| Sandman | |
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Sandman Art by Mark Bagley |
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| Publication information | |
| Publisher | Marvel Comics |
| First appearance | Amazing Spider-Man #4 (September, 1963) |
| Created by | Stan Lee Steve Ditko |
| In-story information | |
| Alter ego | William Baker |
| Team affiliations | Sinister Six Frightful Four Avengers Wild Pack Enforcers The Outlaws The Intruders |
| Notable aliases | Flint Marko, Sylvester Mann, Quarryman |
| Abilities |
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Sandman (William Baker, a.k.a. Flint Marko) is a fictional character who appears in comic books published by Marvel Comics. A shapeshifter endowed through an accident with the ability to turn himself into sand, he eventually reformed, and became an ally of Spider-Man. The character has been adapted into various other media incarnations of Spider-Man, including animated cartoons and the 2007 film Spider-Man 3, in which he is played by Academy Award nominated actor Thomas Haden Church.
In 2009, Sandman was ranked as IGN's 72nd Greatest Comic Book Villain of All Time.[1]
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The Sandman first appeared in The Amazing Spider-Man #4 (Sept. 1963), created by writer Stan Lee and artist Steve Ditko as an adversary of Spider-Man. The character returned in The Amazing Spider-Man #18 and #19, and was soon depicted in other comics, such as battling Hulk and the Fantastic Four. The Sandman was later an ally of Spider-Man, as well as a member of the Avengers and Silver Sable's "Wild Pack" team of mercenaries.
William Baker was born in Queens, New York. At three years old his father abandoned him and his mother, a cleaning lady. In these early years she took her son to Coney Island beach. He lost himself happily in sand sculptures, a craft he would use in secondary school under the encouragement of his teacher (and first crush), Miss Flint.[2]
In preparatory school, a boy named Vic and his two pals bullied William until he, William, learned to fight using opponents' motions against themselves, a technique he performed as if he "slipped through their fingers like sand." Vic and his buddies posed no match to William, who wore them down and who they even befriended throughout high school. At this time, William, a football player on his school's team, used football to channel his anger to apply it to what he sensed as a nascent change in himself. While playing football he adopted the moniker "Flint," the last name of his affection, Miss Flint.[2]
Vic incurs a large debt to a mob. In desperation, he begs Flint to fix a football game he bet on to pay off his debt. Flint does, but finds himself kicked off the team after the coach discovers his involvement in this corruption. The coach vituperates the young, tenderfoot trickster by saying that he will accomplish nothing of importance in his life. Flint soon roughs up his ex-coach, resulting in his expulsion from school and segue into a life of crime.
His illegal activity increases in depth and scope, turning him into a violent, bitter man. Eventually he ends up in prison on Ryker's Island where he meets his father, Floyd Baker. He is friendly to his father but does not tell him who he is. He tells Floyd his nickname, Flint, and a false surname, Marko, inspired by his former coach’s taunts about not "making a mark" on the world. He would use the alias Flint Marko from that point on.[2] (He changed his name also to prevent his mother from discovering he's a criminal.[3]) His father's presence ameliorates him. After Floyd is released from prison, Marko escapes.[2]
Immediately, William flees to a nuclear testing site on a beach near Savannah, Georgia where he comes into contact with sand that had been irradiated by an experimental reactor. His body and the radioactive sand bond, which changes Marko's molecular structure into sand. Impressed, he names himself the Sandman after his new powers.
In high school Marko clashes with Peter Parker/Spider-Man, for the first time. He escaped Spider-Man in his first battle, but later Spider-Man found the Sandman hiding in his school. He defeats Marko with a vacuum cleaner and handed it over to the police.[4] The Sandman escaped by getting through his window after turning himself to sand, but was recaptured by the Human Torch after the Torch lured the Sandman to a building by disguising himself as Spider-Man, then activated the sprinkler systems. After a while the troubled youth resurfaces as a member of the Sinister Six, led by Doctor Octopus. He battled Spider-Man inside an airtight metal box, which was activated when Spider-Man touched a card saying where the Vulture was, but the Sandman was defeated due to Spider-Man having stronger lungs than him.[5] Alongside the Enforcers, he captures the Human Torch but later succumbs to Spider-Man and the Human Torch.[6] After Spider-Man defeats Flint numerous times, Flint diverts his attention to other super heroes. He teams with the Wizard, Paste Pot Pete and Medusa to form the Frightful Four to combat the Fantastic Four, which attacked during Reed and Sue's engagement party. The Fantastic Four with the help of a few other super heroes pound this fledgling group.[7] In another battle he loses against the Four, he dons a diamond-patterned green costume with a purple cap and is joined by Blastaar.[8] Later he and Incredible Hulk duel for the first time. Mandarin joins him in his next conflict against the Hulk.[9]
In time Sandman discovers—starting with his hands—his body can transform into glass and that he can reverse that effect. He contracted cancer and overtook a medical research center. He battled Wonder Man but was cured of cancer by radiation.[10] Afterward, he allied himself with Hydro-Man to battle their mutual enemy, Spider-Man. An accident merged the two villains into a muddle-headed mud monster whose rampage was short-lived when Spider-Man and the police dehydrated the monstrosity.[11] Months later Sandman became independent from Hydro-Man.
Depression sinks into Baker in an episode where he is having second thoughts about evil. The Thing of the Fantastic Four sees Baker's angst and urges him to straighten himself out and use his ability to do good.[12] He began boarding with the Cassadas and teamed with Spider-Man against the Enforcers.[13] Sandman then makes sporadic appearances in Spider-Man comics assisting his former enemy. The first such appearance has him coming to the rescue of Spider-Man and Silver Sable, who are outnumbered and surrounded by the Sinister Syndicate. Silver Sable is impressed by Sandman's performance and recruits him as a freelance operative.[14] Doctor Octopus coerced him to rejoin Sinister Six, but he turned against the clan, whose leader, Doctor Octopus, turned him into glass for his treason. Spider-man, however, saved the Sandman.[15] Sandman also appears as part of The Outlaws, a group of reformed Spider-Man enemies, such as Prowler, Rocket Racer, Puma and Will o' the Wisp, on occasion that would aid Spider-Man.[16]
Later he receives a presidential pardon and briefly joins the Avengers as a reserve member.[17] Later, he becomes a full-time mercenary in the employ of Silver Sable, as a member of her Wild Pack, serving alongside heroes such as Paladin and Battlestar. Sandman is one of the few heroes temporarily overwhelmed by their evil doubles during the Infinity War. This double almost kills them all.
In Amazing Spider-Man V2 #4, Marko turned against Spider-Man and his sometimes ally Thing and declared his allegiance to evil and his former employer, the villainous Wizard. This change proved egregiously incompatible to what many Sandman fans had thought Sandman had become, what he had reformed to, a hero. . This outcry caused Marvel to rush out a story, in Peter Parker: Spider-Man V2 #12, which retconned Amazing Spider-Man #4 in which the Wizard kidnapped Sandman and used his mind control machine, the Id Machine, to control the sandy monstrosity.
The machine worked too well and Sandman went about reforming the Sinister Six to destroy both Spider-Man and Doctor Octopus, only to be double-crossed by Venom, who Sandman recruited as the sixth member of the team. During Venom's brawl against Sandman, the vicious black spider's mouth rips a chunk of sand from Sandman. That missing sand destabilizes Sandman, causing him to lose his ability to maintain his human form. Before falling into the sewer (and as a nod to fans who rejected Marvel's attempt to re-villainize the character), Sandman admitted that part of the reason for his fall from grace was the trouble he had to really cope with life on the good guys' side, and asks Spider-Man to tell his mother he's sorry he didn't fulfull his promise to her, to be a force for good. Sandman washes away and slides down a sewer, from which he mixes into Jones Beach, New York[18] and is thought dead.
Sandman's body and mind are scattered throughout the beach. This separation lasts too long for him, causing his mind to split into good and its opposite, evil, which when dominant created sand vortexes to ensnare beach combers. Spider-Man arrived to confront Sandman, ultimately using Sandman's mental instability to free his captives and cause him to explode.
His sand wafts throughout New York and touches down into piles forming beings that personify him: the good, the bad, the gentle and the innocent. Spider-Man locates these sandmen to convince them unify. Sandman's evil persona merges with his innocent and gentle personas, but Sandman's good one rebuffs the evil one. Because Sandman's mind can handle his personality in separation for a limited time, he loses his ability to retain himself, crumbling and blowing away, leaving Spider-Man to ponder the nature of his scuddled foe.[19]
Sandman is one of the villains recruited to recover the Identity Disc, but during its recovery seemingly he is killed in a mutiny. At the series' end Sandman is found alive and working with Vulture to manipulate the other villains.
In the storyline "Sandblasted," in Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man #17–19 (April-June 2007), Sandman asks Spider-Man to help him redeem his father, who has been charged with and imprisoned for murdering a homeless man. He admits his father was a petty criminal but insists he wouldn't commit murder. Baker also said the victim resembles Peter Parker's Uncle Ben, who had been murdered years before then. Sandman and Spider-Man find the killer, Chameleon 2211. Chameleon 2211 kills Uncle Ben who Hobgoblin 2211 brought from an alternate universe[20] and had been posing as him after that. Thanks to Spider-Man, Floyd Baker is switched with Chameleon 2211 and saved, for which Sandman thanks Spider-Man.
Sandman returned in Spider-Man: The Gauntlet storyline, which redefined the character and his powers/mental state. While investigating a series of murders and a missing girl named Keemia, whose mother is a victim of those murders, Spider-Man traces the murders and the abduction to the Sandman, who is hiding on Governor's Island with Keemia. Sandman's powers have evolved to where he can create duplicates of himself who have their own personalities and to Marko's shock claim they committed the murders.[21]
Spider-Man sneaks away and uses a fan to obliterate the sandmen. Originally Spider-Man believed Keemia would be handed to her grandmother, but instead she was sent to a foster home by Child Protective Services. Carlie, one of Spider-Man's friends who had been under police suspicion for tampering with evidence from the murders committed by Sandman's duplicates, is exonerated, but Sandman is at large.[22]
During the Origin of the Species storyline, Sandman is among the supervillains invited by Doctor Octopus to join his villains' team where he becomes involved in a plot to receive a reward and securing some specific items for him. Sandman went after Spider-Man for Menace's infant Keemia. He ended up colliding with Electro before they showed up.[23] Spider-Man goes on a rampage against the villains after the infant was stolen from him by the Chameleon. In the dock, Sandman along with Shocker and the Enforcers are hiding, however Spider-Man collapses the floor of the building, which falls into the water. Sandman attempts to rise to attack, but Spider-Man shot him using Shocker's vibrational air blasts.[24]
In "Big Time", he is part of the new Sinister Six, along with Mysterio, Rhino, Dr. Octopus, Chameleon, and Electro. He rises up against Octopus's plan to detonate New York, saying Keemia is still there. He is later angered when, during a confrontation between the Sinister Six and the Intelligencia, Doctor Octopus teleports the Wizard into the upper atmosphere, using the Intelligencia's equipment. Sandman was talking with his former Frightful Four teammate and old friend at the time, prompting Sandman to violently attack the Mad Thinker when he was going after Electro because he claimed that he didn't want to lose any more friends.[25]
Sandman has the ability to transform his body. He can will his body hardened, compacted, dispersed or shaped, or a combination of those qualities, an Earth manipulation of sand and rock particles. More often than not in combat, this ability enables him to absorb most blows with little to no ill effect other than reforming himself, a relatively fast action. His striped shirt and cargo pants are colored sand to make him appear as if he wears clothes. Even when soaked, he was able to stretch his sand molecules, growing to double his size.
Sandman can mold his arms and hands into shapes such as a mace or a sledgehammer to battle Spider-Man and his other enemies. His mass, strength and shape shifting ability correspond to the number of sand and rock particles that comprise him. The more he incorporates (nearby) sand grains and rock granules into his body, the more those qualities are enhanced. Even though he controls every particle in his body, his mind exists in the astral plane. He can turn himself into a sandstorm, which enables him to fly great distances and to suffocate his enemies.
His body takes on sand's chemical qualities, impervious to many, but not all, elements. Once, cement's ingredients were mixed into Sandman. That mixture turned him into cement that dried, rendering him immobile. Despite this frailty, he remained alive but in a comalike state for a while before he returned to normal. In addition to his superb endurance, the Sandman possesses superhuman strength several times more than Spider-Man's, on par with the Thing's.
In a story with the Wizard, the Wizard fashioned Sandman a suit with a belt that contained chemicals to mix into the Sandman to enable him to change himself into consistencies related to sand. The suit's composition, as Sandman's usual "clothes," changed with him. Eventually Sandman stopped using the suit.
Temperature does alter the Sandman. At 3,400 Fahrenheit his body turns into glass, also a form he can control. Unlike Sandman's fast transformation from sand to glass, his transformation from glass to sand takes time.[26]
Although he is invulnerable to most physical attacks, even projectiles because they pass through him, water is a different story to him. So, too, is a rare physical attack. In combat against Venom, the villain's powerful mouth ripped cleanly and swiftly into Sandman. The amount of sand removed abruptly, and perhaps because of Venom's poisons, left the mass of Sandman in contortion, crippled beyond immediate repair. Sandman began to disintegrate, then flowed down a drain, giving the impression he had met his end. Later he is washed up onto and into a beach.
As of Amazing Spider-Man #615, it seems Sandman will be able to split into multiple persons, at a time.
Marvel 1602: Fantastick Four, a sequel to Neil Gaiman's Marvel 1602 written by Peter David, features the 1602 version of the Marvel Sandman. While he physically resembles Flint Marko, he has the pale skin and glowing eyes of Gaiman's Morpheus. He also alludes to an ability to summon nightmares. In the fourth issue he is able to send Ben Grimm to sleep by blowing a vapor or dust at him. Both the Sandman and Trapster are crushed by falling debris when Bensaylum collapses.
Sandman appears in the last issue among the Avengers fighting through Krona's stronghold, in a panel where he defeats Scorpion.
Sandman appears as a member of Hood's Masters of Evil.[27] He was killed by both Rogue and Marrow during the riot at Santo Rico.[28]
In the Marvel Noir universe, Sandman exists, and exhibits slightly different powers to the mainstream Universe. Whilst he cannot externally change into sand, he can alter his internal physiology, and, as Spider-Man noted, his skin can feel like granite. He is an enforcer for the Crime Master.[29] His real name is Carmine Di Giandomenico.
In Marvel Zombies: Dead Days, the Sandman, having become a zombie, appears to attack Wolverine and Magneto alongside several other Spider-Man villains during an attempt to evacuate innocent civilians into a S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier. The six villains are repelled.[30] It is later revealed in Marvel Zombies Return #1 that this Sandman was infected by his reality's Spider-Man.
A version of Sandman similar to a past version of 616 counterpart appears as part of a version of the Sinister Six. After Zombie Spider-Man teleports into this reality, the Kingpin sends the six to fight "Spider-Man". The other five members are violently killed by the zombie Spider-Man and Sandman flees, later encountering and killing his own reality's Spider-Man out of fear. He is also disappointed by the seeming betrayal of his enemy, thinking that if Spider-Man is now willing to kill, then Sandman will also kill. Later on, Sandman is infused with a nanite cure developed by Tony Stark and the Zombie Spider-Man that incorporates Wolverine's healing factor, which allows him to safely confront the Zombies, and he finally ends the menace by completely engulfing them, which allows the nanites to disintegrate them. Upon his final death, Zombie Spider-Man thanks Sandman for avenging Aunt May and Mary Jane, to which Sandman replies, "Good riddance, ya freak." He is later congratulated by a resurrected Watcher.[31]
In Spider-Man: Reign Sandman is a part of an elderly Sinister Six which is under the control of the tyrannical power structure running New York. During the showdown between rebellious citizens at the Mayor's tower, the Sandman encounters his super-powered daughter but loses her due to wounds inflicted by the police. As such he abandons the Six and assists Spider-Man in defeating the tyrants.[32]
In Peter Porker, the Spectacular Spider-Ham #12 Sandman appears as a manatee called Sandmanatee.[33]
In the Ultimate Marvel Universe, Flint Marko is a genetic mutation by industrialist Justin Hammer who attempts to recreate the Super Soldier Serum. Shortly after Doctor Octopus kills Hammer, S.H.I.E.L.D. infiltrates Hammer's factory to obtain experiments Hammer had been working on. Marko uses this opportunity to escape and wreak havoc in New Jersey. S.H.I.E.L.D., with the help of Spider-Man, contains him and imprisons him in a S.H.I.E.L.D holding facility. There, he meets fellow genetically altered criminals Norman Osborn (Green Goblin), Dr. Otto Octavius (Doctor Octopus), Max Dillon (Electro) and Kraven the Hunter. Under the Green Goblin's and Dr. Octopus's leadership, they break free and capture Spider-Man. They tie him to a chair, unmask, and humiliate Peter for being a child and for Norman Osborn and Otto Octavious's involvement in his creation. Osborn then blackmails Peter into joining the team, forming the Ultimate Six. Marko participates with the group in an attack on the White House. However, Iron Man stops them. After the battle, S.H.I.E.L.D. seals Marko in various jars and keeps them frozen.
Artist Mark Bagley, who drew the first 100+ issues of Ultimate Spider-Man, noted in his rough designs for Ultimate Sandman that he would appear "Naked" most of the time. As he wanted to go with the more 'realistic' feel of the Ultimate imprint, he doubted whether Flint Marko's clothing had unstable molecules like his body. Alongside the rest of the Ultimate Six, Sandman plays a role in the "Death of Spider-Man" storyline. Norman Osborn breaks him and the rest out of the Triskelion, and after their escape, informs them that God wishes for them to kill Peter Parker.[34]
Sandman makes a cameo in Mini-Marvels when he attacks Spider-Man and the Team Poder while they were playing in a sandbox. He is defeated an turned into a Sand castle.
Thomas Haden Church played Sandman in the 2007 feature film Spider-Man 3. In the film, Sandman's origins are similar to the comics except for his connection to Spider-Man's origin. Flint Marko steals to pay for medical treatment for his critically ill daughter, Penny. While on the run from the police after escaping from prison, he accidentally falls into an experimental particle accelerator that molecularly binds him with sand, giving him shapeshifting sand abilities. A major focus of the plot involves Marko's connection to the murder of Ben Parker (Cliff Robertson), Spider-Man's uncle, in the first film. Sandman is later spotted by police officers walking down the streets of Manhattan. Sandman gets on top of a dump truck filled with huge amounts of sand. At the police station, police captain George Stacy (James Cromwell) discovers evidence Marko is Ben Parker's killer. He tells Peter and Aunt May (Rosemary Harris) the carjacker, Dennis Carradine, whom Peter confronted two years earlier, was Marko's accomplice. A vengeful Spider-Man, wearing the black suit that would eventually become Venom, attacked and seemingly killed Marko but he survived and later joined forces with Venom to eliminate Spider-Man. He is ultimately defeated by Harry Osborn, and upon learning Spider-Man's true identity after witnessing the destruction of Venom, he talks with Peter at the conclusion of the film, revealing he didn't mean to kill Uncle Ben. Flint stated that he just wanted the car from Ben, and as Ben peacefully attempted to talk Flint out of it, Carradine came by, startling Flint, and causing his gun to discharge, killing Ben. This shocks Flint, who remained behind while Carradine drove away in Ben's car before getting in a run with the police. Flint stated this because he wanted Peter to understand and that his love for his daughter Penny is the only thing he has left for himself. Understanding the importance of forgiveness over vengeance, Peter forgives him, and Flint, having accepted Peter's forgiveness, peacefully blows away.
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