Tingle, the strange man dressed in a green jumpsuit, has a terrifying secret in The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker. He is first encountered in the jail on Windfall Island, where he has been imprisoned for stealing a Picto Box. After setting him free, Link can find the odd character on Tingle Island, a small outcropping in the middle of the Great Sea owned and operated by Tingle and his brothers.
The only building on Tingle Island is a tower, the top of which is a giant copy of Tingle’s face that slowly rotates. According to Tingle, the tower spins because of “wonderful fairy magic.” A closer look at the tower reveals that this is a lie. Inside the tower are two men, Ankle and David Jr., who manually rotate the tower by pushing a large mill wheel. Ankle and David Jr. are both dressed in copies of Tingle’s Link-inspired green jumpsuit and hat, wearing pink and white versions respectively. Another man dressed like Tingle, named Knuckle, can be found on Outset Island.
While Ankle and Knuckle are both referred to as Tingle’s brothers, David Jr. shares no relation with the others. According to a Figurine in The Wind Waker, David Jr. is a 17-year-old treasure hunter from Windfall Island who woke up on Tingle’s shore after getting caught in a storm. David Jr. tells Link that he was put into a jumpsuit while he was unconscious and forced to work rotating the tower. He calls Ankle a complete stranger, and it would appear his propensity for getting seasick has kept him from leaving.
Tingle’s Actions In The Wind Waker May Be Caused By A Dark Past
Tingle’s role in the Zelda series is not limited to Wind Waker, and he’s even the star of multiple spin-offs. Tingle’s first appearance was in the strange, doppelgänger-filled Majora’s Mask, where he is a 35-year-old map salesman obsessed with fairies. Tingle also sells Link a chart needed to reach Oracle of Ages‘ Crescent Island. In Four Swords Adventures, Tingle runs several mini-games and attempts to steal Rupees from the player. Tingle only makes a cameo appearance in Phantom Hourglass, his visage gracing a wanted poster, and similar references are made to the character in Spirit Tracks and Skyward Sword.
As part of the quest to unlock the Magical Boomerang, Tingle appears in The Minish Cap alongside Ankle, Knuckle, and David Jr. This is strange, because the Minish Cap canonically takes place centuries before The Wind Waker. How Tingle and his companions appear in so many different eras on Zelda‘s split timeline is unclear. It is possible that Tingle, like Link or Zelda, is reincarnated throughout the series, meaning there could be multiple different lifetimes in which Tingle kidnaps and enslaves David Jr.
Tingle himself may have once been enslaved. In the ambiguously canon Freshly-Picked Tingle’s Rosy Rupeeland, a game released exclusively in Japan for the Nintendo DS, it is revealed that Tingle is not actually named Tingle. He was once an ordinary middle-aged man cursed by a demon named Uncle Rupee to be a Tingle, servants who wear green jumpsuits and die if they do not collect Rupees. Although that game ends with Tingle defeating Uncle Rupee and earning his freedom, he keeps the jumpsuit and continues calling himself Tingle. It is possible that David Jr. is affected by a similar curse, similarly forced to work for Tingle in The Wind Waker.
