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

[Emily]

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.

I have it. There is something wrong with it. Most of the cards are very intense and faces stare out at you. I'm not sure if it is the artwork or how it's been drawn but it unnerves me. I also had the artwork on one of the cards start to move, it did scare me - I wasn't ready, I didn't try to enter the card, wasn't even in that frame of mind plus it left me with a killer headache and a deck I like to forget I own.

 

[Cocobird55]

The Vertigo creeps me out too. I have one for sale in the Trading thread.

 

[Glitterbird]

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.

I find it interesting but not creepy or freaky, I'm a bad one to ask I suppose.

Decks i find creepy/unsettling Bosch, Barbara Walker, Doreen Virtue (I'm not even being sarcastic) It reminds me of the twilight zone (which I think someone else mentioned) but the episode of where the bad guy died, and he wound up in a place that was always perfect and he always won every game he played, and everyone always agreed with him, and it turned out to be hell.

 

[Chiriku]

Re: Sirian Starseed

Let's face it: CGI/digital art, by its intrinsically android nature, is predisposed to looking "off," vacant, soulless, and "wrong." Not-quite-human, for many, is far more disturbing than "totally different monster species" (in the same way that not-quite-Judeo-Christian is more disturbing to many fundamentalist Christians than "totally different religion/belief system").

It is a testament to Ciro Marchetti's skill as a digital artist that so many people get over this natural aversion to android art and even enjoy the imagery presented to them. (On the other hand, this does not account for the popularity of far less adept computer-generated decks such as the Wizards' Tarot--there's my theory shot to hell).

The other thing about Sirian Starseed: any enterprise about which the creators state, "our co-creative journey was guided, at the outset, by the blessed Sirian High Council," will set off alarm bells ringing in many people's subconscious. I think people are naturally wary of "high councils," especially ones that guide or govern creative or spiritual enterprises. We can't help but connect the dots to "unwholesome authority," which, when combined with a child's haunting vacant-eyed gaze on a card like "Indigo," makes the mental leap into "cult" territory.

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[Myrrha]

The Alice manga deck seems... well, no other way to say it other than a deck for pedophiles.

I was just thinking that was a cute deck, love the tea cups on the cups suit and the very emotional way the skies and landscapes are painted. I didn't see anything pedophiliac about it.

Tarot of the Elves is on my wish list but I can definitely see how it would seem creepy with the stiff unreal looking people in it.

There aren't really any decks I find scary. I have learned that some decks from ceremonial magic traditions, including the Thoth, give me a panicked "let me out of here" feeling. The network of symbols with defined correct meanings seems to close in on me like a prison.

 

[magpie9]

And that's not creepy or scary?

 

[Myrrha]

And that's not creepy or scary?

Well, I wouldn't call occult decks creepy because some people like having that elaborate symbolism with agreed-upon meanings and there isn't anything wrong with that. I don't feel a strong enough sense of panic with them to really say they scare me, it is just that the tarot- reading part of me kind of goes "eek!". I guess it is more to do with the idea of reading with them than the decks themselves.

 

[magpie9]

Well, I wouldn't call occult decks creepy because some people like having that elaborate symbolism with agreed-upon meanings and there isn't anything wrong with that. I don't feel a strong enough sense of panic with them to really say they scare me, it is just that the tarot- reading part of me kind of goes "eek!". I guess it is more to do with the idea of reading with them than the decks themselves.

Sort of 8 of Swords? i think that would bother me a lot.

 

[Ron521]

The H.R. Giger Tarot I once owned seemed more like a cold, dark parody of the tarot majors, full of human torsos with tubes and hoses connected to most orfices. I didn't really see it as "tarot" at all, as much as a series of images which didn't convey anything except discomfort.

 

[Richard]

.......I have learned that some decks from ceremonial magic traditions, including the Thoth, give me a panicked "let me out of here" feeling. The network of symbols with defined correct meanings seems to close in on me like a prison.

I can see where one might get that impression from the esoteric decks, especially with all that symbolism thrown at the reader. The Rider-Waite is like that too, but the symbolism is veiled, so it does not seem as restrictive or intimidating.

An esoteric deck has several levels of meaning. I'll just give a single example. In a divinatory reading, The Fool may represent a foolish person or attitude. For the weirdos who use the deck for meditation, The Fool may represent an inexperienced soul encountering the world for the first time. He will go through the experiences depicted in the Major Trumps. Eventually he may wish to return from whence he came, which is the way of enlightenment.

Neither divination nor meditation is an incorrect way to use Tarot, but if you find that the explicit symbols in a deck like the Thoth are more of a liability than an asset, then put it away and don't worry about it.