It’s difficult for me to imagine an internal storyline for a god-like figure. So during my last reading of The Sandman, a comic that follows Morpheus, the Lord of Dreams around, I watched closely for what kind of situations he’s in and how those are affecting him internally. Here’s my favorite story from Gaiman.

Morpheus falls in love with a human. That isn’t a story in itself. Morpheus understands that he’s part of the endless and she’s just a human, so it’s not meant to be. He falls in love and life goes on. It becomes a story when his baby brothers — Desire and Despair — start to play a prank on him, and Morpheus becomes increasingly obsessive over this human.

It’s fun to think about these all-powerful gods playing pranks and tricks on each other. Reminds me of Loki toying with Thor. This simple prank makes Morpheus human because now he’s controlled by his internal desires, and now he has a story we can relate to, and now he has a character arc: can he learn to overcome this temptation and desire?

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Here’s another fun part of the comic. I said Desire is Dream’s brother, which was wrong. Desire is his brother/sister; he/she is a hermaphrodite, as desire doesn’t discriminate.