Director of Logan and Indiana Jones 5 On Abandoned Idea for Sandman
Many of the ideas for an adaptation of the Sandman graphic novel series were shot down in recent years. One of them was a project for HBO by James Mangold. The creator finally revealed what went wrong.
Neil Gaiman's Sandman is one of the most important and ambitious comic book series available on the market. Every good story, sooner or later, finds its adaptation in the cinema. Or at least should, as the iconic series had no luck in this aspect. The complexity of the source material and many external factors meant that despite several bold creative attempts, Sandman was never filmed.
One such duds was James Mangold's idea presented to HBO management. The project would have happened if it had not been for politics and the merciless law of money. More about the situation and plans for the future was told by the creator himself:
"It’s no secret that I was trying to pull together a version of Neil Gaiman’s Sandman. I pitched it to HBO years ago and they bought the pitch as a long form series and then it got undone by a political turf war at WB. [...] Anyway, in regard to other projects of the future, I couldn’t possibly speak about conjecture because anything I say in the realm of comic books becomes instant nitro-glycerine ready to haunt me for the next 10 years on Twitter."
All is not lost that is delayed, however. Sandman will finally be released as a series, but thanks to Netflix. Neil Gaiman acts as the executive producer and the main producer is Alan Heinberg (responsible for the script for Wonder Woman). Mangold himself has also made his feelings towards the project known:
"Regardless, now it’s happening and I am so happy for Neil who I think is a marvellous person as well as a supremely brilliant artist. His unique vision weaves the psychological, psychedelic, romantic, sexual and fantastical in a way that is both personal and epic."
Despite James Mangold's failure with the project, his career is still at an ideal point. He was recently nominated for an Oscar for Le Mans '66 racing film, and his original superhero interpretation of Logan is considered by the public as one of the most powerful comic book adaptations in the history of the genre. The director's next project is to be Indiana Jones 5, on whose set Mangold is to replace Steven Spielberg himself.
