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The Sandman/Tear Jerker: Difference between revisions
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* "24 Hours":
* "The Sound of her Wings", where Dream follows his sister Death on her daily work, always make it for this troper, all because of this page. It is just so... '''''real.'''''▼
** A group of people in a diner end up tortured and killed by John Dee, with the outside world and superheroes helpless to save them. During the hour where they get their minds back, they beg him to stop and ask him why. Dee replies, "Because I ''can''."
** Judy is a [[Troubled Abuser]]. Her ex Donna has broken up with her for this reason, and Judy spends her time in the diner thinking about her, writing a letter of apology before the torture starts. She was not a nice person, but her death has an impact on the story. Rose Walker was revealed to be friends with Judy, and was the last person she spoke with before John Dee started his work; in ''Doll's House'', Rose narrates her disbelief that Judy just died like that. Donna, having a hard time dealing with the grief, renames herself Foxglove for a clean start, and even writes a song about Judy's unusual passing. We hear it in ''Death: The High Cost of Living''.
▲* "The Sound of
{{quote|'''Mother:''' OOtchacootchacoo?
'''Baby:''' babababa!
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** Here's what makes it worse if you know that these were the signs of SIDS. The baby got sleep apnea at the worst possible time, in a period when it wasn't well-understood. Even their mother hadn't left the room, there was little to nothing either of them could have done to stop it.
* This troper's tearjerker moment for this series was in ''The Doll's House'' -- all the little sequences of Jed's adventures in the dream-world, which are all very sweet and cutesy, and the contrast with the panels of what's really happening when he wakes up. I must have read that same comic a million times, and I still sniffle. Every. ''Single''. Time. (They are also in a small way [[Nightmare Fuel|nightmarish]] -- such as the one where he wakes from a dream about setting loose the verbal gerbils, which are still very cute-looking, to being bitten by rats.)
*Jed is finally rescued, thanks to Gilbert. He's also unconscious and dehydrated
*Gilbert is revealed to not be a real person, though he does pay his rent on time and defends his friends with a cane. He's a Dream creation, a place called Fiddler's Green. Unlike most of the creations that ran to the real world, Gilbert didn't seek power or an escape from his maker. He wanted to be human, quirks and all. But then he learns his new best friend Rose is the Vortex, and that her powers are awakening. Gilbert goes [[Oh Crap]] when Matthew the raven tells him this and returns to the Dreaming ''immediately'' hoping that he's not too late. Why? Because Dream is bound by duty and necessity to kill the Vortex, and Gilbert would face any punishment that Morpheus levies on him if it would save Rose's life.
*The confrontation when Gilbert finds Rose and Dream, as Dream is breaking this revelation gently to Rose. Dream doesn't want to do it because Rose is an innocent person, and he does not kill. He says the last time he failed his duty, entire worlds nearly ended. Gilbert comes and hugs Rose protectively. He says to Dream he'll accept any punishment for deserting, but please let him exchange his life for Rose's, as he would die for her. Dream can't accept that, and sincerely apologizes. Not because of [[Cruel Mercy]]. It's because Fiddler's Green isn't the Vortex, and never was, and thus his death would accomplish nothing. Gilbert apologizes to Rose, saying he was a failure of a person while giving her a farewell hug. Fortunately, Unity Kincaid comes by, as the young woman she used to be, and asks her granddaughter Rose for her heart, the item that makes her the Vortex. Unity reveals that ''she'' was the one that Dream was supposed to kill a long time ago, and someone raping her in her sleep caused the curse to be passed to Rose. She takes the heart, lets it shatter, and accepts her death knowing it means her granddaughter would live.
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* This troper cried, for the first time in months, at the end of the ''A Game of You''. She finds it hard to believe that nobody else cried {{spoiler|when Death came to pick up Wanda. And she looked so beautiful... This troper also started crying when the woman Barbie was talking to said how nice Alvin looked in his suit, with his hair cut. "She was so proud of her hair."}}
** Barbie recounts to Wanda's aunt that {{spoiler|she was the only survivor of their leveled apartment building, thanks to a homeless woman named Maisie shielding Barbie's sleeping body with hers}}. As paramedics loaded Barbie onto a stretcher, she saw {{spoiler|Wanda in a body bag}}. Barbie was not willing to believe what she was seeing and screamed at them to {{spoiler|let Wanda out, that she won't be able to breathe in the bag}}. Said aunt is transphobic and believes Wanda was a sinner for coming out of the closet; she starts patting Rose's shoulder to comfort her.
** The conversation by the gravestone. Barbie asks {{
** Barbie scrawling Wanda's given name off {{spoiler|her grave}} with her favorite lipstick and writing her real one. It might've been too similar to a scene from the TV miniseries ''Roots'' but it did finish the book in a powerful, emotional bang.
* The ending of the story. Barbie had to leave her dream world behind to save her living friends and still lost one of them. She can't stay with Hazel and Foxglove, who have to prepare for a baby, and Thessaly has gone off to do her thing without acknowledging it was her fault that {{spoiler|Wanda died}}. Barbie admits she doesn't know what she's going to do as a divorcee with no legacy or meaning to her life, only head out into the world, and see what she can make of it.
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*** For that matter, Cain, who does clearly love his brother in their opening scene, but cannot change the nature of their relationship.
** Lyta Hall telling a pregnant Rose Walker to "kill [the baby] now. Kill it before it breaks your heart."
* Thessaly protected Lyta's sleeping form because she owed the Furies a favor, as she tells Dream; it's not because of their breakup. When ''The Kindly Ones'' ends, however, Lyta wakes up in her apartment, disheveled and confused, and Thessaly is cleaning her glasses. She gives Lyta a [[Mercy Lead]]: take twenty minutes to shower and do whatever she can to leave town, because a bunch of divine beings are coming for Lyta's head. Thessaly also says that she will probably be one of them, so start running.
* {{spoiler|Morpheus}}'s death.
** It was {{spoiler|Nada's farewell to him toward the end of the funeral}} that pushed this editor over the edge and into open bawling.
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** What's even more sad and beautiful about that moment is that {{spoiler|he couldn't be more wrong. Over all the issues of ''[[The Sandman]]'', we see Dream change, and love and need other people and act like a man, and finally leave his kingdom - through death - because at last he realised that he had changed.}}
* Nuala's realization of Dream's motivation for everything post Brief Lives. {{spoiler|"You... you want them to kill you, don't you? You want to be punished for your son's death."}} The look on Dream's face the next panel is heartwrenching.
* Throughout the series, it's implied that killing one of the Endless brings about [[Fate Worse Than Death|terrible punishment]], even under good intent. After the climax of The Kindly Ones, {{spoiler|Lyta Hall, Morpheus's}} killer is expressly reminded this, with the further warning that the person who'd done so previously would suffer for all eternity when his motives were purer by far. The penalty handed down is to be allowed to walk away with no further harm done to her -- a [[Cruel Mercy]], {{spoiler|as her efforts were [[All for Nothing]], and everything she's done ensured she'd never see her son again, as he'd been reincarnated into the new Dream. It's also unofficial exile from the Dreaming, since Lyta did kill innocent creations that had nothing to do with Daniel's disappearance.}}
** Even worse, Lyta is now a vessel for the Furies, and there are no takebacks; only her death would free her. If she kills a blood relative, the Furies would release her as a vessel but then murder her in turn. A sequel series reveals that while no one can hurt her for her crimes against Dream and destroying his world, they ''can'' try and make Lyta kill a blood relative to attack the Furies indirectly.
** Turns into a [[Crowning Moment of Heartwarming]] when {{spoiler|Daniel!Dream forgives her in the Wake.}} Later on in ''Justice Society of America'', when she and a {{spoiler|resurrected Hector do hero work for the Justice Society, Lyta sincerely atones for her actions. As a result, Daniel is able to lift the exile, welcoming her and his father back into the Dreaming.}}
* ''Endless Nights''
* Dream and Desire ''used'' to be close. Then for fun, Desire made Dream's latest paramour fall for someone else, as a joke. They then don't understand when their brother gives them a What The Hell Hero for breaking his heart, and severs ties. Desire decided their next bit of fun would be manipulating events to sic the Furies on Dream, to kill him.
* "15 Portraits of Despair" in ''Endless Nights''. Chances are one of them will be much too close to home for you to shrug off.
{{quote|''I am Despair - and all those who despair are me.''}}
* ''Death: The High Cost of Living''
** Deedee loses her composure once when Erasmus kills the henchman that wants to sell her ankh for money rather than surrender her. She tells Sexton, screaming, that he may have been a jerk but he's a human being who needs help, and he needs to breathe. They do their best to make him comfortable. Even so, he dies in front of them.
** Sexton is a depressed young man that doesn't know what he wants in life. A girl his age saves him from a trash heap and leads him on the most exciting day that he's had in ages when Mad Hattie forcibly asks them to find her heart. After being suspicious of how Deedee keeps getting free stuff and claiming that she's Death, Sexton comes to see how wonderful she is. They eat breakfast after Mad Hettie saves them from Erasmus, buy a replacement ankh, and chill in Central Park. Deedee feels her time is up, and gives him a peck on the cheek, before standing on the edge of a fountain. Then she falls into the water; at first, Sexton thinks she's doing it on purpose, only she's not responding. He goes [[Oh Crap]] and tries to run to her side. Erasmus has her body, but says that she's escaped him, ''this'' time. Sexton's face is reflected in the water, mourning. All he can do is call her kindly neighbor, who explains it must have been Deedee's heart that gave out in time.
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[[Category:Tear Jerker/Comics]]
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