David S. Goyer: ‘I'd Be Crazy to Say It Wasn't Weird' to Work on ‘The Sandman' Amid Neil Gaiman Allegations
David S. Goyer understands: it was 'weird' to work on 'The Sandman' Season 2 after various allegations against author and co-creator Neil Gaiman were made public. Goyer, created the series alongside Gaiman, told Variety that while Gaiman 'wasn't as involved in Season 2 as he was in Season 1,' the accusations against him still impacted the rollout of the Netflix show.
Gaiman was accused by multiple women of engaging in nonconsensual 'rough and degrading sex' and coercion during Tortoise Media's four-part podcast 'Master: The Allegations Against Neil Gaiman.' Gaiman denied the sexual assault and rape allegations in July 2024. Amid the claims against Gaiman, his 'Good Omens' series debuted a third season that consisted solely of a 90-minute finale episode; an animated project was also shelved.
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'The Sandman' Season 2, which starts streaming on July 3, will be the final season of the DC Comics series. At the time when the allegations against Gaiman were released, Season 2 was in the midst of filming. (Season 2 had been announced in 2022, with Tom Sturridge, Boyd Holbrook, Patton Oswalt, Gwendoline Christie, Charles Dance, Jenna Coleman, Stephen Fry, John Cameron Mitchell, and more stars returning.)
'When the accusations first came out, I think we were three weeks from finishing filming Season 2 — so we were very, very far down the path,' Goyer said of how production weathered the claims against Gaiman. 'Neil wasn't as involved in Season 2 as he was in Season 1. Obviously, it's complicated. I have tremendous respect for women that come forward in those situations. It's really concerning, but I know that Netflix, at the time, felt, 'God, we spent two years making this thing. There's all these actors and writers and directors involved that, if we didn't air it, wouldn't be fully compensated for it.' And so we just decided, we're going to let this work speak for itself. But I'd be crazy to say it wasn't weird.'
Goyer added of the accusations, 'I can say, personally, I had never glimpsed any of this.'
The screenwriter further shared that 'The Sandman' was set to wrap with Season 2 regardless of the allegations against Gaiman. '[The ending] was planned more than two years ago. And we had a lot of discussions, [showrunner] Allan [Heinberg] and I, with Netflix,' Goyer said. 'And obviously we love the books, but one of the concerns about some of the story arcs is that Dream [Sturridge] isn't in them very much. And so when we were discussing, everyone's concern was like, are we really going to sort of deviate and do six episodes that Dream's not in at all, except for the very end? And the other thing was even though the original comic book run, I think, was 75 issues, we just ended up burning through story faster than we thought we would, because the individual issues, a lot of them, when they were first being published, are only 17 pages.'
He continued, 'So in many cases, the source material to make an episode was four or even sometimes five issues. So when we first went into it, we thought it would be possibly four 10 episode seasons. Now, the first season had 11, the second season is 12. When we talked through it, we felt, let's make a slightly bigger Season 2 and take it through to the end. There's always the possibility that we could do some of the other spinoff material, if you will. But it was just a question of, like, do we do it as three seasons? Do we do it as four? And again, we just decided, let's just go for it and take it all the way through 'The Wake.''
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