The Universal Monsters Deck

[Tom]

I grew up at the Universal Horror movies and thought that I could really relate to this deck.  When I got the deck, however, although it's supposed to be related to Rider, White, Smith system, I'm having trouble relating their different names suits to what I've been used to. I'm having trouble seeing correlations. I haven't actually tried to do a reading with these because they seem so alien to me. Is anyone using the stack and enjoying it? This may be a deck that I will just have for my collection and not use it all but just admire the artwork. 

[DanielJUK]

Some members on the forum have been negative about their other released decks already 😞. Insight Editions seems to be a company that makes stationary, like folders and journals and notebooks. They buy licensing rights of popular series and now seem to have added tarot decks to their items.

 

Here are some old posts / threads on the forum about their stuff....

 

Labyrinth Tarot

 

Star Trek:TNG Tarot (click on the top part of the url box to go the actual linked post)

 

Lord of the Rings Tarot

 

I think they buy these rights for the fandom merchandise of those brands. But they are new to the tarot game, they are new deck publishers. I am not sure they make good reading decks. Some of them they don't even properly do the minors (pips) 😞 . So this might be relating to your reading issues.

[Rori]

Insight Edition decks are very much hit or miss with the community, it seems. Some of them, like the TNG deck, are almost universally disliked, while more recent ones seem to be better received? The Buffy deck got a lot of praise, even though there was a pretty big error in the guidebook.

 

I have and love the Disney Villains, and I've been tempted by the Monster deck you mention, too. The art is stunning and the deck itself is pretty cheap - so I think if I end up buying it and it doesn't resonate, you could always make up your own system? Either use it as an oracle deck altogether or just rework the suit association. One of my favorite tarottubers did that with the Insight Editions Stranger Things tarot - their renamed suits didn't make sense to her, so she decided to mix them up (I think lights were swords or something, and to her lights felt more like wands - I can't recall now). That made it a workable deck for her and I think it even turned into one of her favorites.

 

So if you like the art and are nostalgic about the characters it depicts, maybe you could go through it like that and see if you can make up your own associations? And if it doesn't work at all, rest assured - it's not just you.

There are so, so many Insight Editions decks that don't live up to their potential, which is always a huge shame because the artists they hire are always impeccable. I haven't seen a single deck from them that didn't have stunning art.

[Tom]

The art is the only reason I wouldn't try to sell this off.  I have a lot of decks in my collection, but I only use a few favorites to read with. As collectors items, sometimes I just occasional just want to revisit the decks to enjoy the beautiful images. 

[Niobium]

My main issue with Insight Editions decks is they're often pips. Some of the designs are well thought out; others, much less so. As @Rori said, very hit or miss. I received the LotR deck for Christmas, and while Tomas Hijo's woodcut art is to die for I really, deeply wish it had fully illustrated minors. 😕

[Tom]

The closest thing to a regular RWS correlation was the Two of Cups with the roses interesting amongst the tombstones. 

[Rori]

Yeah....

 

Like, I don't mind a pippy deck - I just read it numerically, instead of using the RWS associations - if the pips are well done, and if they're consistent. My problem with so many Insight Editions decks is that they seem to be neither - it's a mix of illustrated and pips, or the pips are sort of lazy, where they're just copy/pastings of the same object over and over instead of being arranged in a certain way like they would be in the Marseilles tradition, for example. 

 

And even that would be fine, I guess, if the publishers were upfront about it - but they usually advertise their decks showing only Majors and Courts, and you never know what the Minors look like until the first walk throughs hit YouTube. They've done that for pretty much every single one of their decks, so it has to be a calculated marketing strategy - and it's kinda shady, tbh.

[Tom]

I've had several let downs regarding regarding minor arcana cards.  It's not a good sign when the only show examples of the makes and none of the minor cards. I have the Tattoo Tarot with had old style Marcelles pips.  It's a shame to because the Major Arcana is so well done.  They say they're based on RWS but it's a kind of bait and switch your of things.