'Ink Master: Turf War': Fans think this season has too many tattoo artists and none of them are great
'Ink Master: Turf War' is back with a group of 20 tattoo artists, who will be judged based on the aesthetics and technical skills they lay on the table.
Divided into four teams of five members each, the participants will have to bring out their best while being part of a team, which means the creative differences and ego clashes need to be kept at bay. But how can that happen when there's a group of talented people under one roof, all competing with one another?
This year the artists specialize in multiple techniques — some are great with black-and-grey pieces, watercolor, and neo-traditional pieces, while some love to go for color realism and surrealism.
But the judges — Oliver Peck, David Navarro, Chris Nunez — were brutal in dissecting each of their work right after the first round, in which they were allotted six hours to complete a tattoo that would represent their home states.
There were multiple problem areas with those that were saved in this week's episode — starting from shading, outlining, usage of colors, to even positioning of elements that sort of border the tattoo. But the bottom-ranked ones were put in a tough spot with the judges asking them to create a piece that represents patriotism within six hours.
Meanwhile, the audience seems convinced that the artists are not that great this season, not even the ones with a dated resume.
"Dear BS tattoo artists, Don't take spots away from people willing to grind. #InkMaster #InkMasterPremiere," a fan wrote. "Hopefully the tattoos get better because..," another posted. "I don’t know where you find some of these tattooers. Do you intentionally throw in a few that suck?" a user tweeted.
Another fan said: "Did I just hear a contestant say she never did a 3D shades tattoo? ( about the liberty bell) what does it take to get on this show?"
Also, a section on social media believes that there are way too many artists competing and they say that this will only create further confusion. "Strange, and 20 artists is 4 too many. That just makes room for more bad tattoos and further confusion on which is the worst," a user pointed out.
'Ink Master: Turf War' premiere episode witnessed a voluntary and a judges-based exit — Drew Hicks and Nychelle Elise, respectively. The winner of the show gets honored with the title of Ink Master and walks home with a grand cash prize of $100,000 and an editorial spread in the Inked Magazine.