her, one way or another, that Morpheus is responsible while he finds the actual parties responsible. Helping him out are Johanna Constantine (Jenna Coleman) and, despite her reservations, a new Corinthian (Boyd Holbrook). Loki has evil plans – this includes killing Daniel, turning into an immortal, becoming the new Dream King (Jacob Anderson). Will Daniel be the kind of King like his half creator, will he follow Morpheus’ footsteps and what does this all mean?

The second half of The Sandman‘s last season follows the first half more than it does the first season – the story arcs are longer. Critics complained that the first half didn’t know what to do with those arcs/ actors but they seemed fine. There’s no Lucifer during this half, but at least Destruction comes back which is great because I like Barry Sloane. The arcs, even if they technically cover the same amount of episodes, feel a bit more contained in this final volume. Rufus Sewell gets a hello and goodbye while Jacob Anderson gets more to do with Daniel’s approach to becoming Dream.

For the most part though, this volume feels like the gang from the first season is getting back together. The ‘gang getting back together’ in The Sandman‘s last five episodes clarify what this ‘conflict’ is about. It’s not about Morpheus and the Kindly Ladies because the latter doesn’t have the final say on the former. That designation comes from the actual Death (Kirby), one of the many relationships that Morpheus fumbles in his ‘life’. The fact that Morpheus has too many of those relationships means the show has to equal that with several arcs. But the scene between Death and Morpheus is both ephemeral yet touching, just like the rest of this show.

Netflix is the only place to stream the second half of The Sandman‘s last season.

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