Sandman co-creator Neil Gaiman and artist Gary Frank (Doomsday Clock, Action Comics) made an unofficial pitch for a comic where the cheerful and compassionate personification of Death from discusses the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
On Twitter, Gaiman wrote, "I wish we'd done a 2020 'Death Talks About Life' for Covid", adding, "And actually, that might be something to talk to [DC Comics]Â about." Frank concurred, offering an "audition" in the form of a previous drawing he had done of of Death.
Of course, this proposal was made casually on social media in response to a comment by a fan and has not received any kind of formal announcement from DC Comics or Gaiman himself. However, Gaiman's suggestion did receive something of a nod in the form of a tweet saying "Yes please hello" from DC senior editor Chris Conroy. Conroy is currently in charge of Gaiman's Sandman Universe imprint, which runs under the DC Black Label. The idea for a Death COVID-19 comic was also seconded by comic book writers Cecil Castellucci and Sam Humphries.
The previous comic Gaiman refers to is a Sandman spinoff PSA starring Death titled Death Talks About Life, which was first published in January 1993. It was scripted by Gaiman himself and drawn by Sandman regular contributor, Dave McKean. In it, after Death directly gives readers information about HIV/AIDS, safe sex practices and contraception. Notably, the comic also featured a demonstration, for which Death enlists a reluctant John Constantine from Hellblazer, to show how to put a condom using a banana as a prop. It also included information about and contact numbers for HIV/AIDS awareness resources.
Death Talks About Life was distributed for free as a standalone eight-page comic and was also included in issues of The Sandman #46, Hellblazer #62 and Shade the Changing Man #32, all of which were published at the time under DC's now defunct Vertigo Comics imprint.