What would you say is the scariest/creepiest Tarot deck?

[magpie9]

Phantasmagoric Theater Tarot is downright creepy in a perverted sort of way. Not the sort of emotions I want to access when reading cards.

I just managed to sell my copy for $7.50, and am ecstatic! It totally creeps me out. Those things look like they bite.

Lucy Lescott is past creepy and into truly Horrible.
Eyebright said "But yes the dead baby card was a bit of a shocker when I first saw it, but such a vivid embodiment of the sorrow, agony and anguish this card can represent. I always wonder if she is the mother and she did the deed..." about the Lucy Lescott, and I'm sure she did it. Horrid deck, horrid commentary on modern times.

Barbara Walker is weird beyond belief, but somehow doesn't creep me out. On the other hand, I don't find myself spending any spare time with it...

 

[greatdane]

I have read several posts that AT readers said the New Orleans Voodoo Tarot freaked them out. I don't have it, but wondering how many here think it's scary.

 

[Chiriku]

Interestingly, the one tarot deck that has unnerved me in 15 years of collecting is one that some people consider especially "spiritual" and inspiring. I thought no one else would agree with me, yet I read this thread and see that a few do--it's the Enochian.

I figured out why it bothers me. I was raised in a fundamentalist Christian framework and was conditioned to view with immediate revulsion anything that seemed just close enough to Judeo-Christian traditions but "off" in some way--inverted crosses, Black Masses, and so on. To my mind--my viscera--the Enochian oozes theological perversion. I imagine this has something to do with Enochian magic's basis in concepts that are very Abrahamic in nature (angels, Babylon, the Sephiroth).

Granted, the Golden Dawn and Crowley also trafficked in some pretty Abrahamic-with-a-twist concepts (perhaps that is why many people in the West instinctively shrink from the Thoth) , but when you add that lifetime of religious conditioning to the vortex-like artwork in the Enochian Tarot-- even the babies have demonic-looking eyes and smiles---it never fails to start up the pricking in my thumbs in a way no other deck has.

 

[Chiriku]

I have read several posts that AT readers said the New Orleans Voodoo Tarot freaked them out. I don't have it, but wondering how many here think it's scary.

Well, my friend, this deck was painted by the same artist as that of the Enochian. See my post (cross-posted against yours) above.

 

[magpie9]

A couple of the cards in the New Orleans VooDoo really bother me...they have a sense of Dark Power around them and I hesitate to mess with that. I have the deck,but somehow never get to using or learning it. brrrr.....
The Newziet (spellling?) gives me the jim-jams, too. It's the minor pip cards. All those deformed wands (or whatever suit) lined up and staring at you...ick! They can't get out of the cards, right???

 

[Winterchild]

Cosmic

I know that the Cosmic has a big fan base here, but something about it creeps me out big time. I looked at it once, then put it under my bed and tried to forget that I bought it! I looked it at a second time when the long thread about it kept getting bumped, and I didn't find it quite as creepy as the first time, but it still felt unsettling to me. There are a lot of weird looking dudes in that deck.

Yet, I keep it. Partly b/c everyone loves it so much and I'm afraid I'll change my mind and be sorry I got rid of it.

hahahahahahahha... yes it's those dudes in tights ballet dancers freak me a little too.... they all remind me of puppets... But if they made a Breakfast on Pluto or Priscilla tarot deck I would adore it..... glam is one thing... ooooh I want a glam rock tarot...Marc Bolan.. ! But sword fighters ballet dancing in pink tights... nope! I do like some of these cards tho and love the font.

 

[Winterchild]

Elves/Walker/Virtue

Agreed. And gratuitously violent to boot. My least favorite deck of all time.

Oh yes definitely all these...... I hated the elves in LotR too... have you seen the youtube videos of people having elf ears made? google it... talk about strange!

I do love Ludy Lescot though....

 

[Winterchild]

I was both joking and not joking. What creeps me out the most is that it was published at all, that this is the state we're in. It also feels strangely post-apocalyptic, as if we would all glow like that if we were irradiated by WW3.

In any case, no (other) deck really creeps me out, although some decks have cards that are decidedly darker than the other cards in the same deck. The relatively harmless Morgan-Greer has one of the scariest Devils I've seen. Although my only true love, the Thoth is decidedly creepy, and my best friend likes me reading for her but never with that one.

The entire Sirian Starseed just screams "cult" to me, and is unsettling. The Alice manga deck seems... well, no other way to say it other than a deck for pedophiles.

Totally agree about Sirian Starseed...... I find that scary.... much moreso than say Zombie Apocalypse or the raw nasty ones... when you can see the dark stuff at least you know what you are dealing with!!!

 

[magpie9]

Sirian Starseed makes my skin crawl.

 

[Le Fanu]

Sirian Starseed makes my skin crawl.

Cult deck par excellence. I can imagine this deck being found among the debris of a mass cult suicide. Horrible. Plus it tries to be nice and understanding in the way that sinister cult leaders do...