The Sandman/Tear Jerker

"Mother: OOtchacootchacoo?
 * "The Sound of her Wings", where Dream follows his sister Death on her daily work, always make it for this troper, all because of this page. It is just so... real.

Baby: babababa!

[Mother leaves to pick up the milk bottle, Death takes the baby in her arms]

Baby: KKK... [Now in Death's Realm]... But... is that all there was? Is that all I get?

Death: Yes, I am afraid so.

[The Sound of Her Wings]

Mother: Look, booful, Mama's got you something lovely... honey?... NO!!!"


 * This troper's tearjerker moment for this series was in The Doll's House -- all the little sequences of Jed's adventures in the dream-world, which are all very sweet and cutesy, and the contrast with the panels of what's really happening when he wakes up. I must have read that same comic a million times, and I still sniffle. Every. Single. Time. (They are also in a small way nightmarish -- such as the one where he wakes from a dream about setting loose the verbal gerbils, which are still very cute-looking, to being bitten by rats.)
 * An off-hand remark in an early book does this. Shakespeare's son bemoans that the only way his father'd care about him is if he died, because then he'd make a play about it.
 * This troper cried, for the first time in months, at the end of the A Game of You. She finds it hard to believe that nobody else cried
 * Barbie scrawling Wanda's given name off with her favorite lipstick and writing her real one. It might've been too similar to a scene from the TV miniseries Roots but it did finish the book in a powerful, emotional bang.
 * The end of "Ramadan," with its flash-forward from Harun al-Rashid's Baghdad to a little boy hearing stories about it in a bombed-out area of present-day Baghdad.
 * Orpheus' story, which was already a massive Tear Jerker outside of the series. Particularly the moment when

"I thought we'd have longer. It never gets any easier. People you love not being there any more."
 * There's a line near the end about how when Dream walks off, he doesn't look back. You could take that to mean that Orpheus should have had that much willpower, and then he wouldn't be in this mess. Or you could take it the other way: By not looking back, Dream reveals a level of cold-heartedness completely opposite the temperament of his son (at least on the surface). It makes Orpheus's failure more forgivable... and because you don't judge him as harshly now, the punishment seems even worse.
 * The scene in Brief Lives where Despair reminisces on her last meeting with Destruction, then bursts into tears. Desire attempts to contact her, but Despair doesn't react.
 * Is this troper the only one whose heart broke for Delirium when she got to the "I had to be...I had to be... It hurt." part? A single panel drives home the point hard that there's a real, deep sadness underneath Delirium's Fun Personified and Cloudcuckoolander personality.
 * From The World's End: "I think I fell in love with her, a little bit. Isn't that dumb? But it was like I knew her. Like she was my oldest, dearest friend. The kind of person you can tell anything to, no matter how bad, and they'll still love you, because they know you. I wanted to go with her. I wanted her to notice me. And then she stopped walking. Under the moon, she stopped. And looked at us. She looked at me. Maybe she was trying to tell me something; I don't know. She probably didn't even know I was there. But I'll always love her. All my life." Especially when you consider he's talking about.
 * The fates of, , and , among others.
 * What about Fiddler's Green? His demise is the one that always gets me. Those last words reflecting on the small pleasures of his life - "A kiss once...from a friend..." - and then slumping dead.
 * Or Abel...poor Abel, with the grieving Goldie perched on his chest.
 * For that matter, Cain, who does clearly love his brother in their opening scene, but cannot change the nature of their relationship.
 * Lyta Hall telling a pregnant Rose Walker to "kill [the baby] now. Kill it before it breaks your heart."
 * 's death.
 * It was that pushed this editor over the edge and into open bawling.
 * For this troper, the moment was when . For the record, this troper is a guy.
 * There are way too many moments in The Wake that were Tear Jerkers for this Troper. gave this troper chills.
 * This troper is pissed at how scared everyone looked at that moment. speech is probably the most touching of the sibling's speeches especially when you realize.
 * Also, and the guilt and rage he felt.
 * As well as right while she's crying and showing us she actually has feelings other than rage and spite.
 * If Delirium's speech doesn't make you feel at least a little tearful, you probably have no soul.
 * cries for Bast, who gives her speech quietly knowing that it's not long before she dies, too. "And now he is gone. And I am old."
 * Hob waking up weeping was one, and the With Dream's Star shining in the sky and that feeling that after ten issues...it was over. Amazing.
 * I am tearing up just thinking about the scene in The Wake when Hob.
 * Hob Gadling's reaction . You'd think an immortal man would have become used to the people he's close to dying, but instead, his mourning at the grave of his most recent love is painful because of how real it is.


 * Morpheus' confession to Shakespeare in the final issue: "I am...in my fashion...an island."
 * What's even more sad and beautiful about that moment is that
 * Nuala's realization of Dream's motivation for everything post Brief Lives.  The look on Dream's face the next panel is heartwrenching.
 * Throughout the series, it's implied that killing one of the Endless brings about terrible punishment, even under good intent. After the climax of The Kindly Ones,  killer is expressly reminded this, with the further warning that the person who'd done so previously would suffer for all eternity when his motives were purer by far. The penalty handed down is to be allowed to walk away with no further harm done to her -- a Cruel Mercy,
 * Turns into a Crowning Moment of Heartwarming when

"I am Despair - and all those who despair are me."
 * "15 Portraits of Despair" in Endless Nights. Chances are one of them will be much too close to home for you to shrug off.