The Neil Deal

Neil Gaiman talks Sandman: Overture, and updates us on his future projects

Neil Gaiman talks American Gods and Fortunately, The Milk.

neil gaiman isn’t one to worry about what to do for an encore — or with an Overture. The scribe’s Sandman: Overture is collected in DC’s new The Sandman: Overture Deluxe Edition. Gaiman tells Red Alert he’s excited to see JH Williams’ art get the Deluxe treatment.

“I had this giant cosmic epic in my head, and I knew that I needed somebody who could draw giant cosmic epics. So JH was basically our one choice. And bless him, he said yes.”

Though Gaiman has no immediate plans for a follow-up, he says it has sparked ideas for other tales in the universe.

“There’s so much story – questions I haven’t answered, things I know but I haven’t said, things I don’t quite know but would love to discover…”

In the meantime, Gaiman is awaiting Bryan Fuller’s TV adaptation of his American Gods, due in January 2017.

“A lot of what they’re doing that I really like right now is they’re opening it up… There are characters who may have only had half a page in the book, or a couple of pages, who are gonna be major players; and there are characters who were important but off stage a lot in the book who are gonna be on stage, or at least on the screen. Because one of the things about the book is you are very much stuck inside Shadow’s head looking out through Shadow’s eyes. But the great thing about a TV series is there’s no particular reason why you need to be stuck in Shadow’s head looking out through Shadow’s eyes.”

Gaiman adds he’ll probably write one of the show’s second season scripts. “Only because there’s a TV series that I’m currently writing. I should be wrapping up episode six right now, and I’m just about halfway though episode four. So my own TV series is sort of in front of everything.”

On the film front, Edgar Wright and Johnny Depp are on board to direct and star in an adaptation of Gaiman’s Fortunately, The Milk — with animation by The Lego Movie’s Animal Logic, to whom Gaiman recommended Wright.

“The next thing I knew Edgar and I were having a meeting in Johnny Depp’s mysterious offices in Hollywood, talking about who we’d like to write it. The first person we wanted was [Flight Of The Conchords’] Bret [McKenzie], and he said yes. So the process so far has just been one where we go out to people and they say yes.”

Sandman: Overture is out now.