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Title: A Game of You (Sandman, Book 5) by Neil Gaiman, Samuel R. Delany, Shawn MacManus, Colleen Doran, Bryan Talbot, George Pratt, Stan Woch, Dick Giordano ISBN: 1-56389-089-5 Publisher: DC Comics Pub. Date: 03 September, 1993 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.52 (23 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: The best of the Sandman
Comment: No other volume of the magnificent Sandman series so perfectly captures the darkly magical essence as this one. Many people dislike it, and many will say that you should read other tales first, but for me personally, I think that if you like "A Game of You" then you will like all others, and if you dislike it, you probably will dislike many others as well. It is not as important to the story overall as some arcs, and the Sandman himself harldy interacts with the human characters until well into the story. Also absent are most of the Sandman's family, with Death being regelated to a cameo. However, this is what makes the issue so special. It uses the Sandman mileu to create a unique fantasy world of its own, one which uses archtypes to allow readers to identify with it and yet be startled around every turn. If the "death" of the world is not heartrending, then perhaps you lack the imagination that fuels such a world. Read this and enjoy.
Rating: 5
Summary: A great story of identity and finding your inner child
Comment: Neil Gaiman does it again! He takes Barbie, a marginal character in the "Doll's House" storyline and makes her into a 3 dimensional character. He also introduces some other great characters like Hazel, Foxglove, Clarissa, and my personal favorite in this volume, Wanda. After reading this tale, I was struck by how the characters matter so much in Sandman stories. How Neil cares about them so much that they keep popping up again and again in unlikely places. Even when someone mentions another person, I can tell that Neil has a character description written up for that person and they will appear in another story. Clarissa will appear again in "Kindly Ones", while Hazel and Foxglove are in both "Death" mini-series. (Also Foxglove is mentioned by another character in the "24 Hours" chapter in "Preludes and Nocturnes.")
That aside, "A Game of You" is probably the most personal story of the entire Sandman oeuvre. It's primarily the story of Barbie and her childhood dreams that become very real. The heart of the story is Barbie's relationship with Wanda which is both funny and touching. Dream doesn't appear much in this one, but the story is so good and the main characters so interesting that you won't mind at all.
Rating: 5
Summary: Pure Magic
Comment: Never content with telling Sandman from one fixed perspective for too long, Gaiman again turns the collection on its head and has yet another character (this time 'Barbie,' a supporting player in the Doll's House), provide the orientation to the text for us. Gaiman seems to be at his best when Morpheus plays more of a supporting role in the narrative. As was the case in the stellar Doll's House, A Game of You focuses on human relationships. Although Morpheus is certainly an interesting character, in the end he is, as his sister Death previously remarked, "an anthropomorphic personification:" an idealized abstraction. Gaiman's human characters, however, are fully rounded: capable of the myriad -and often contradictory- emotions that make us flesh and blood. It's Gaiman's probing exploration of humanity that really sets the series apart from other graphic novels that choose to focus on the wearisome 'superheroes and bad guys' formula. How many other graphic novels, for example, detail the ups and downs of a lesbian couple or the anxieties of transvestism? This is ground breaking stuff, to be sure, and provides much needed realness to the medium.
Barbie's adventures in dreamland bear an eerie resemblance to Frodo's in the Lord of the Rings and Dorothy's in the Wizard of Oz, and for good reason. All three works are manifestations of what Joseph Campbell terms the "hero cycle:" a rite of passage that chronicles the hero's departure and eventual return. The hero cycle is a fundamental aspect of mythology, and Gaiman's skilful usage of it affords the tale a feeling of timelessness, a structural connection to the process of myth making.
The art in this series is fantastic and probably the best in the collection to date. Shawn McManus does a wonderful job of bringing out the mood of the text: note McManus' usage of nearly pure white and black cells in the first chapter to underscore the starkness of Barbie's "dream country." Somewhat jarring, however, is the fact that Colleen Doran drew the art for only the third story. Her less detailed style essentially interrupts the atmosphere created by McManus in the five other stories.
Although this is the fifth text in the Sandman series, Gaiman demonstrates he has plenty of gas left in the tank. His imagination continues to propel him to new and strange places, and I'm more than willing to sit in the passenger's seat and enjoy the view.
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Title: Dream Country (Sandman, Book 3) by Neil Gaiman, Malcolm Jones III, Colleen Doran, Kelley Jones, Charles Vess, Steve Erickson ISBN: 156389016X Publisher: DC Comics Pub. Date: 24 September, 1991 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Brief Lives (Sandman, Book 7) by Neil Gaiman, Jill Thompson, Vince Locke, Peter Straub ISBN: 1563891387 Publisher: DC Comics Pub. Date: 01 January, 1995 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: The Doll's House (Sandman, Book 2) by Neil Gaiman, Malcolm Jones III, Mike Dringenberg, Michael Zulli, Clive Barker ISBN: 0930289595 Publisher: DC Comics Pub. Date: 01 September, 1991 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: Worlds' End (Sandman, Book 8) by Neil Gaiman, Stephen King ISBN: 1563891719 Publisher: DC Comics Pub. Date: 01 July, 1995 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: The Kindly Ones (Sandman, Book 9) by Neil Gaiman, Frank McConnell ISBN: 1563892057 Publisher: DC Comics Pub. Date: 01 September, 1996 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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