Of course, I then went about proving myself wrong by trying to improve on it. The original listing of the Major Arcana is at the given link. Here is my version:
The Fool - Dr. Doom
The Magician - Hawkeye
The High Priestess - Storm
The Empress - Sue Richards (The Invisible Woman)
The Emperor - Reed Richards (Mr. Fantastic)
The Hierophant - The Watcher
The Lovers - Peter Parker and Mary-Jane
The Chariot - Tony Stark (Iron Man)
Justice - Nick Fury
The Hermit - Rogue
Wheel of Fortune - Bruce Banner (The Incredible Hulk)
Strength - Ben Grimm (the Thing)
The Hanged Man - Matt Murdock (Daredevil)
Death - Wolverine
Art - Alicia Masters
The Devil - Namor (the Sub-Mariner)
The Tower - Galactus
The Star - Charles Xavier (Professor X)
The Moon - Johnny Storm (the Human Torch)
The Sun - Captain America
Judgment - Magneto
The World - The Red Skull
Some of these may make perfect sense to you. Some are surely really out of the box. No fear. I shall explain my choices.
The Fool : The original lists Spider-Man, who is a good, solid, and obvious choice. Dr. Doom was listed as The Devil. Yet upon consideration and reflection, Victor von Doom struck me as the prototypical fool. So arrogant that it borders on innocence and an honorable man as long as one excepts his premise of the universe, Doom has absolute faith and his own left-handed wisdom. He is also one of several cards in my selection that strikes upon a basic theme: we are far more often reversed than we are upright.
The Magician: Hawkeye certainly surprises you, so I feel the need to explain my reasoning. First, the original card in the tarot deck was Le Mountebanke, a very different kind of conjurer. Second, a list of the card's qualities soon suggests Hawkeye to be a far better representative of the archetype than one might think.
The High Priestess: One of my few really obvious choices. Who better to represent natural, spiritual female power than a goddess?
The Empress: Storm and Sue were reversed in the original, but the one quality absolutely unique to The Empress is that she is that of the mother. Beyond being a literal mother, Sue is the mother to her friends and teammates and a font of unsuspected power.
The Emperor: Reed goes with Sue, the father to the mother. He also embodies leadership, experience, and common sense. He is not the man who shouts 'Avengers Assemble!' when the arrows fly... but is there anyone who doesn't listen when he has something to say?
The Hierophant: I really think this one is on the obvious side. I almost made him The Hermit, but his apparent isolation is an illusion. He is very much involved with others despite being alone in his stronghold.
The Lovers: Who else would it be? I mean, seriously. Pete and MJ embody starry eyed love, good and bad, like nobody else in comics.
The Chariot: The first of only two cards I did not change from the original linked above. Because it's too damn perfect to change.
Justice: Go on wikipedia or a tarot sight and read the qualities of the card. Then read the 'Mother Russia' arc of Garth Ennis's MAX Punisher series. The good colonel IS Justice.
The Hermit: This is based purely on symbolism rather than character. Until someone cheated with a certain Cajun's superpowers, Rogue was truly alone even in the middle of a crowd and could never be anything else. Not everyone who dwells apart from mankind does so by choice.
Wheel of Fortune: On a good day you're a brilliant scientist with a brilliant and gorgeous wife. On a bad day you're a rampaging monster who can't be stopped. The trouble is, on a good day, you are still entirely aware of who you are on a bad day. So when are you really lucky?
Strength: I love Luke and Danny as much as the next geek, but seriously? Who else is it really going to be?
The Hanged Man: I kept the original with one small alteration. 'Daredevil' isn't the one whose life keeps getting ruined. It's Matt who's hanging by the ankle.
Death: Okay, so this one is terribly obvious. Except 'Death' is a card all about new beginnings and regeneration. Who needs both more than a man whose past changes with every new writer?
Art: The card is 'Temperance' in many decks, but I just like Crowley's take too much. Add to that a blind sculptor in love with a good-hearted monster? Too good to pass up.
The Devil: The original, as I noted above, was Dr. Doom. I considered Norman Osborne and a friend was sure the right answer was Magneto. I really thought about it and then I really read the qualities of the card. Materialism, ignorance, stagnation, lust, egoism, anger, obsession, instincts, sexuality, and pessimism? Namor breathes the qualities this card possesses. Self-deception and self-enslavement are never far from his life.
The Tower: Who else would it be?
The Star: People think of the good Professor's intellectual qualities, his immense power, or his iron will so often they tend to forget that this is a man who has devoted his life to taking care of kids so they can grow up and be happy and loved. This side of him drives everything.
The Moon: This is usually a feminine card, but Johnny embodies its traits in a pure and natural sense. He's the little brother in his family and he's always struggled to grow up.
The Sun: Come on. Someone else better out there?
Judgment: Not all punishment is 'fair.' Sometimes the true consequences our foibles and failings are far harsher than we want to believe we deserve. The fact that judgment can be so cruel and merciless does not mitigate the fact that we deserve to be punished. This is another quality that is reversed in life far more than it is upright and Magneto reflects that.
The World: This is the single choice most outside the box, likely because The World was the hardest card to imagine. It comes down to this: in a universe where Magneto is Judgment, deep down there is going to be a good reason for that. More than anything else, the life we live and the world in which we live it are reversed far more often than upright. This card reflects that. Judgment takes the form of a Magneto so very often because, whether we like it or not, the world has far too much of the Red Skull in it.
Lots of people will hate some of these choices. Some of it says more about me than about tarot or the cards. Still, that's the point of a deck. It needs to speak to the person holding it.
