The Sandman Season 2 will introduce us to the rest of the Endless, and the latest preview gives us our first glimpse of their wayward sibling, “The Prodigal,” a.k.a. Destruction. Destruction will be played by Barry Sloane, and he is featured in a new teaser image published by Entertainment Weekly on Wednesday. He fits in nicely with the other ageless, primordial beings in this setting, though we know that he has actually abandoned his siblings and his responsibilities in the time of the series. The Prodigal’s story is a fan-favorite in the original Sandman comics, and showrunner Allan Heinberg seems to have captured the heart of it in this adaptation.
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“He has such a lightness of touch, and he’s such a loving human,” Heinberg said of Sloane. “That’s really what we were looking for in casting this role. You think of Destruction, especially as he’s presented in the comics during The Song of Orpheus story, as the ultimate destroyer of worlds. His story in the comic, and in our show as well, is actually a soul that’s in conflict. He wants to create, he doesn’t want to destroy. So you need an actor who is so full of love and so full of joy and yet looks like the archetypal soldier.”
The Sandman Season 1 introduced us to our titular hero, Dream (Tom Sturridge) as well as his closest sibling, Death (Kirby) and their younger twin siblings, Desire (Mason Alexander Park) and Despair (Donna Preston). The Season 2 trailer has already introduced us to two more Endless — Delirium (Esme Creed-Miles) and Destiny (Adrian Lester) — and shown a brief scene where they all gather for a family meeting. They acknowledge the absence of Destruction, but it looks like he won’t stay apart for the whole season.
Destruction’s Story
For those curious, Destruction’s departure from his family and duties is explained in the original comics, but this may be a spoiler for the TV show. Destruction abandoned his realm and his responsibilities 300 years before the events of the main series because he refused to take responsibility for the creation of the atomic bomb and the unprecedented havoc it would cause. He traveling through different worlds, Destruction longs to be creative, but doing so goes against his very nature.
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The other Endless only refer to Destruction as “Brother” or “the Prodigal” after he leaves his realm, “the Fulcrum.” His departure causes major rifts for the family, though it’s not actually the reason for the family meeting we saw in the trailer. However, it sounds like Destruction’s story will be a major part of this final season’s arc, especially since Heinberg is focused on the Endless. He told EW that he conceptualized this series as “a family drama above all.”
The Sandman Season 2 drops in two parts on Netflix. The first part premieres on July 3rd, followed by the final installment on July 24th. Season 1 is streaming there now.
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Image courtesy of Netflix.
