The Sandman Mystery Theatre Compendium 1 by Matt WagnerMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
Haunted by dreams, Wesley Dodds ventures out at night in an overcoat and gasmask as... The Sandman!
I was drifting away from comics as this was originally coming out but managed to read the first trade sometime in that mythical time before Goodreads. When I saw DC was finally reprinting it, I jumped on board.
I'm a little glad I didn't read this when I was young because I wouldn't have appreciated it nearly as much. Matt Wagner took the core of the Golden Age Sandman concept, added in a dash of Neil Gaiman's Sandman, and turned it into a pulp crime book.
Wesley Dodds isn't a muscle bound character like most super heroes. He's kind of dumpy, thick around the middle, and his only super power is his brain. Sure, he has a gas gun and can take a punch but he outwits criminals rather than rushing in to punch them out. Over the course of this book, he takes on various killers but his greatest adversary is his love for Dian Belmont.
Boy howdy, Wesley and Dian are one of the best couples in comics. The book is as much about Wesley and Dian's complex relationship as it is bad guys getting what's coming to them. She's a smart lady and no shrinking violet.
This thing is almost as gritty as James Ellroy at times. Make no mistake about it, this is a mature readers book. There's cursing, sex, racism, incest, gore, violence, and all the other adult content we all enjoy.
Guy Davis handles the most of the art, though there are lots of fill-ins. Davis' art seemed scratchy at first but really grew on me after a while. The other artists like Warren Pleece, Alex Ross, Dean Ormston, David Lloyd, John Bolton, and the rest kept the mood set by Davis but gave things their own feel. Visually, it's a moody book and doesn't feel at all like a super hero book. If not for the gas mask and gas gun, Wagner's Sandman could be a forgotten pulp character from the 1920s.
Sandman Mystery Theatre is a forgotten gem of 1990s comics. I hope this sells well enough for DC to put out the other half. Five out of five stars.
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