THE GREAT AND POWERFUL TURTLE

Real Name: Thomas Tudbury

Identity/Class: Alternate reality (Earth-46915) human mutant

Occupation: TV repairman

Group Membership: Formerly Anti-Swarm taskforce

Affiliations: Captain Trips (Mark Meadows/Aquarius/Cosmic Traveler/Jumpin' Jack Flash/Monster/Moonchild/Radical/Starshine), Barbara Casko, Gina DiAngelis, Joey DiAngelis ("Froggy"), Doctor Tachyon (Prince Tisianne brant Ts'ara sek Halima sek Ragnar sek Omian of House Ilkazam), Charles Dutton, Father Squid (Robert St. Cabrini), Fantasy (Asta Lenser), Jay Ackroyd (Popinjay), Howler (Stan Wojpowicz), Kid Dinosaur (Arnold Fentner), Legion (Danielle Shepherd), Mistral (Helene Carlysle), Modular Man, Peregrine (Amare Sweet), Pulse (Cyrus Randall), Water Lily (Jane Lillian Dow), Xavier Desmond, Zoe Harris;
   (friendly with, but unaware of his villainous alter ego) Gregg Hartmann (Puppetman)

Enemies: Bloat (Theodor Honorlaw), Demon Princes, Herne the Wild Huntsman (Dylan Hardesty), the Jumpers, the Masons (Astronomer, Demise/James Spector, Imp, Insulin, Judas/Harry Mathias, Kafka, Kim Toy O'Toole, Red, others), Sculptress

Known Relatives: Unidentified parents, Doctor Tachyon (adoptive sire, sort of)

Aliases: "Tuds"

Base of Operations: Di Angelis Scrap Metal and Auto Parts junkyard, Bayonne, New Jersey 

First Appearance: "Shell Games," Wild Cards (January 1987);
   (Marvel, shells only) Wild Cards#1 (September 1990);
   (Marvel, full) Wild Cards#3 (November 1990)

Powers/Abilities: Thomas Tudbury is the world's strongest telekinetic - he once lifted the battleship New Jersey (weighing in excess of 45,000 tons) several feet aloft for around thirty seconds, destroyed the Brooklyn Bridge and created and directed a tsunami in New York Harbor to destroy Ellis Island. However he has to be able to concentrate to use his powers. His shells served to protect him from attacks so he could do so, but over time while his powers grew immensely while in the shells, they became psychological crutches and he became almost powerless outside of them; eventually, when deprived of his shell for a time he pushed himself to use his powers again outside of the armor and regained the power to move at least small objects when not inside his vehicles. His telekinesis is invisible and silent, and he controls it by envisioning objects such as giant hands to lift or scoop things up, or battering rams to strike things.

   His shells are armored vehicles held aloft purely by his powers. Over time his ability to fly them became second nature, allowing him to maintain altitude without really focusing on doing so. His original shell was a Volkswagen Beetle covered in overlapping plates of war surplus battleship armor, with cameras mounted in the wheel wells linked to a TV inside so he could see his surroundings, a ham radio to listen to police reports, and a microphone attached to an exterior loudspeaker so he could communicate with those outside. Later shells were larger and more comfortable inside, with a fridge, radar, infrared scopes and a computer monitoring the systems. His initial shell weighed around 4 tons, but by the end the final shell weighed 23 tons, a weight that was inconsequential considering how strong Tom's telekinesis had become.

Height: 5'9"
Weight: 170 lbs.
Eyes: Green
Hair: Brown

History:
(Wild Cards#1 (fb) - BTS) - The Takisians were an extraterrestrial species whose twelve ruling houses had been warring with one another since time immemorial. The ruling elite possessed powerful psionic abilities, but most Takisians lacked such abilities. One house, Ilkazam, sought to break the stalemate by developing a retrovirus which would link to the host's DNA and create meta-Takisians, but after hundreds of years what they had instead was a lottery - very occasionally their virus gave the test subjects amazing enhanced abilities, but far more frequently it created grotesque deformities or killed the recipient in a wide variety of horrifying ways. 

(Wild Cards novel) - The House of Ilkazam realized that as it stood they could not use the virus on their own people, since it would slay the majority of them, but they could not deploy it as a weapon against their enemies, because whoever survived would be potentially incredibly powerful.

(Wild Cards#1 (fb) - BTS) - The decision was made that the virus needed a widescale field test to figure out these issues. Since they couldn't use it on Takis or its colonies, the House of Ilkazam began searching space for a compatible species. They found that species on Earth: humans, who proved to be genetically identical to Takisians. One of the scientists, Prince Tisianne brant Ts'ara sek Halima sek Ragnar sek Omian, objected to unleashing the virus and potentially causing planetary genocide, so he sought to prevent the test, intercepting the ship carrying the virus bomb high in Earth's atmosphere, but his attempt to tractor beam the test ship into space caused it to instead break apart.

   Tisianne's own ship was damaged in the attempt, and he was forced to land in the United States of America, where he was soon captured by the military, who dubbed him Doctor Tachyon, a nickname based on his being a scientist combined with mishearing him saying his homeworld's name. He tried to warn his captors about the bomb, but they disbelieved him until it was too late.

   The bomb meanwhile fell into the hands of criminals who decided to blackmail the USA with it. An attempt by the war hero Robert "Jetboy" Tomlin to stop their airship as it flew over Manhattan failed to stop the bomb's detonation, and the virus was unleashed on September 15th 1946. It hit New York immediately, and then was spread by the jet stream to cause subsequent random outbreaks all over the globe.

   Some of those exposed were comparatively lucky; the virus infected them but lay dormant, a ticking time bomb that might be triggered at any time by stress or external stimulation, or being passed down to to offspring. A vast number, 60,000 in the first three days alone, died in bizarre and unique ways, such as literally melting or turning to stone. A smaller but still significant number gained weird physical traits, such as growing hooves or becoming a dog with a still-human head, and the very smallest and luckiest group suddenly found themselves possessing superhuman abilities. Because of the random nature of the results, the press dubbed it the Wild Card Virus. Those slain were said to have "drawn the Black Queen," the deformed were Jokers, and the superhumans Aces. Released from military custody, Doctor Tachyon did his best to help the survivors, even developing a cure that worked in a tiny percentage of cases, and over the next few decades humanity struggled to adapt to the new status quo. Most of mankind was still just human, but Jokers and Aces walked among them, and the risk of being exposed to the virus never fully went away. Often ostracized and targeted by hate groups because of their visible afflictions, Jokers often ended up congregating in their own neighborhoods, such as New York's Bowery District, which became known as Jokertown.

(Wild Cards novel, "Shell Games") - Thomas Tudbury was born in 1944 in Bayonne, New Jersey. As a child he was shy and nerdy, and a fan of comics. In third grade he became best friends with "Junkyard" Joey DiAngelis, a boy in his class who had been held back twice, when Joey came to his defense against two bullies that were tormenting Tom and the two pet turtles he had brought in to school that day for the third grade pet show. He also discovered he was an Ace possessing telekinetic abilities when he hit one of the bullies, by then fleeing thanks to Joey, in the back of the head with a flying dead turtle. They bonded further in 1954 when nine year old Tom used his powers to rescue comics from a book burning the PTA had arranged in response to the frenzy generated by Frederic Wertham's book Seduction of the Innocent.

   In 1963 the 19 year old Tom went to Rutgers College, but dropped out hearing about the assassination of President Kennedy, a man Tom had idolized.

(Wild Cards novel, "Shell Games"/Wild Cards#3 (fb)) - Tom Tudbury visit Joey DiAngelis at the New Jersey junkyard Joey had inherited from his late father. Catching Tom reading some of his old Jetboy comics, Joey told him that he was no Jetboy, but Tom insisted he was more than his childhood hero, adding he couldn't pretend any more that his power wasn't there, because times like these meant everyone had responsibilities. Joey pointed out that Aces got drafted and nobody ever saw them again, but Tom responded that he could keep his identity a secret. Joey laughed at this, and asked if he'd wear longjohns too, so Tom went out into the junkyard calling back for Joey to follow him. To prove his point he telekinetically lifted a car wreck and spun it around in the air, though the effort made him pour with sweat. Smashing it into other wrecks he turned to Joey and stated that his power was getting stronger all the time, but Joey's response was to tell Tom to stop him then, and he began shoving, slapping and punching his friend. Realizing he had gone too far when Tom fell to the ground with a split lip, Joey apologized, and Tom protested that Joey hadn't been fair by not giving him a chance to concentrate. However Joey retorted that bad guys wouldn't either, and told his friend to come back inside, out of the cold. Instead Tom stood disconsolate and thinking, pondering what Jetboy had that he didn't. Suddenly inspiration hit him. Moments later Joey was disturbed by a loud crash and ran back outside, only to be suddenly yanked upside down into the air. Above him Tom was sitting in a car floating above Joey's home. Dropped back to the ground Joey pointed out that if he had a gun Tom would still be dead meat, but Tom said he'd had an idea about that, and reminded Joey about the war surplus armor plate he had in the junkyard.

   Over the next few days the pair welded old battleship armor to the exterior of a Volkswagen Beetle and installed cameras to the exterior so the person inside could safely see outside all around the vehicle. Soon after he made one of his first forays in his new armored vehicle, lifted aloft by his telekinesis, and rescued people from a burning building. When a fireman demanded to know who he was, Tom came up with a name of the spot, identifying himself as the Turtle. Then he paused and corrected himself - he was the Great and Powerful Turtle.

(Wild Cards novel, "Shell Games") - The Turtle then extinguished the fire by dropping water from the Hudson River on it. He later helped Doctor Tachyon start the long climb out an alcoholic stupor he had been in since the HUAC trials of the 1950s McCarthy era, forcibly making the alien confront his demons because he needed the telepath's help solving a murder.

(Wild Cards novel, "Transfigurations") - The first public superhero since HUAC, the Turtle quickly became a celebrity, and within a year Cosh Comics began publishing a (presumably unauthorized) comic based on him.

(Wild Cards 2: Aces High, "Unto the Sixth Generation 2") - In 1965 following a major blackout a gigantic 45 foot ape had been discovered wandering in Central Park.

(Wild Cards 2: Aces High, "Winter's Chill") - The Turtle captured the Great Ape during that blackout.

(Wild Cards 2: Aces High, "Unto the Sixth Generation 2") - Following its capture, it had been housed in Central Park Zoo, but every subsequent year it managed to escape a few times, and each time it grabbed a blonde woman and then climbed the Empire State Building, for reasons no one had ever fathomed out. The Turtle usually pried the ape's fingers apart and floated the women to the ground, allowing other Aces to then knock out the ape, which regenerated so they didn't have to worry about causing it permanent harm.

(Wild Cards 2: Aces High, "Winter's Chill" (fb)) - In 1969 he and Joey dug a tunnel from the underground bunker beneath the junkyard where he stored his shells to the waters of New York Bay so he could bring his shell in and out without risking being spotted. 

(Wild Cards novel, "Interlude 3") - By 1971 (and probably much earlier) rumors had spread that the reason the Turtle was never seen outside his shell was because he was a Joker.

(Wild Cards 2: Aces High, "Winter's Chill" (fb)) - In 1972 he reconnected with a childhood crush, Barbara Casko, and they began dating. For the next year between work and his social life he had little time for superheroing, to the point where months passed without him going out as the Turtle, until the press began to speculate the hero was dead and Doctor Tachyon began running classified adverts offering rewards for news on his missing friend. Learning this he called Tachyon to reassure him, letting slip he was dating someone who had once been infected with the Virus and drawn a minor Joker before Tachyon successfully cured her. Hearing this Tachyon regretfully informed his friend that she would still have the latent Virus in her DNA, and if they were to have kids those children would unquestionably draw a Card, with the same odds as anyone else who did. Unwilling to subject Barbara to the high risk of having any offspring she had with him draw the Black Queen or Joker, Tom broke up with her, though they remained friends.

(Wild Cards 4: Aces Abroad (fb)) - In the early 1970s the battleship New Jersey was being refitted at the Bayonne Naval Supply Center in New Jersey. The Turtle lifted the vessel several feet out of the water and held it aloft for almost half a minute.

(Wild Cards novel, "Strings") - In 1976 he joined other Aces in trying to keep the National Guard and rioting Jokers Rights activists from harming one another, unaware the entire situation was being inflamed by Senator Gregg Hartmann, ostensibly a pro-Wild Cards representative but secretly the malevolent mind-controlling Puppetman, an Ace who fed off strong emotions and so used his abilities to generate situations to trigger same.

(Wild Cards 2: Aces High, "Winter's Chill" (fb)) - That same year Tom bought Joey's junkyard when Joey got married, then closed it, so he could continue to safely use it as the base to store his shells.

(Wild Cards novel, "Interlude 5") - In 1981 Aces Magazine published a retrospective on Thirty-Five Years of the Wild Card, which included a quote from the Turtle: "You want to know if I'm an ace or a joker? The answer is yes."

(Wild Cards 5: Down and Dirty, "All The King's Horses" (fb)) - In late 1981 Tom began working on constructing his fifth and most sophisticated shell, spending four years and most of his money on putting it together. It took him four years to finish.

(Wild Cards 2: Aces High, "Unto the Sixth Generation 2") - Early in 1986 the alien Swarm invaded Earth, giant, vaguely insectoid lifeforms that threatened to devour everything in their path. Turtle joined an Ace taskforce that fought and eventually defeated them.

(Wild Cards 2: Aces High, "Winter's Chill") - In March of 1986 Tom learned Barbara was getting married, an emotional blow worsened when he learned it was to one of the people who had bullied him in school. He buried himself in his heroing.

(Wild Cards 2: Aces High, "Relative Difficulties") - In the spring of 1986 some of Tachyon's relatives came looking for him, kidnapping Tachyon, his new acquaintance Captain Trips (an Ace would could change into a variety of different superhumans depending on what special drugs he imbibed) and the Turtle, the latter two "specimens" . The aliens jettisoned his shell, only recently finished and the most expensive and most advanced he had, out into space. To protect his friends from being harmed Doctor Tachyon formally adopted them as his stirps, effectively equerries bound to his House. Deprived of his shell which he had become dependent on to access his powers, with a lot of effort Tom managed to use his powers albeit very slightly anyway, and together the abductees escaped. This was the first time Tachyon had ever seen Tom outside his shell and learned his real name.

(Wild Cards 2: Aces High, "By Lost Ways") - In May 1986 the Ace Fortunato and Doctor Tachyon assembled a group of Aces, including the Turtle (now in his previous shell), to take part on a raid on the Cloisters, the base of the Masons, a secret group of Jokers, nats and Aces with plans for world domination, who also practiced human sacrifice, and who were believed (wrongly in this one thing only) to be responsible for drawing the Swarm to Earth. This shattered the power of the group, though some Masons, most significantly the murderous leader the Astronomer, escaped. 

(Wild Cards 3: Joker's Wild) - On September 15th 1986, Wild Card Day and the fortieth anniversary of the release of the Virus, the Astronomer and his surviving Masons launched a coordinated revenge attack against all the Aces who had attacked the Cloisters. As the Turtle flew across the Hudson River between Manhattan and Jersey he was attacked by Insulin, an Ace who could send anyone she targeted into diabetic shock, and Imp, an Ace able to generate an electromagnetic pulse that neutralized the shell's cameras and other equipment. After disabling both the man and the shell, they shot at the shell with napalm, causing the Turtle to crash into the river, and his shell swiftly sank to the bottom. Broken fragments of the shell were soon recovered, but there was no sign of the man within.

(Wild Cards 5: Down and Dirty, "All The King's Horses" (fb)) - The Turtle blacked out before he hit the water as his shell sank rapidly, with no way to open the escape hatch manually even had he been awake thanks to the exterior water pressure. survived, though he was in shock and barely aware of what he was doing. He made his way back to the junkyard, and that evening, with shells 3 and 4 having had their equipment cannibalized to build the now destroyed fourth shell, took out his original shell for a flight in defiance of his assailants.

(Wild Cards 3: Joker's Wild) - For most of the day he was believed dead, one of several victims of the Astronomer, but that evening, after Fortunato had defeated the villain (and the former Mason Demise actually slain him), the Turtle's original shells was seen flying over Jokertown and doing a victory roll to confirm he was still alive.

(Wild Cards 4: Aces Abroad - BTS) - However, as months passed without another Turtle sighting, doubt began to spread again as to whether the sighting had been real, despite hundreds claiming to have seen him.

(Wild Cards 5: Down and Dirty, "All The King's Horses") - With his original shell's tech barely working any more, and his two other remaining shells in even worse condition, Tom was unable to get loans for the money needed to construct a new shell. Additionally, his close call had left him shaken, so he decided it was time to quit being a superhero. He made plans to sell the junkyard to a developer, and sold the three remaining shells to Charles Dutton's Famous Bowery Wild Card Museum in Jokertown, though he had to fly all three there in one go to prove their authenticity. His cab ride back to the junkyard was interrupted by a sudden lockdown of Manhattan triggered by the news of someone spreading the Wild Card Virus, and witnessing the resulting panic and violence this triggered made Tom reconsider his decision to retire. With Tachyon's help he faked his own death, using the corpse of an anonymous and unidentifiable Black Queen victim as his proxy. He left the junkyard to Joey, then moved into a shack on it that looked dilapidated from the outside but was comfortably fitted inside, and combined Dutton's payment with his life insurance to buy the parts for a new shell.

(Wild Cards#1 (fb) - BTS) - Dutton put the old shells on display in his Museum in Jokertown. 

(Wild Cards#1 - BTS) - In 1988 (see comments) a bomber began a campaign aimed at Wild Card-related sites, beginning by blowing up Jetboy's Tomb and planting a bomb in the restaurant Aces High.

(Wild Cards#3) - The possibility that the bomber had planted another device at Doctor Tachyon's Jokertown Clinic prompted a hasty evacuation which panic threatened to turn into a disaster as Jokers fled the building and the narrow entrance became a chokepoint, not helped by rubbernecking crowds clogging the streets so the evacuees couldn't disperse. Luckily the Turtle showed up, calling for calm over his loudspeakers and lifting people and vehicles out the way to clear a path for the bomb squad. One of the people outside the Clinic was the private detective Jay Ackroyd, an Ace known as Popinjay because of his ability to teleport anyone he pointed his index fingers at anywhere he could visualize. Ackroyd's latest case was trying to track and identify the bomber, a case he was sure tracked all the way back to Jetboy. Having already picked the brains of others for what they might know about the aviator's last adventure, Ackroyd asked to talk to the Turtle, so he lifted Jay up to sit on the top of his shell. However, all Turtle knew about Jetboy was what he'd read in comics. He asked Jay what he thought the pilot had meant by his last words, "I can't die yet, I haven't seen the Jolsen Story." Ackroyd asked Turtle for his interpretation, and Turtle mused that people always had unfinished business, so they needed to try and do all they could while they were able. In response Ackroyd told the Turtle he read too many comics, and Turtle lowered the detective back to the ground. The Turtle continued to hover over the Clinic, until suddenly it exploded.

(Wild Cards#4) - Turtle used his telekinesis to hold in most of the force of the explosion, redirecting it into a funnel of fire going straight up into the sky. Those on the ground close to the building were still thrown back by some of the blast that got up before the telekinetic shield went up, but thanks to the Turtle's intervention only one died.

   Ackroyd soon tracked down the bomber, who had been trying to stir up public opinion against those infected by the Wild Card Virus. Though his bombing campaign was thwarted, his actions and a New York Times expose that revealed his agenda still succeeded in heating up tensions, including leading a mob to throw objects at the Turtle as he patrolled in his shell.

(Wild Cards 6: Ace in the Hole) - In July 1986 the Turtle provided crowd control at the Democratic Convention in Atlanta, where pro-Joker candidate Gregg Hartmann was running against rabidly anti-Wild Card candidate Reverend Leo Barnett. However Doctor Tachyon discovered that Hartmann was the psychotic Puppetman, and though he felt he could not publicly reveal this, nor even tell his friends the truth, he openly shifted his support to third choice candidate Jesse Jackson, which helped cost Hartmann the candidacy; Tachyon's actions drove a wedge between him and the Turtle, who couldn't understand why he had done this.

(Wild Cards 9: Jokertown Shuffle - BTS) - In 1990 a group of Jokers led by Bloat took over Ellis Island and renamed it the Rox. They were backed by Jumpers, individuals empowered by an Ace who could swap bodies by locking eyes with their target, making it very difficult for regular authorities to deal with them.

(Wild Cards 9: Jokertown Shuffle, "Madman Across the Water") - Turtle clashed with his friend Captain Trips (in his pyrokinetic Jumpin' Jack Flash form) when Trips' daughter Sprout was arrested and Turtle tried to stop Flash breaking her out of jail.

(Wild Cards 9: Jokertown Shuffle, "Lovers V") - In August 1990 a young pregnant woman showed up at the junkyard in the middle of the night and revealed she was Doctor Tachyon, who had been bodyswapped by a Jumper, Tachyon's own sociopathic grandson Blaise.

(Wild Cards 9: Jokertown Shuffle, "Lovers VI") - Turtle took Tachyon to the Rox hoping to restore him to his original body, but they learned Blaise had already left. Pursuing him, they caught up just as Blaise stole Tachyon's old spaceship (long since repaired) and fled off planet to Takis with Tachyon's body on board.

(Wild Cards 10: Double Solitaire) - Tachyon arranged passage to Takis via another alien living on Earth. Turtle wanted to accompany and help his friend, but the vessel didn't have space for his shell, so he reluctantly stayed behind.

(Wild Cards 11: Dealers Choice) - In September 1990 the government organized a taskforce of Aces who were theoretically immune to Jumpers, mostly because their eyes were hidden from view. Turtle ferried ex-Senator Gregg Hartmann and Joker religious leader Father Squid to the Rox so they could attempt to broker peace, but the talks failed. To save Hartmann's life from the Rox's warrior Herne and his Wild Hunt the Turtle was forced to destroy the Brooklyn Bridge with a giant telekinetic hammer that slew most of Herne's hunt, a move that shook Turtle as he had never previously killed anyone.

   The government's army was using the Ace known as Legion for secure communication between units; Danielle "Danny" Shepherd was an attractive young woman with seven bodies sharing one consciousness, each constantly aware of anything the others knew. With her consciousness too spread out for a Jumper to steal any of her bodies or telepath to read, each of her bodies was assigned to a different unit of the Ace recruits, including one with Turtle. After taking part in a frontal assault on the Rox the Turtle discovered that battle was merely providing distraction for a covert team sneaking in through the caverns below, and angered at the military's deception (since they'd planned that even if the peace talks had worked), Turtle quit. He and Legion had fallen for one another, so his Danny returned to the Junkyard with him, where they made love. However, just afterwards the Danny accompanying the covert team was ripped apart by Herne's hounds. Despite this happening miles away, the Danny in Turtle's bed was similarly torn asunder right in front of Tom. Unable to save her, and with the EMTs he called assuming he was the killer, Tom fled in his shell, flew up the Hudson River, then raced down towards the Rox with a massive telekinetic scoop in the water, creating a massive tidal wave that utterly destroyed the Rox. Horrified at what had happened and what he had done, he abandoned his shell in front of Dutton's Museum. However, while he had assumed all of Danny's bodies would have suffered the same fate as the one he had been with, he was only partially correct. Two of them survived, shielded in different ways from the psychic trauma that had slain the others. One of those bodies sought Tom out and convinced him, homeless, financially destitute and a wanted man, to go with her to California.

(Wild Cards 14: Marked Cards, "A Breath of Life" (fb) - BTS) - Thanks to the surviving Dannys' testimonies, the murder case against Tom was dropped. However the Turtle's reputation was destroyed among Jokers for the hundreds he had slain on the Rox. Under a pseudonym he wrote his autobiography, Shell Games, which revealed his true identity to the world, but which also got him into trouble with the IRS for insurance fraud, the City of New York wanted him to help fix the Brooklyn Bridge, the federal authorities wanted him to put the Statue of Liberty back in place (collateral damage from his tidal wave), as well as spurious lawsuits from people who claimed the Turtle had assaulted them. There was some good news - there was talk of a Shell Games movie, with Richard Dreyfuss in the running to play Tom.

(Wild Cards 14: Marked Cards, "A Breath of Life") - While still fighting his lawsuits Tom and Danny visited New York as part of a press tour for Shell Games, and at the request of Charles Dutton he met with new Ace Zoe Harris to help her try and get a better handle on controlling her powers.

Comments: Created by George R.R. Martin. Adapted into Marvel by Lewis Shiner, George R.R. Martin, Barry Kitson and Mark Nelson.

   The Turtle originated as a character created by writer George R.R. Martin (decades before Martin began writing A Song of Fire and Ice, the series that was adapted to TV as Game of Thrones) for the Chaosium tebletop roleplaying game Superworld. Around the same time shared world anthologies where multiple authors wrote short stories sharing the same setting, allowing their characters to meet and interact, were becoming a thing in fantasy and SF literature, so Martin and his friends decided to do their own superhero anthology series, in many cases using the characters they had come up with for the game. The result was the Wild Cards series, which are still being released to this day (though there was somewhat of a hiatus during the late 1990s). As of the time of me writing this profile there have been 34 books released in the series, with writers including Roger Zelazny, Paul Cornell and Chris Claremont. Comic artist Brian Bolland also provided cover art for several of the British printings. Additionally, and fittingly given where Wild Cards originated, there have been two tabletop RPG adaptations, GURPS (Generic Universal Role-Playing System) Wild Cards from Steve Jackson Games in 1989 and Wild Cards Campaign Setting released in 2008 by Green Ronin for their Mutants and Masterminds superhero RPG. Tom has entries in both, and his physical stats above come from the first of these. In comics, alongside the four issue Epic miniseries, Marvel also published four short stories in the title Epic Anthology, then Dabel Brothers released a six issue Wild Cards: The Hard Call in 2008, Marvel with a four issue series Wild Cards: The Drawing of Cards by Paul Cornell in 2022, and Bantam Books released three graphic novels, Wild Cards: Now and Then, Wild Cards: Sins of the Father, and Wild Cards: Ante Up, between 2023 and 2025. Drawing of Cards adapted part of the first Wild Cards anthology, and parts of the original Epic miniseries adapt the origin stories of various characters such as the Turtle's story from the first novel in the third issue of the comic, but the framing story in the Epic run and all the rest of the titles are brand new.

   There is nothing in any of the comics that would prevent them all sharing the same continuity as the novels - indeed, as series designed to be written by multiple authors, and with most of the comics written by authors who also penned tales for the novels, that shared continuity is definitely intended.

   Epic's initial Wild Cards miniseries was set between the novels Down and Dirty (#5 in the book series) and Ace in the Hole (#6). The former is set between October 1986 and April 1987, while the latter begins July 18th 1988. The Wild Cards novels don't use a sliding timescale, so these dates aren't topical references, meaning the miniseries is set either in late 1987 or early 1988. Turtle was last seen in the fourteenth novel, Marked Cards, in 1994. Since the novels have moved on more or less in real time, and Tom ages like a normal human, he'd be in his early 80s by now, assuming he's not passed away.

   Many Aces have "Ace jingles" people use to recall who they are and what their powers are. Only a few have been revealed to the readers, but we do know the Turtles: "The Turtle's shell hides him well / Ace or Joker, who can tell?"

   This profile was completed on 09/06/2026, but its publication was delayed as it was intended for the Appendix 25th anniversary's celebratory event to represent Wild Cards.

Profile by Loki.

CLARIFICATIONS:
The Great and Powerful Turtle has no known connections to:

images: (without ads)
Wild Cards#3, p42, pan1 (main image, his first shell)
Wild Cards#3, p30, pan4 (headshot)
Wild Cards#3, p34, pan1 (interior of shell)
Wild Cards#3, p41, pan2 (coming up with the idea of using a flying car for protection)
Wild Cards#1, p42, pan4 (past shells on display at the Famous Bowery Wild Card Dime Museum)
Wild Cards#3, p32, pan5 (top view of shell)

Appearances:
Wild Cards#1 (September 1990) - Lewis Shiner, Walton Simons (writers), Harry Candelario, Keith Williams (art), Gregory Wright (editor)
Wild Cards#3 (November 1990) - Lewis Shiner, George R.R. Martin (writers), Barry Kitson, Mark Nelson (art), Nel Yomtov (editor)
Wild Cards#4 (December 1990) - Lewis Shiner, Howard Waldrop (writers), Barry Kitson, John Tartaglione (art), Nelson Yomtov (editor)

First Posted: 09/11/2026
Last updated: 09/06/2026

Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.

Non-Marvel Copyright info
All other characters mentioned or pictured are ™ and © 1941-2099 Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved. If you like this stuff, you should check out the real thing!
Please visit The Marvel Official Site at: http://www.marvel.com

Special Thanks to www.g-mart.com for hosting the Appendix, Master List, etc.!

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