GFT Retrospective #88: The Dream Eater Saga #8 (Sinbad One-Shot)

Sinbad One-Shot Review

by Sean Wilkinson,

Retrospective Dreamer,

Wishful Ticketmaster.

Sinbad, if you recall from some of my posts early on in the Retrospective, is a property that originally had big brand expansion and integration plans, the cancelation of which led to a late-stage title change. Zenescope once had plans for a series continuation of The Lamp that would have elaborated on Belinda’s time as a genie and crossed over with a 1001 Arabian Nights sub-franchise that would have included Sinbad and Aladdin among other One-Shot and miniseries adaptations of the famous Middle Eastern fairy tale collection. After those plans were scrapped, the Arabian Nights branding was dropped and Zenescope planned to make Sinbad an ongoing series (at least until the remaining two pieces of the Jericho Visor were found and recurring villains like Alorana and General Tipu were defeated), but probably because money, Sinbad was canceled after the City Of the Dead storyline, and we wouldn't get more of the legendary sailor until the time travel Crossover, and the One-Shot I'm reviewing today. The lore is too dense and lengthy to copy here, so check out the links to my old posts in this preceding paragraph, and read the following bio images for some Notes from the Cliff:

Before you read on, please remember to Become A Ticketholder if you haven't already, leave a comment at the bottom of this post, help out my ad revenue as you read so I don't have to live in a lamp, and follow me on BlueSky, Tumblr, Reddit, Facebook, and LinkedIn to like what you see and receive the latest Grimm news on my my content.

The Dream Eater Saga #8

Sinbad One-Shot

One thing I omitted last week was how much cross-referencing I had to do for the art and writing credits because it was the first of the Dream Eater Saga issues to not have an eyecatcher title panel with that information. For that, I had to compare the last names on the cover with the full names on the Trade Volume's credits page, and then multi-confirm with ComicVine, comics.org, Google, and various fan Wikis for a more complete picture (image puns!) of who drew what.

Thankfully, the Sinbad One-Shot has such a panel to make things easier for readers like me, so I can tell you that with Shamus Beyale on pencils (Grimm Fairy Tales 2011 Special Edition), and Andrew Elder on colors (Once Upon A Time and Myths & Legends #6), the interior art ranges from impressively detailed to rushed and sketchy, and with Dan Wickline returning from previous Sinbad projects to do the writing, the story is bare and full of on-brand quips and character moments, and feels off with the absence of Belinda and the underutilization of Samantha to even out Baba Yaga here.

Following their trip through a Provenance portal at the end of the last issue, Baba Yaga, Anslied the Piper, and Samantha Darren (who is also there, looking totally inconspicuous in her bright blue-and-white superhero costume with a ratty cloak over it like a pair of Groucho glasses on Superman) find themselves in late 700s Yanbu' Al Bahr (in what would now be Saudi Arabia, and in continuity with the established Abbasid Caliphate time period of the Sinbad maxi-series, if not also the crossover). General Tipu being in charge, Osmium being present, and Wilhelm and Shon'du having elemental powers sets this after City Of the Dead but before any future - and canceled! - adventures. Tipu has captured Pots and staged a public execution to lure out and capture Sinbad, but he's Sinbad, and his crew are the Arabian Avengers, so things don't go according to plan. Also, according to Baba Yaga, our time-wandering trio need "one of the strongest and most powerful men in any of the Realms" to defeat the Dream Eater. You'd think they mean Sinbad, but even though it's sort of obvious (really obvious if you count the amazing cover by EBas and Jason Embury shown above), it turns out that Pots is the one they need. Not only was he established in Once Upon A Time to be sensitive to the Dream Eater's presence, but we find out here that he still has the lamp!

There's a cool magical standoff between our trio and the combined forces of Wilhelm, Samelia, Old Man, and Sinbad, but somehow, Baba Yaga being evil and demanding gets the job done faster than if Samantha had explained what's going on (which would have been more interesting in terms of character, but would have also been repetitive, forced exposition, and therefore bad content execution). So instead, Samantha gets knocked on her ass by a protection spell on the lamp, Baba Yaga coerces Pots into wishing for a portal, and the issue ends with Sinbad and Samelia following Pots, the Piper, Baba Yaga, and Samantha back to the modern day, with a stinger promise that the event will continue in Grimm Fairy Tales.

It's frustrating that interesting character dynamics and dimension were sacrificed here for easy quips and an accelerated pace, but the Sinbad One-Shot had its moments (Pots was the best written, and that magic duel was kind of fun and innovative), and I'm looking forward to rediscovering how the story continues for next week's review.

So please remember to Become A Ticketholder if you haven't already, leave a comment at the bottom of this post, help out my ad revenue as you read so I don't have to live in a lamp, and follow me on BlueSky, Tumblr, Reddit, Facebook, and LinkedIn to like what you see and receive the latest Grimm news on my my content.

Ticketmaster,

Setting Sail.