* MTV
OGs versus Young Guns.
Sixteen brand-new artists
will form two teams based solely on experience.
There's not a single weak artist here.
This is tattoo bootcamp.
Fucking bring it.
[Narrator] They'll push their creativity...
[Woman] Let's fucking go, bitches!
[Narrator] And their experience...
[Cat] Oh, no.
Well, that's why you're a Young Gun.
[Narrator] To the limit.
Make that shit look good.
I hope they shit that bad.
Fuck me.
[Woman 3] You're not a fucking genius,
so don't be an asshole.
"Make this more simple" or "Make this like that."
-I was correct. -Whoo!
Today, you must battle it out, tattooing the face.
[Woman 4] This could go wrong in so many ways.
[Man] Tattooing for our lives right now.
[Pained moan] [whispers] Oh, my God.
I fucked myself over.
Things go sideways really fast.
Battle to the death.
[Narrator] Only the strongest will survive.
If we're gonna do this, we're gonna battle.
I'm fucking scared shitless.
There's no fucking way that you're gonna expect a free ride.
This is an emotional battle for me.
Does anybody else wanna progress to the end?
Why the fuck else are we here?
[Narrator] Judged by industry icons.
The small transitions in hue, that's crazy.
I haven't seen any tattoo pull that off.
Super-clean, solid-ass tattoo
and you should be fucking stoked.
Nailed every little piece of that tattoo.
It's badass.
They're so fucking good.
He nailed it. You took a swing
and you absolutely hit it out of the park.
[Narrator] In the end, only one artist
will earn a $250,000 prize...
This shit is fucking bananas.
The game is afoot.
Gear up and get ready.
[Narrator] And a title of Ink Master.
[rock music]
[dramatic music]
Woah! Shit!
Let's go!
[Love] [laughs] Not the fame.
Whoo, I wonder who's gonna be right here.
This feels like a dream.
I cannot believe I'm on Ink Master right now.
This is crazy.
I do like the orange.
Yellow is not bad.
-[Love] Uh-huh. -[Jade] I could do it.
[Pony] What's happening, man? How you doing? How's everybody?
There's not a single weak artist here.
Pony Paloni.
Hey, Jade, how are you?
[Alena] Pony, are you serious?
Who doesn't know Pony?
He's on every social media platform,
killing it.
I am a huge fan of you.
-[Pony] No, you're not. -Yes.
[Tony] James Tex. Dude, it's an absolute pleasure.
I've been following your stuff for a long time.
I call someone like James a visionary.
Someone who just has this concept, this idea
and he can just draw it up on the fly.
I heard so much about you. I admire your work.
[James] It's probably all lies.
I'm here, competing with my son.
Against my son.
You guys, that's so cute.
Doing this competition with my dad.
[chuckling]
I'm here to fucking beat him.
There are so many good tattooers here, it's crazy.
Stacked.
[rock music]
[Woman] Hell, yeah.
Let's go!
Bring it in.
Welcome. Are you excited?
[contestants] Yeah!
For more than a decade, hundreds of artists
with different specialties and strengths
have entered this competition,
hoping to prove that they have what it takes
to be an Ink Master.
That's wild.
Only the best have succeeded.
Best of the best.
In that elite group of Ink Master winners,
were artists like DJ
who have been tattooing for more than a decade.
The first time I won Ink Master,
I had already been tattooing for 20 years.
So I was super confident in knowing every style
and having to do whatever walked in the door.
And artists like Ryan
who have been tattooing for far less than that.
I won this competition with only four years of experience.
Being so fresh in the industry, you're hungry.
You wanna learn.
[Nikko] Yeah, you have classic craftsmanship
and you have modern mastery.
It leads us to an interesting question.
To be crowned Ink Master, what's more important?
Years of experience or a fresh new view of the craft?
[Man] Debatable.
-It could go either way. -Anything goes.
For this competition, you will form two teams
based solely on how long you've been tattooing.
The OGs, tattooing for more than a decade...
-Oh, wow. -Heavy hitters.
Versus the Young Guns.
Tattooing for 10 years or less.
Our backs are still fine.
[Love] There you go. Shoulders intact.
[Joseph] Just got real.
To get to the end, you must battle it out
alongside your team until only the strongest remain.
Wait, I'll warm up your little milk bottles.
Being a Young Gun has its advantages.
We're totally open to accepting new things,
learning new things, and trying new things.
The OGs might stick to what they know
so much that it's not gonna benefit them in the competition.
But, ultimately, no matter how long you've been tattooing,
only one artist will walk away
with $250,000...
-Jeez. -That's a whole lot of cheese.
And the title of Ink Master.
That's why we're here.
There is one more thing you should know.
[contestants] Here goes.
There are eight OGs...
and eight Young Guns.
But there are only six spots on each team.
Oh, no.
That means four of you will be packing your machines
before you even moved into a shop.
Oh, my God.
We just got here, dude.
Shit.
Yeah, no doubt. Four people right off the rib.
Before you get to battle the opposing team,
you must first battle your own.
Oh, my God.
That's fucked up.
It's time to weed out the weak one team at a time.
Sink or swim.
Please tell me the OGs are gonna go first.
Young Guns, you're up first.
Oh, no.
Oh, my God, I'm gonna throw up.
Why?
For your first elimination tattoo,
the subject matter is completely up to you.
Speaking my language, let's go.
The style is not.
You must tattoo in one of these three distinct styles.
American traditional, Japanese, or new school.
[Man] Good luck.
Those are three scariest styles.
I don't do color. I don't do lines.
I don't do any of that. Oh, my God.
Make sure your tattoo speaks for itself
because these tattoos will be judged completely blind.
I wanna know exactly what style I'm looking at.
This is Ink Master.
You need to be able to take a swing at everything.
Young Guns, today, you will have five hours to tattoo.
Let's go. I'm ready.
This is your chance to prove to the rest of the Young Guns
that you deserve a spot on the team
because two of you will be going home.
It got serious.
Start designing and we'll sit in your canvases.
Good luck.
Good luck, kids.
It's gonna be magic.
All right, what are we doing?
I think I might do some Japanese.
-Japanese? -Yeah.
Luckily, I did a traditional tattoo recently-ish.
You've been training, huh?
Not even.
I actually should've been on the old team
just because of my age.
-Now I'm just sitting here. -[Woman] How old are you?
Forty-three.
I picked up a tattoo machine on a whim,
and I fell in love with it,
and it literally changed my whole life.
Every time I sit down and I put that machine in my hand,
I'm just so fucking happy.
I've lived an entire life, I wasn't happy what I was doing.
And now I'm fucking happy.
Every day, I wake up and I go to work.
And I'm super pumped to be there,
and I'm so happy to hang out with my clients.
And I'm just so grateful.
And I'm not only here, but I'm here.
This is crazy.
It's looking really funky, but it'll make sense
when it's all done.
Look at me, trying to draw my design
after seven months of not tattooing.
[Jenna] Why were you not tattooing?
Because I'm having a baby, girl.
Five months ago, I had my beautiful little baby boy.
And it was everything I've ever wanted.
I love being a mom.
Towards the last trimester of pregnancy,
it was really rough and I wasn't able to tattoo.
It was hard 'cause I was so used to working all the time.
I'm here to show myself, what I can do,
that I can find my creative spark again
and produce work the way I used to produce work,
and even better.
And now here I am, trying to get back into tattooing.
Everybody else is competing against each other,
but this is me in a competition against myself.
All right.
[Jenna] We already agreed we're sending boys home.
-Yes. Absolutely. -So we're fine.
[Cat] Being the first to be sent home
before we even unpack our machines
is like [imitates disgruntled cat].
[Love] It'll be the worst to be sent home, period.
[laughing]
[Cat] That's true, that's true.
[dramatic stinger]
[Man] Hey, I'm gonna be your human canvas today.
-I'm your human canvas. -Hello. Nice to meet you.
He's a cute little cowboy and his dead frog.
Young Guns, there are eight of you
and only six spots on the team.
[Jenna] You gotta win this.
[Joel] If you want one of those spots,
you're going to have to prove it.
You have five hours to tattoo and your time starts now.
It's go time.
Let's fucking go, bitches.
[Woman] Oh, my God.
We wanna test the Young Guns right out of the gate.
[Cat] Oh, no.
Three styles that are staples in tattoo history.
American traditional.
Yeah, this looks awesome.
[DJ] Clean lines, solid saturation,
a really simple color palette, Japanese.
[Joseph] And it's perfect.
[DJ] Clean lines, solid saturation.
It's a lot of the same things as American traditional
with a little bit more modern take.
Or new school.
You need to know a lot of trics to do new school.
If you don't know how to draw and skew proportions correctly,
you'll fall short.
I like that placement right there.
If one of these Young Guns want their name on a shop,
they gotta impress us right off the bat.
[Love] I'm pushing towards you. Try to hold your bearings.
[DJ] If you can't hit one of these styles,
then hit the road.
We're testing out a new machine today.
-[Man] Perfect. Nice. -Risky business.
All right, we are on this journey together.
[rock music]
[Johnny] So sick seeing the stencil on the skin.
It's like when my brain starts to see it all.
I see the future.
I'm gonna do a new school crazy fucking squid creature.
Like if you took some mushrooms
and you've seen a fucking squid come out of the ocean.
The leg can sometimes get a little twitchy
so don't freak yourself out over it.
I grew up being taught do it how you feel.
I tattoo from a space that feels authentic
and organic as fuck.
In my own head, there's a little cowboy
lassoing all my ideas, and then pulling them in,
and like, "Get back here, you crazy."
I've been doing stuff like this
a little bit more often now.
Young Guns, there are four hours left.
[Man] Look who's here, guys.
Right, oh, right, what do we got here?
The OGs.
[Cat] Here they come.
How are y'all doing?
[Cat] To blow up our spot.
I'm all for it. That's what we're here for.
Everybody, look.
This isn't nerve-wracking or anything. [giggles nervously]
People have said, in their three years of tattooing,
they were nowhere near where I am now.
My technical abilities are so sharp and precise,
that, no matter the challenge, I'll be able
to produce a clean piece of work.
She hasn't finished the outline yet.
[Jade] Give me chills.
I'm just trying to get clean lines.
Looks can be deceiving.
I might pull up in a little skirt and a crop top,
but I can tattoo my ass off.
-How you shading that heart? -Red.
-Just solid? -No.
More shadow where the snake overlaps.
My name is Love and so I wanna go with a heart-centered design.
Hearts are a staple in American traditional tattoos.
That's my new tag, "Done with Love."
I love that.
I'm a plus-size queer black tattoo artist.
I want to make sure that people who look like me
and identify the way that I do
have access to amazing, beautiful,
life-changing, body-complementing work.
This right here, hot fire.
I've chosen to carry my communities on my back
and if I don't win, I'll feel like I'm letting them down.
Just go.
Kitsune mask, smart choice.
Does it need more shading?
I'm from a region in Siberia, Asian part of Russia.
It's the coldest inhabited place on Earth.
It wasn't easy. We didn't have basic human needs.
Boiling water, we didn't have a bathroom.
I literally had to struggle to survive.
Do you think I should do thicker lines on the mask?
Yes. Just to make it look a little stronger.
[Alena] Yeah, yeah.
I only do black and gray realism.
I had fucking balls big enough
to go for Japanese and color tattoo.
None of the things I do on a regular basis.
Winning Ink Master is not gonna be easy.
But it won't be the hardest thing I've ever done.
Whip it, whip it, whip it, lali, lali, lali.
Much of the older generation tattoo artists,
they don't wanna give a chance to the new guys.
You like it?
Do better?
Wanna show him how it's done?
It wasn't easy for me in Puerto Rico.
I would knock on doors, tattoo shops,
just begging for apprenticeships.
And I would just constantly get shut down.
I'm completely self-taught.
For this challenge, I tried to maintain it
as simple as possible,
making sure it's really solid, hacked to the brim.
All of the work I've done by myself.
To get to Ink Master is on the line.
[Pony] We might have some competition.
They're not doing half-bad.
This is what they wanted. They wanted traditional.
They want straightforward.
-[Jorell] You went big. -[Andy] Oh, he's cruising.
Almost done, he's touching the color.
[Jorell] Yeah, it's crispy.
[Trevor] I just wanna get a spot in the shop.
I really discovered art in my senior year of high school.
I had to take an art class. My father just passed away.
Having my dad die from cancer, it was hard.
I had a lot of things going on in my head.
And it was just something I could use
to process my emotions
and just let things go,
and letting my feelings out on a paper
and stuff like that really helped me
to become a better artist and just grow.
I'm waiting till later on to unleash some of my own style.
All right, everybody, there is one hour left on the clock.
You have one hour.
[rock music]
You just question so much when you're put on the spot.
[Man] Always second-guessing, looking for perfection.
I haven't tattooed in seven months.
It feels foreign.
I have to constantly keep adjusting my hand speed,
how much pressure I'm applying.
I am terrified.
Five, four, three, two, one.
That's it. Time's up. No more ink.
[Alena] Ooh, we did it.
[Man] We did it!
Yay. On the wire.
This thing looks amazing. What you think?
-[Man] No, that's sick. Yeah. -[Love] You like it? Hell, yeah.
I feel like we nailed it.
[Man] Yeah, I think you did it good. Absolutely.
[Jenna] Now we just have to win, man.
[Man] Yeah, good luck.
So as far as technical ability goes,
I think they're all shitting the bed here.
[Jorell] I feel like that's what the challenge was asking.
What is the complaint that OGs would have
to Young Guns?
You don't fucking know the fundamentals.
And it matters.
There are six spots.
Who are the two that are going home?
Based on what you guys saw.
From what I saw from Jade,
it takes you two hours to do a line work.
You should be able to do it in 10 to 15 minutes.
If it's gonna take her two days to color in a rose,
you could do it in fucking 15 minutes.
If it comes down to hitting the mark,
I have to put Trevor on the bottom,
because he did what he wanted to do.
He didn't do traditional.
His color palette was weird.
Opaque greens, traditional doesn't have that.
Did anybody know what Johnny's image was?
I just couldn't connect
what was happening with the tentacles and the hea.
There's two different things in Johnny's put together,
which it should be one.
I think all Young Bucks should go home
and we should all stay 'cause we're all way better than them.
[Pony] You're not wrong.
[rock music]
All right, blind critique. You guys ready for this?
Ready as I'll ever be, yeah, yeah.
We'll find out.
[Man] Oh! Here we go!
The Young Guns had five hours to tattoo
in one of three distinct styles.
American traditional, Japanese, or new school.
This is a blind critique.
Let's see how they did.
Let's bring up the first tattoo.
Oh, no, it's mine.
Overall, I think this tattoo's adorable.
Look at this thing, guys.
Look at the little teeth and the little lips
and the cute little button nose.
I love the illustration. This little boy,
this cold look, coming out of the graveyard.
But that almost coffin shape behind the tattoo
is a little bit confusing to where the boy comes out of t
in certain areas but doesn't in others.
The frog is amazing. I really love the frog.
It really captures my imagination.
Then everything else is an afterthought.
I did do it at the end
of when I had already designed everything.
So he nailed it, he nailed it, yeah.
[Joel] Bring up the next tattoo.
[group moans bewilderedly]
That was me.
[Nikko] It's a super bold tattoo.
It's super American traditional. It's clean.
The color choices are good.
It wasn't overdone with any weird colors
that weren't too out of the ordinary.
[Ryan] The saturation is really, really nice.
All of the negative space around each petal is dope.
It's dope. It's solid.
[James] I was literally scared for you.
I thought this was going south real quick.
Or real slow. [group laughing]
[Jade] I was literally just trying to take the challenge
word for word and what they wanted.
Clean, simple, and to the point, American traditional.
[Joel] Let's see the next tattoo.
It's me.
[Joel] It doesn't scream American traditional to me.
The line weight should've been a little heavie,
a little less going on.
Honestly, I really like this tattoo.
But, come on, it's not American traditional.
It's not.
When you have different angles and different flips,
mandalas, and all these trips,
it takes away from the beauty of the simplicity
of American traditional.
I know I took a lot of risks.
I pushed it. I was trying to do my own thing.
It was a nice neo-traditional tattoo, though.
Let's bring up the next tattoo.
That's me.
[Joel] I think it hits the mark for American traditional.
This has some design issues.
The most important parts of the heart are covered up.
This has a balloon appearance.
It looks like, when the stencil was put on,
it was pushed one way on the top
and then pushed one way on the very bottom
so the dagger doesn't look exactly straight to me.
And these are the Young Guns doing it, right?
This is where experience comes in.
I stand by that tattoo.
It's my first American traditional.
I'm proud of it. I don't feel like
it's a tattoo where someone in the back of the grocery store
is gonna go, "What the fuck is that?"
[Joel] Let's bring up the next tattoo.
That's mine.
[Joel] Nice lines, nice colors.
[Ryan] It's readable, bold, saturated.
I think this person is a technician.
Hell, yeah.
[Joel] On the artistic side of it,
the ropes could've benefitted from separation
from the mask itself.
They hug it a bit too hard.
But, overall, beautiful tattoo.
Japanese, for sure, and straight to the point.
I'm very happy, I think.
Your tattoo was sick.
[Joel] Moving on, let's see the next tattoo.
[Man] Who dat?
Oh. That's mine.
[Joel] New school. It's vibrant.
I don't really understand what's going on on the bottom.
They look like suction cups.
I feel like it's a squid.
But then I think that's a crab claw
at the top.
Look, if you cover those bottom tentacles,
it's a cool tattoo.
[Man] It's a cool tattoo like that.
[DJ] And if you cover the face,
it's its own cool little charactery tentacley dude.
But together, it was two pieces
that look like they were just stuck together.
[Man] It wasn't transitioned cohesive,
not to feel like one piece.
I just tried to design something that was like me.
[Joel] Let's see the next tattoo.
Oh, that's my turn now.
[Joel] I like this one. It's super clean.
It's crispy. Great composition.
The way the petals for, where the flowers are.
The way the ropes frame the piece
and flow with the body.
Some of this linework could cut a fucking tomato.
It is sharp.
They showed us bold lines, thin lines,
beautiful clean saturation,
and a really lovely, simple, sophisticated design.
I was worried about the linework.
I took the longest time on the lines.
I guess it paid off. Oh, my God. Ooh!
[Joel] Let's see the last tattoo.
[Ryan] This person is a true artist
who really understands how to illustrate
in a really impressive way.
The shapes of the shadows,
the facial expression,
so many things about this tattoo
are really, really impressive.
I just think the technical ability
isn't there.
You can tell when tattoos are just overdone and overworked.
Like they kept going over it.
It was punching too much of an area at once
and too fast of a rate.
And that's where experience comes in.
And that's where Young Guns sometimes tend to overdo it.
This tattoo is a big deal for me
because it's my first time back, doing what I love.
There are only six spots on the Young Guns team.
It's going to be interesting
to see how this shakes out.
Artists, it's time to get in here.
[dramatic stinger]
[dramatic music]
Young Guns, today, you had five hours
to tattoo in one of three distinct styles.
Based only on your work,
each of your tattoos have been ranked
by the judges.
One by one, the top four artists
will be revealed.
If you made it into the top four,
you are safe from elimination
and you've secured a spot on the team of Young Guns.
Please reveal the highest rank tattoo.
Who's it gonna be?
[Joel] Congratulations, Elina.
You have the highest-ranked tattoo for the Young Guns
and you have the first spot on the team.
Well done.
Why did you decide to do Japanese?
'Cause it was the scariest thing out of the three.
Good answer.
With a tattoo this clean,
I think you're ready for this competition.
That's a beautiful tattoo.
Thank you so much.
[DJ] Have a seat.
Please reveal the second-highest rank tattoo.
That's mine.
[Joel] Congratulations, Joseph.
You have the second-highest rank tattoo.
[Ryan] It was a perfect sticker.
Thank you. Nice.
Go ahead and join your team.
-[Love] Good job. -[Joseph] Thank you.
[Joel] Please reveal the third-highest rank tattoo.
Congratulations, Jade.
You have the third-highest rank tattoo.
Thank you.
[Joel] How long you been tattooing?
[Jade] Just over three years.
[Joel] Three years. Wow.
This tattoo is bold and solid,
really impressive for someone
that's been tattooing only three years. That's crazy.
[Joel] Congratulations, Jade.
You have the third spot on the team.
Thank you.
Please reveal the fourth highest-rank tattoo.
Congratulations, Jenna.
You have the fourth-highest rank tattoo.
Thank you.
[Joel] This is just a great cute little sad guy.
-This is a great tattoo. -Thank you.
[Joel] You have the fourth spot on the team.
Congratulations, top four artists.
You are safe from elimination.
And you've all secured your spot on the Young Guns.
Four Young Guns remain.
And there are only two spots left on the team.
The artist with the lowest-rank tattoo
will be eliminated from the competition.
Reveal the lowest rank tattoo.
Damn.
Hi, Love. How you doing?
Could be better.
Do you usually do American traditional?
[Love] Absolutely not.
That's my first American traditional piece,
plus-sized black female tattoo artist,
I didn't have a traditional apprenticeship.
But I wanted to show you guys I value the opportunity,
so I did my research
and I gave you the subject matter, the color palette.
I didn't have a mentor either. I taught myself everything.
And you're a three-time winner so say less.
[Nikko] It's a great traditional tattoo.
You can tell it's traditional.
And to do your first one here in front of everyone
takes guts.
[DJ] You're early in, so just stick with it.
Get the experience, keep studying.
And you're gonna be great.
Yeah, I learned so much from all of you.
I'm hella grateful.
Love, you do not have what it takes
to be Ink Master.
Just pack your machines and head home.
Thank y'all again for the opportunity.
I'm really sad to be leaving,
but I'm still really proud of my tattoo.
This opportunity is once-in-a-lifetime for me.
And I'm gonna learn, I'm gonna grow.
This won't be the last time you see me.
[Joel] Trevor, Johnny, and Cat,
you will have one final chance to save yourself
from elimination.
-Oh, shit. -[Cat] I already blew it once
and you're giving me another shot?
You get to fight it out to stay.
Oh, my God.
To earn one of the final two spots on your team,
you must face off in a five-hour tattoo.
Here we go. Another five hours.
For this face off, the power is in the hands
of your potential teammates.
Oh, shit.
[Joel] Elina, Joseph, Jade, and Jenna,
because you have the four highest rank tattoos,
you now have the power to assign the style
and subject of the face off tattoo.
All right, what style and subject
do they have to tattoo?
They must tattoo a neo-traditional face.
[Joel] A neo-traditional face.
Human face or...
Doesn't matter. You guys are artists.
We wanna see your artistic. You guys decide.
This is definitely not how I was planning
to make my debut back from maternity leave.
You're entering this competition from maternity leave?
-Yeah. -[Ryan] How old is your baby?
Five months.
First of all, congratulations.
-In the trenches. -In the trenches, babe.
You have to hone in, compartmentalize,
and trust the skin.
You need to feel it.
This is not the place to be afraid.
If I don't nail this, just send me home.
-It's fine. -We will.
Damn.
The face off is set.
Tomorrow, you will have five hours to tattoo.
This is your last chance to secure your spot
in the competition.
There is no room for error.
One of you will be going home.
Head out and good luck.
I need to show the judges that I can take their critiques
and I can apply them.
If I went home before even getting a shop,
I would feel like I failed
and I can't let that happen.
-Hey, I'm your human canvas. -[Johnny] Johnny.
-Nice to meet you. -Nice to meet you.
This is your tattoo today, dude. This what I got for you.
-Doug. -I'm Cat.
Hopefully, we can give you a cool tattoo today.
Just start already on the hot spot.
I'm just trying to get into a shop
so I can even have a chance.
We only get five hours,
so this is probably the biggest I'd wanna go,
'cause I'm still gonna get in there
and do all the cool shading and effects and stuff.
Cat, Trevor, and Johnny.
This is your last chance
to save yourself from elimination
and earn your spot on the Young Guns team.
You have five hours to tattoo.
-And your time starts now. -Let's do this thing.
All right.
Yeah, that's fucking tight.
This face off is going to be extremely difficult
because it's more of a head-to-head battle.
In new-traditional tattooing,
we're really looking for multiple line leads,
Solid saturation, really elegant blends
from one color to the next,
and a creative approach that fits the body beautifully.
Stand naturally.
Neo-traditional tattoos are tough.
Stripping out the details, keeping it clean,
readable, very difficult to do.
[Trevor] This is definitely my signature style.
This is their last shot. This tattoo better show
they wanna be there and it's their best.
Stoked to do this design.
I love doing bold lines, colors.
That's my specialty right there.
Are you ready?
My tattoo is a reflection of how I'm feeling.
It's broken. It is cut-up.
But she's still hanging in there.
Hi, guys.
[Man] Oh, shit!
Oh, hey.
How are you feeling, Cat?
[Cat] Uh, I'm nervous.
Do you think I should go more bold
or is it okay a little bit thinner for neo-trad?
[Elina] I would do a different size line.
-[Cat] I'm so scared of... -Don't be scared.
[Cat] Bolding a line, so it's like, ugh,
like I'm not going bold.
[Eliza] Stop doubting yourself.
Fear is not real. You're just making it up in your head.
Freaking lines hecka hard.
[Joseph] Trevorewskie. How you doing, bud?
[Trevor] I'm thankful that you guys lobbed me a softball.
Yeah, you're supposed to kill this, bro.
[Trevor] I wanna make this team so badly,
I'm gonna do whatever it takes.
I've always been told that I'm neo-trad,
so I'm just gonna do what I always do right now
and come out and do a sick tattoo.
Would you be up to changing the color palette in the flower?
[Trevor] Why would I do that?
[Jenny] They're not classic neo-trad tones.
Especially that lime green, right?
I've used this color palette so many times.
It looks fucking sick when it's done.
You don't do neo-trad tattoos,
so why're you trying to tell me to do a neo-trad tattoo?
It's probably gonna be loud as shit.
It's gonna be good, right?
I wanna prove it to myself
that I can stack up against the best artists in the world.
This is for $250,000.
It's a big deal.
[Joel] All right, guys, there are three hours left.
[Cat] Oh, no.
[pulsing music]
-You having fun over here? -Yeah.
[Johnny] I think I had a little bit too much fun
yesterday with my design.
[Nikko] Hey, that's all right.
You got a second chance at life.
[Johnny] So I'm trying to keep it a little simpler.
I wanna make sure everything has
those little neo-trad aspects, like a flower.
And then there's this gnarly eyeball
that's just chilling at the bottom.
It's risky, but just put it there
because it looks neo-trad.
I don't wanna get too crazy.
Just do it how it should be done.
That's how my brother would say it, for sure.
He'd be like, "You don't always gotta go crazy all the time."
I work alongside my two brothers, so I work...
[Nikko] Your brothers tattoo as well.
That's cool, though. So a family of artists, huh?
[Johnny] I came to Ink Master to show
that you can follow your dreams
and not be scared to jump through that portal
of freaking going for it.
I get that courageousness from my mom.
She supported us, told us we could do anything
and chase our dreams, and I believe that.
She made it believable for me.
And I hope my little brother does the same one day.
Takes the risks.
How's it going?
[Cat] I'm a little nervous, a little shaky,
but I'm trying not to overwork. I'm like...
[Ryan] You just went through this huge transformation
and this huge evolution, right?
And now you're coming back in
looking for the same person that you were before.
And what you should be looking for
is the new evolved version of you.
Maybe now is the perfect time to come out like a Phoenix,
bigger and stronger.
Yes.
I know what to do and I just need to do it.
All right, guys, you have one hour.
[dramatic music]
[moans nervously]
Scary.
[Joel] Five, four, three, two, one.
That's it. Time's up. No more ink.
All right, we did it.
Good shit, dude.
[Man] That looks fucking insane.
You fucking did it.
You're awesome, dude.
Hopefully, it'll be good enough
to get me on the team.
I think I like it.
[Trevor] Dude, that was brutal in there.
Especially with only being three tattooers
and knowing that one of you three that are going home?
It's $250,000 on the line.
Yeah, you could cut the tension in there
with a fucking knife, bro.
I tried listening to all the things
that you guys told me.
Anywhere that I could pivot, I did.
You better get on the team.
I was going through this identity crisis
of being a tattoo artist and being somebody's mommy.
I feel guilty that I'm enjoying this
because I'm not with him.
I have two kids, right? It gets better
because you have so much more motivation
because you have to do it for your baby.
You don't wanna come home...
And say, "Mommy sucked 'cause she didn't give it her all.
She gave up."
[Jenny] And we want you to be a kickass member of our team.
We need your drawing skills. You can't leave us.
You are so amazing.
I wanna be on the team.
I have a lot to prove.
[music]
Today, you had to face off
tattooing neo-traditional human faces.
Let's see how you did.
Johnny, you're up first.
This one's a lot more readable.
And you can really tell what's going on.
But this piece looks a little stiff.
[Ryan] Since you pulled the hair
in such a compartmentalized sort of way,
I think you missed a lot of movement in the tattoo.
I took that route to go
a little bit more sticker and flat.
I do think it's a lot of stuff crammed together.
You got the halo, the flower, the jewel, the eye.
There's a lot going on in a small tattoo.
There's a lot of tricks in there that could've been simplified.
-Cat. -No. Sorry.
-You two were corrected. -[Joel] You're up next.
Hi, guys.
You are a very talented illustrator.
I love the shine on the nose.
The lips are great.
I love the eyebrows. The eyebrows are crispy.
Any female comes out the eyebrow place
looking like that, she's like, "Damn, these are perfect."
[Nikko] But it looks unfinished to me.
It looks more illustrated to me than neo-traditional.
That's where you maybe added stuff in
that wasn't as necessary
for things that would've screamed more neo-traditional.
[Ryan] You fixed the problem we had with you yesterday
when it comes to overworking it.
But I think you're really overthinking it.
And last up, Trevor.
The ask was a face.
I think you could've focused a little more on that.
This face is playing peekaboo right now.
Like, "Here I am."
But I really like the style of this one.
It has that good darkness coming into the light
where the rose is glowing.
There's only two eyelashes.
What it seems like is you stuck one eyelash in there
and wasn't sure.
Either fully commit to eyelashes
or commit to one beautiful one.
Color choices are awesome.
Obviously, you do it neo-traditional.
And you hit the mark with that.
[Joel] Based on your work,
two of you will secure your spot
on the Young Guns team.
One of you will be packing your machines.
I think we have a tough decision.
I know that I'm versatile.
I can do a bunch of different styles
that will lend me to the team well.
Trevor, he can bang on a solid tattoo.
Playing the game already.
I like that.
We're trying to secure somebody
who makes up for some of our weaknesses
so that these guys don't whoop us.
It's hard to argue with that.
He's a solid tattooer.
I think my biggest pro was that I got
outside the box, creative mentality.
I'm always trying to think about something
a little bit different or maybe something
that you never thought of.
They can also find a lot of value in drawing abilities
and design and dimension,
and somebody who can bust that out
and I think that's something that I can really contribute.
It's time to determine who's going home.
I think Trevor absolutely hit neo-traditional.
Even though it has issues, that's 100% neo-traditional.
Cat's tattoo, I personally loved the face.
I loved the illustration.
It looks unfinished to me.
It looks a little unfinished to me.
-[DJ] I can see that. -And then Johnny's.
[Nikko] It does look finished.
I will say the tattoo looks finished.
But I do think it's a lot of stuff crammed together.
And it just falls a little flat for me.
[Ryan] As opposed to Cat
who brought what we loved about her artistry yesterday
fixed some of the technical mistakes,
and so I think Johnny took a step back.
Cat took a step forward.
And so, for me, my vote is for Johnny to go home.
Cat, I think you did a great illustration.
And, Johnny, I think you like to do everything you got
in one tattoo.
It's hard for you to just reel it back in a little bit.
My vote's for you, Johnny.
My vote is for Johnny.
The judges have decided Johnny.
You do not have what it takes to be Ink Master.
I just wanna say thank you to everyone.
I'm taking my notes and I'm gonna make sure
I apply everything that I've learned here
and continue to learn, so...
You're super early in on your career.
It all just takes time.
[Nikko] It takes a lot of guts to come in here,
taking that swing. You're gonna go far, bro.
Please pack your machines and head home.
I'm beyond proud of myself.
Even though I left earlier than I wanted to,
chase your dreams.
I have a 12-year-old brother.
I want him to be able to see this
and know he can go for it too,
so go for your dreams. Make your dreams come true.
[Joel] Congratulations, Cat, and Trevor,
you have secured your spot on the Young Guns team.
Thank you, guys.
OGs, hopefully, you've all been paying attention.
Ready to go.
Tomorrow, all of you will be battling for a place
on the OG team.
-Let's do it. -Do it.
Get some rest. You're gonna need it.
[Narrator] On the next episode of Ink Master...
[Man] The cobra is in a pit.
Don't talk the talk until you've walked the walk, OGs.
You're going in huge with your tattoo.
If they don't kill it, there's no excuse.
It was a ballsy move and I don't think you pulled it off.
You used a crutch to keep yourself safe.
Holy shit.
[music]