The Annotated Sandman

              Edited by Ralf Hildebrandt and largely written by David Goldfarb

                            Issue 56: "Worlds' End"

   Neil Gaiman, Bryan Talbot, Mark Buckingham, Gary Amaro, Dick Giordano,
                          Tony Harris, Steve Leialoha

               Sixth and last story in anthology "Worlds' End"

Cover: Note that the sign is a mirror-reversed negative image of the sign
from the cover of issue #51.

Page 3 panel 5: Such as the death of an Endless?

Page 4 panel 4: Gangster story? The only story we've seen that isn't 
identifiable from this list would be "A Tale of Two Cities", from #51, but 
that one hardly seems describable as a gangster story. Perhaps she's referring 
to the man who won November 1937 in a poker game, or perhaps a story told 
downstairs while Brant was hearing about Prez.
Lord Vetinari  thoughts about that:
I think she means the one told by the comrade of Petriefax about the
fall of the last Necropolis. It is reminiscient of when the MOB came to
town as a group of a few overwhelming strangers and demanded things or
caused much Destruction. Given that the woman has no idea about the
Endless and what is really happening this is quite plausible to be what
it is from her point of view.
About the fall of Necropolis story, i originally thought that when they
said their sister was dead they meant Death, because it would be like a
metaphor for the endless, stop caring and believing, and they die. But
in the picture of the six strangers it definitely seems as if their is
Death in their, but not Despair, who we know has died.

       panel 5: Horatio Alger (1832-1899) was known for stories of poor but
honest boys making good through hard work.

Page 8 panel 7: Given that the Endless embody aspects of reality, if a storm
is caused by the death and replacement of one of them, then both theories are
equally true. There has been only one before, and as we were reminded last
issue, an Endless has died and been replaced once before.

Page 9 panel 4: The return of Steven Brust, seen once before in 51:9:4.

Page 10: The song is part of the Gaiman-written "Generic Folk Song".

Page 13: OK, time to play "name the characters". This one is Destiny, of course.

Pp. 14-15: The man with the flag, judging by his coat and vest, is Lucien. Some
netters have speculated that the first pallbearer is Desire (who otherwise is
noticeably absent from the proceedings), and the second (with red hair) is 
Loki.  The big question is who is in the coffin. Opinions vary, but the most 
popular guess is Dream, with Orpheus a distant second.

Pp. 16-17: Going roughly from left to right: Nuala, Abel, Mervyn Pumpkinhead,
Cain, Luz, Wilkinson, Queen Titania, Matthew the raven, Bast, Despair, an angel
(perhaps Remiel), Odin, Thor, Emperor Norton, probably Gregory the Gargoyle,
Gilbert/Fiddler's Green, and Martin Tenbones.

Page 18: Finally, Delirium and Death. In the introduction to the "Death 
Gallery", Gaiman relates a story from the Kabala, that the Angel of Death 
collects souls through love: when you see it(/him/her) you fall in love so 
quickly that your soul is drawn out through your eyes. 

Page 22 panel 4: There are numerous Hindu gods and goddesses represented with
multiple arms. We can infer that the landlady was one such who lost all her
worshippers, and took refuge at the inn before returning to the Dreaming. 

Page 23 panel 7: The crystal was given to Nuala in issue 42, page 4, panel 5.

Page 24 The lady behind the bar seems to be wearing a similar pendant to 
Nuala's (in Brief Lives Sandman #42 - also 
seen in The Kindly Ones Sandman #58)