‘Ink Master’ season 4, episode 7 review: Is Kyle Dunbar getting sandbagged by Chris Nunez?

The judges on “Ink Master” made it clear last week that they feel there’s a top of the pack and a bottom of the pack this year with no one in between, and with that in mind they are on a mission to weed out the weaker tattoo artists, starting with their double elimination last week of Bubba and Keith. Will there be another double elimination tonight?

Flash challenge: The artists are being tested on adaptability (the ability to be able to take on anything that comes your way). Their task is to tattoo a word that represents how the canvas gets the most out of life. Lettering is always tricky because it has to be perfect, but to make things even trickier, they also have to include an image and both components have to work together.

Scott has been at the head of the pack for weeks now and Matti has spent the past few episodes trying to position himself with Scott… a very smart, strategic move to not only show how good he is, but it also puts Matti at the forefront of the judges minds as a top dog. This move is starting to rattle Halo and we are wondering if this is something that is going to make Matti move of a target.

King Ruck was in his element with a canvas that wanted big graffiti lettering, but the fact that he didn’t finish it is a big “no no” when it comes to adaptability (or is it since last season we saw Tatu baby present 3 unfinished tattoos and still make it to the finale). What really rubbed us the wrong way was that we couldn’t read what Scott’s tattoo said at all (and the flag was going backwards) and the judges gushed all over it. What is going on with the judges critiques these past two seasons? It is starting to seem like they make up their minds about who their favorites are early on and then they can do no wrong, even when their tattoos are a mess.

So who won the flash challenge? It came down to Halo and Sausage but the winner ended up being Halo and it was well deserved.

Elimination:  With adaptability still in mind, the artists were given bad relationship tattoos to cover up (never ever get someone’s name tattooed on you, just saying). There were some tough cover ups and Halo had no problem handing out some of the tougher ones to the top dogs. King Ruck got saddled with another really difficult canvas and Melissa had to not only deal with a tough canvas, but also an image she knew nothing about.

Judging: As usual the judges loved all over Scott (this time the tattoo was worth them loving all over) and even though all of the artists agreed that Kyle’s tattoo this week was crazy good, the judges hated it – especially Chris Nunez. The top two were Scott and Halo with Halo being the winner of the day. as far as who was in the bottom, Halo chose Jim, the human canvas jury chose King Ruck and the judges asked for Melissa and Gentle Jay as well. Double elimination again this week and Jim and King Ruck were sent packing, but not before Chris mentioned that he thought Kyle should’ve been in the bottom.

The judging this season is making us crazy, especially when it comes to Kyle Dunbar. His work this season is easily better then last season, he’s done some solid work like his X-Men Beast tattoo, the cat placement tattoo and this week’s hourglass/lettering tattoo and never gets the rewards he deserves. Chris Nunez has said that he pushes Kyle harder to get better work out of him and when the better work comes in then Kyle gets what… more criticism? This is becoming increasingly frustrating to watch. Episode grade: C

Want more “Ink Master” season 4 scoop (including exit interviews with all of the eliminated contestants) then head over to the link here. Also we podcast about the show each week and you can listen to them at CarterMatt at the link here or download the podcasts over at iTunes.

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Photo: Spike TV