Friday, May 26, 2006

Superman is a Tulpa.

Neil Gaiman co-wrote this article for Wired about "The Myth of Superman." It says Alvin Schwartz wrote a book about Superman, and how he transcends being a character in a comic book.

Schwartz writes that Superman is real. He is a tulpa, a Tibetan word for a being brought to life through thought and willpower.
I learned the word tulpa from the CCG On The Edge, from which I learned many unusual things. Tulpa was a hot, broken card that figured in many decks. It produced FAQs like these:
The card says the Tulpa is "a copy of the real Character." Can I play a Tulpa before a non-Tulpa version of the Character is in play?
Can I call a non-Tulpa version of a Unique Character after I have played a Tulpa of the same Character?
Of course, real Tulpas (!) are made from whole cloth and not copies.
It was said that Carlos Castaneda was able to materialize a living squirrel on the palm of Don Juan's hand based on the latter's instruction.

5 comments:

Kindralas said...

Tulpa wasn't broken, Tulpa's Secret was.

Anyway, I'd definitely be putting Monique behind a Superman and a Tulpa'ed Superman.

DrHeimlich said...

As I recall, there was an episode of the show Supernatural (surprisingly good show, BTW), that also featured a Tulpa as the monster to be slain.

Shocho said...

Yeah, there's an X-Files ep too, "Arcadia" from the 6th season.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, I've been watching Supernatural. It's like X-Files without the government conspiracy. Anyway, that card sounds like the nightmare that was Clone and even worse, Vesuvan Doppleganger.

Kindralas said...

Tulpa wasn't really that bad, per se. It'd be like in Star Wars if you had a card that let you play a second copy of Vader to the table. Yeah, it'd be pretty frigging strong, but it's a two-card combo which is somewhat unreliable.

As I said, the powerhouse card was Tulpa's Secret, which let you play a Tulpa along with any other character for free. Dunno how they didn't see the problem with that...