If Oberon shows elements of Dream's character then the same could be said for other Elven Kings, not least the imperious and judgmental Thranduil from The Hobbit. Lee Pace's performance in The Desolation of Smaug shows that he has the commanding presence and stature and appropriately elegant sense of movement to embody the Lord of the Dreaming. As Thranduil, Pace shows an inalienable sense of his own rightness in all things, a level of detachment from the wider world and yet a sense of underlying scars that run deep within him. Since his TV career in likeable whimsical fantasies Wonderfalls and Pushing Daisies which would set him up fairly well for Gaiman's world of overlapping story universes Pace is now on the verge of a greater degree of movie stardom, following Spielberg's Lincoln and the Jackson's The Hobbit with the villain in Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy. There is no doubt, then, that Pace could hold his own on a big budget comic book fantasy production like Sandman. However, unlike his fellow Marvel universe villain Hiddleston or Hobbit co-star Cumberbatch, Pace does not have such a level of association with other parts and already in-built audience expectation that would count against an actor really being able to define the character from scratch. The Sandman wouldn't have to be such a high budget production as all that, though, and Pace's memorable role as a bedridden stuntman telling escapist fantasy stories in Tarsem Singh's much cheaper but hugely visually imaginative The Fall may point the way towards a more affordable production.
