A newly-released deleted scene from Netflix's adaptation of Neil Gaiman's seminal DC series The Sandman offers greater insight into Death's (Kirby Howell-Baptiste) personality and approach to her job.
Netflix previously screened this deleted scene at CCXP 2022, though did not share it online at the time. To celebrate the holiday season, however, the streaming giant has now published it to platforms like YouTube and Twitter. "In the spirit of the holidays, we have a gift for the best fans in the world: more Death [and] Dream," The Sandman developers Gaiman, Allan Heinberg and David S. Goyer wrote to accompany the Twitter version. "This deleted scene from The Sandman episode "The Sound of Her Wings" gives us a little more insight into why Death is the way she is. We hope you enjoy it."
As the trio mentioned, the deleted scene comes from The Sandman's sixth episode, "The Sound of Her Wings," adapted from 1989's Sandman #8 by Gaiman, Mike Dringenberg, Malcolm Jones III, Robbie Busch and Todd Klein. In the episode, a depressed and directionless Dream (Tom Sturridge) accompanies his older sister, Death, in a day of her life of escorting the deceased to the afterlife.
In the cut scene, the cheerful and upbeat Death -- who was once jaded by her job -- tells her brother how she came to develop empathy for humankind. "...I resolved that every hundred years I would take a day to see how I would like it -- see what I could learn from it," she says. "And at the end of my very first day of being alive, when I met me, I turned to me and I told me that I was a cold, stuck-up bitch. Only, I didn't say it anywhere as nicely. So, I got the message."
Sandman's Deleted Scene References a Classic Gaiman Story
Death vowing to experience mortal life for one day every 100 years is a direct reference to Death: The High Cost of Living by Gaiman, Chris Bachalo, Mark Buckingham, Steve Oliff and Klein. The High Cost of Living is a limited series originally published under DC's Vertigo Comics imprint in 1993 as a spinoff of The Sandman. The three-issue series centers on a suicidal young man named Sexton, who gains a new lease on life after spending an eventful day with a girl named Didi, who claims to be the personification of Death. A film adaptation of The High Cost of Living, titled Death and Me, was previously in the works at New Line Cinema, though ultimately went unproduced.
At any rate, Howell-Baptiste herself previously discussed the significance of her deleted Sandman scene when it was screened at CCXP. "So, she lived for a day and then met herself," the actor said. "She was taking it, she had her amount of time. And I think that scene or that part that we've taken from the comic is so key to who Death is, and the reason why she's so compassionate is because she understands because she went through it. So she understands that no one is ready at the end because she herself being Death and knowing what was going to happen, still didn't feel ready to go."
Netflix's The Sandman Has Been Renewed for Season 2
The first season of The Sandman -- initially consisting of 10 episodes -- premiered on Netflix earlier this year on Aug. 5. A two-part bonus episode then hit the platform on Aug. 19. In early November, the DC series was officially renewed for Season 2. "There are some astonishing stories waiting for Morpheus and the rest of them... Now it's time to get back to work," Gaiman said at the time to celebrate the news. "There's a family meal ahead, after all. And Lucifer is waiting for Morpheus to return to Hell."
The Sandman Season 1 is currently streaming on Netflix.