Wesley Dodds, the Sandman, began as a dark, brooding character in a gas mask and fedora with a gas gun. In late 1941, DC instructed Mort Weisinger and Paul Norris to revamp the character. Weisinger and Norris dressed him in a yellow-and-purple costume and gave him a sidekick named Sandy the Golden Boy, real name Sandy Hawkins. This revamp was little more than a Batman knockoff, complete with wirepoon guns (like the batarang and rope Batman uses) and signature car. Soon thereafter, Joe Simon and Jack Kirby left Timely Comics (now Marvel) and began working at DC. After a failed attempt to work on Batman, DC assigned them the Sandman. They took a Batman knockoff and made him into a quasi-prophetic character who appeared in dreams as a warning to criminals and a beacon of hope to the downtrodden.
Sandman by Joe Simon & Jack Kirby collects World's Finest Comics #6–7, Adventure Comics #72–102, and Sandman #1. With the exception of the Sandman one-shot, all of the comics come from the 1940s and feature gangsters along with the occasional reference to the war. Reading Simon and Kirby's Sandman is like reading their run on Captain America Comics. In 1974, Simon and Kirby reunited to recreate the Sandman once again in Sandman #1. This version wears yet a different costume and lives in the dreamworld. He has the ability to control others' dreams with the aid of his nightmare beasts. Unlike Wesley Dodds or Neil Gaiman's Morpheus, this Sandman never caught on.
Those interested in the history of the character will find this an interesting volume as it captures a unique period in the character's fictional biography. Beginning in the 1990s, DC published Sandman Mystery Theatre, which tells new stories of Dodds in the 1930s in which he wears his original costume, retconning much of this period away. Despite the change in continuity, Simon and Kirby's dynamic writing and art continues to entertain. ( )

In 1941, DC gave the Sandman a new costume and a new sidekick in an attempt to revive a fading character by making him more like a superhero-- they even ditched Wesley Dodds's girlfriend Dian. It probably would have failed, had not Joe Simon and Jack Kirby taken over the character in 1942, fresh off their success creating Captain America for Marvel. Every story the two of them collaborated on is here. They're goofy, sure, but they're also really quite good-- they've got art by Jack Kirby, you know! Kirby and Simon's layouts are dynamic, with stretching borders and crossing the gutter and just all-out explosive imagery. The Sandman no longer uses his gas gun or mask here (alas), but the name is kept appropriate with the use of dreams in the stories. Frequently, characters are motivated by their dreams (or even lack thereof), and all the villains in New York City dream of the Sandman. In fact, when Wesley Dodds is replaced by an impostor, Sandy figures it out because "Dodds" mentions dreaming of the Sandman!

Some are better than others, of course, and as you might imagine from a book featuring twenty-four different stories, it eventually gets repetitive. Some are just dumb, but there are a lot of neat ones, too. I also enjoyed the glimpses of World War II propaganda; the Sandman and Sandy exhort the reader to buy war bonds, but even better is the comic about Hitler, Mussolini, and Hirohito reading The Boy Commandos. The Sandman stories get flat-out terrible at the end, but I think those ones might not actually be by Simon and Kirby-- though I'm basing that on the most fleeting of evidence!

It's just weird to think that these adventures happened to the same guy as Sandman Mystery Theatre. And it's even weirder to think that that version of Wesley Dodds hung out with an obnoxious snot like Sandy. (Okay, he's nowhere near as bad as Green Arrow's kid sidekick Speedy.)

Also included is the first issue of the 1974-76 series about the second Sandman, Garrett Sanford, which reunited Simon and Kirby for the last time ever. It's weird and doesn't quite hang together-- what is General Electric's plan, anyway?-- but the concepts and visuals are as captivating as always. You can see why Roy Thomas brought back this version (and even game him a name, which Simon and Kirby did not), and why Neil Gaiman nicked some of the concepts for his Sandman series.

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