Sandman Universe: Nightmare Country #1 Frison 1:100

DC Black Label, published date: June 2022 (release date: 2022-04-12).

This is the 1:100 retailer incentive variant of Sandman Universe Nightmare Country #1, with a Jenny Frison Card Stock Variant Cover. The issue was written by James Tynion IV with interior art by Yanick Paquette and Lisandro Estherren. The series was published under the Black Label imprint of DC Comics.

Sometimes, nightmares walk the Earth. Every night when you sleep, the Lord of Dreams chooses the path you’ll follow…into a sylvan Elysium, or down the hallways of your darkest fears. And sometimes, if it is Dream’s will, those nightmares escape those halls, and go out into the world. But it is not a choice he makes lightly.

Today the Corinthian walks the Earth again. The most feared of all Dream’s nightmares, his ravenous mouths have made him a legend among serial killers. Letting the Corinthian out among mortals is the most dangerous thing Dream could possibly do. But he has no choice—because there is another nightmare walking the Earth, one that must be hunted…and this monster is one that Dream, lord of all nightmares, did not make.

Horror-comics superstar James Tynion IV has waited his whole career to pay tribute to the mythos of The Sandman, the work that made him the writer he is today—and that time has come! Designed to welcome new readers into one of the greatest worlds in DC’s library, The Sandman Universe: Nightmare Country is a terrify-ing travelogue through a nation recognizable and obscene, which will show you things seen in no Sandman series ever before—with spectacular art by Lisandro Estherren (Redneck, Strange Skies Over East Berlin) and "nightmare" sequences by comics art all-stars, starting with the incredible Yanick Paquette!

Below are the other Diamond distributed editions:

From left to right, top to bottom they are (barcode prefix in brackets):

• Reiko Murakami regular edition (00111)
• Yanick Paquette Card Stock Cover (00121)
• Kelley Jones 1:25 Card Stock Variant Cover (00131)
• Alvaro Martinez Bueno 1:50 Card Stock Variant Cover (00141)

In mid-May 2022, there were five gradings recorded for the "Frison Variant Cover" in the CGC census with all five in the top grade of 9.8 (near mint / mint).

In that same timeframe, CBCS did not have any recorded gradings for the 1:100 in their population report but it was early days with it only being a month since the comic was distributed.

This comic has been noted as the first appearance of The Smiling Man.