The creators of the Lucifer television series discussed Gwendoline Christie’s portrayal of Lucifer Morningstar in Netflix’s “The Sandman.” “The Sandman,” a critically renowned comic series by Neil Gaiman, finally found a home on Netflix after many years of unsuccessful attempts. The project, which was originally planned as a live-action film years ago, was reworked as a television series, allowing Gaiman’s work to receive more attention than simply two hours in a theater.
Morpheus and the Endless, a family that represents important components of the cosmos anthropomorphically, are the main characters of “The Sandman.” Gwendoline Christie, who starred in Game of Thrones and Star Wars, as Lucifer Morningstar, one of the major characters in “The Sandman” season 1. Before she appeared, Tom Ellis played the DC/Vertigo-based character for six seasons of Lucifer, a procedural-fantasy series that was based on Gaiman’s work. Prior to the show’s conclusion in 2021—almost a year before “The Sandman“ made its debut on the same platform—Netflix decided to save Lucifer after it had run for three seasons on FOX before it was canceled.
Ildy Modrovich and Joe Henderson, the creators of the Lucifer television series, are unrelated to “The Sandman” but embrace Christie’s interpretation of the DC legend. The co-creators of Lucifer were asked if they had seen “The Sandman’s” portrayal of the Devil in a recent interview with TVLine to promote the season 6 Blu-Ray/DVD release. Henderson was extremely complimentary of how Lucifer was portrayed in The Sandman. The co-showrunner of Lucifer also discussed how Ellis’ portrayal of the character would never have worked with “The Sandman’s” overall plot, adding that he even enjoys the fact that the two versions of the character differ significantly from one another.
“I loved her. I love it. It’s funny, many of the fans were like, “Why isn’t it Tom Ellis?” If you watch the show you see why, because her Lucifer is cruel, and brutal, and awesome. And it would break our hearts if Tom Ellis played that version of it, because ours is very sweet and kind. I love the differences, and I want to write the road trip spinoff of the two of them traveling America together and getting in trouble!”
Henderson is dead on in this regard, notwithstanding how well-liked Ellis’ Lucifer was and is. There was never a trajectory for Lucifer where he could naturally develop into the terrible adversary that Christie’s character became in “The Sandman” season 1, despite the fact that his show did explore the many nuanced faces of Lucifer. It’s also important to keep in mind that Chloe Decker and the titular character had a happy ending in season six of Lucifer, which would have been wrecked if he suddenly turned evil in “The Sandman.”
Ellis’ tenure as Lucifer may be coming to an end, but “The Sandman” might still pull off a crossover in the future in which Christie’s Lucifer appears alongside Ellis’. Although Lucifer began as its own standalone universe, Crisis on Infinite Earths revealed that Ellis’ character is set on Earth-666, causing Lucifer to become loosely connected to the Arrowverse. Even though it was only a brief visit, it did raise the possibility of crossovers between Lucifer and other DC franchises. If the Netflix show decided to have Ellis as a guest in a future season 2 or later, “The Sandman” might easily be one of them.
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