The series was developed by Gaiman, David S. Goyer, and Allan Heinberg for the streaming service Netflix and is produced by DC Entertainment and Warner Bros. Television.

The series has received positive reviews from critics with praise going toward the casting, production design, costumes, faithfulness to its source material, visual effects, and performances.

Morpheus successfully summons the Fates, who inform him of the whereabouts of his equipment; the pouch of sand is in the possession of exorcist Johanna Constantine, his helm in the hands of a demon in Hell, and the ruby used by Ethel's son John Dee.

Morpheus tracks down Constantine, seeking the return of his pouch, who is in the middle of sending the demon Agileth back to Hell after he used the body of Kevin Brody to marry the London Princess.

There, he uses the ruby's power to prevent the patrons and staff (and the world at large, shown via the television) from being able to lie, eventually driving them to murder each other or commit suicide.

[26] Inquisitr wrote that "Sandman's nature as a comic has been a very unique and life-changing experience for many and that made it very difficult and challenging to translate into the small and big screens.

[27] Elliot and Rossio's script merged the first two Sandman storylines, Preludes & Nocturnes and The Doll's House, into a single story, while also mixing elements of live-action and animation, citing Jan Švankmajer's Alice (1988) as inspiration.

[36] David S. Goyer had pitched a Sandman adaptation to Warner Bros. in 2013 and by February 2014 was set to produce the film alongside Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Gaiman, with Jack Thorne writing.

Film director James Mangold pitched a series concept to HBO while consulting with Gaiman on an unofficial basis, but it did not materialize due to a "political turf war at WB".

[43] By September 2010, Warner Bros. Television was licensing the rights to produce a TV series, and that Supernatural creator Eric Kripke was their preferred candidate to adapt the saga.

[45] Subsequently, Kripke said the project was not happening, but DC Comics' then-Chief Creative Officer (COO) Geoff Johns revealed a series was still in development with the involvement of Gaiman.

The three eventually met for dinner in Los Angeles to discuss the series and began pitching it three days later, with Heinberg signing his contract with Warner Bros.

[68] In January 2021, Sturridge, Gwendoline Christie, Vivienne Acheampong, Holbrook, Charles Dance, Asim Chaudhry, and Sanjeev Bhaskar were announced to be starring in the series.

[69] Twelve more cast members were announced in May 2021: Kirby, Mason Alexander Park, Donna Preston, Jenna Coleman, Niamh Walsh, Joely Richardson, David Thewlis, Kyo Ra, Stephen Fry, Razane Jammal, Sandra James Young, and Oswalt.

[73] In July 2024, it was reported that Ruairi O'Connor, Freddie Fox, Clive Russell, Laurence O'Fuarain, Ann Skelly, Douglas Booth, Jack Gleeson, Indya Moore, and Steve Coogan were cast as Orpheus, Loki, Odin, Thor, Nuala, Cluracan, Puck, Wanda, and Barnabas separately for the second season.

Dream's ruby and bag of sand, like most items in the series, were created as physical objects and later enhanced by the visual effects team in post production.

For the set designs, the production team conducted research into various periods in history, particularly for the tavern scenes featuring Dream and Hob Gadling, which span several hundred years.

[88] To create Lucifer's Palace, the VFX team was concerned about viewers' preconceived ideas of how it should appear and began by using Google Images to research previous depictions.

The series was scored by British composer David Buckley, who was nominated for an Emmy Award in the Outstanding Theme Music category in 2017 for his work on The Good Fight.

[66] Charles Pulliam-Moore of The Verge felt the trailer confirmed the series would retain the comic's "focus on the macabre" and featured "a sense of scale... that's hopefully going to be consistent throughout the show".

The website's critics consensus reads, "While it may hold few surprises for fans of the source material, The Sandman's first season satisfyingly adapts an allegedly unfilmable classic.

[103][104] Judy Berman of Time also gave a positive review, praising its production design and casting, while also highlighting the standalone episodes, calling the series "easily one of the best small-screen comic adaptations ever made.

He also praised its visuals and the performances, especially Sturridge's, whom he felt "captures the competing aspects of Morpheus that are forever roiling under his impassive surface — his haughtiness, his wounded vulnerability; his stiffness, his longing for connection.

[107] At Variety, Caroline Framke praised the narrative structure of the series and story, writing that it "metes out its material with an economical approach (no episode runs over 54 minutes)", but criticized some of the visual effects and use of computer-generated imagery (CGI) and felt it did not replicate the art from the comics.

Under the expert guidance of comic book creator Neil Gaiman, Netflix was able to streamline this mind-bending and rich anthology into a cohesive and beautiful series full of characters that each had their own defining outlook on the world in which they lived - or survived - in".

[109] Los Angeles Times included the series in its unranked list of "10 best TV shows of 2022" and called it "a shimmering, magical, moving masterpiece that defies the odds".

[110] Meanwhile, Collider named it one of the best new TV shows of the year and wrote, "The Sandman introduces audiences to a rich, layered, enchanting world of pure imagination.

[111] In a mixed review, Karama Horne of TheWrap called the series "visually stunning" and further praised its costumes, sound design, and the cast performances, while criticizing its pacing and noting that its "anthology style of storytelling" caused the plot to suffer, especially towards the season's end.

Club called The Sandman a "generic fantasy series" that is too faithful to its source material, "doing what is essentially the bare minimum in replicating an acclaimed work of art and transferring it into a different medium", though he praised some of the performances.

He said that the "meticulous detail in replicating the look and tone [of the comic] doesn't create much emotional investment", noting the "episodic" chapters in the series which he thought negatively affected its pacing, but also felt that it would satisfy fans familiar with the source material.