I’m really not sure how to explain it but.. adhd is just like. These two. In your brain. At all times. But I mean hey sometimes they pay rent by giving you a good idea or 43
So! this is a general running theme i’ve noticed with MePhone4 that i consider to be very unique to him– and with just how many times i’ve rewatched Inanimate Insanity, it becomes more and more glaringly obvious to me each time i do.
He seems to have a genuine aversion to violence- at the very least- from himself, or relating to him, and the clues towards this start as early as season 1! (he has, of course, caused accidental deaths, and this isn’t meant to make him look particularly nice, so much as to highlight this very specific theme i’ve noticed in his writing)
Now, MePhone4 wasn’t all that developed yet in S1, but we still get a pretty clear look at this theme when MePhone4s cohosts for an episode-
Firstly, although he was snarky about it and acted like he didn’t care that much, he still wouldn’t allow MePhone4s to kill OJ, choosing instead to work with someone he didn’t like over the (temporary, fixable) death of one contestant.
[id: MePhone4 and MePhone4s are talking. Captions: MePhone4: “No, not “Yeah”, you’re being extremely cruel to everyone, and i’ve had enough” MePhone4s: “Hey, you’re cruel to them too!” MePhone4: “I’m not nearly as bad as you. So i’m putting you somewhere you can’t hurt anybody”]
He gets upset when 4s forces the contestants through a much more dangerous challenge, painfully killing all three in the process.
And this wasn’t a one-off thing! We see that he refuses to act violently even when his life is in real danger. In cases where he is directly being threatened, he doesn’t do anything to defend himself.
[id: first picture: MePhone5 is floating and chasing MePhone4 with a gun, and MePhone4 is holding his hands up and backing away. second picture: YinYang is trying to hit MePhone4 with a large torch, and MePhone4 is calling for help. Captions: MePhone4: “Security!”]
When MePhone5 is attempting to kill him, all he does is back away, and when YinYang becomes violent towards him, he actually calls for help– from Toilet! A character we know he dislikes! He would rather request the help of someone he hates over the possibility of harming someone who is an active threat to him! He has every reason to act defensively in either of these scenarios, he just doesn’t. The only case in which he does something in self defense is when he pushes MePhone4s into quicksand- which isn’t terribly violent in itself, and ONLY happens when he’s already being wrestled and is almost pushed in himself. And it doesn’t even end up killing 4s.
We see this sort of behavior one more time when the Shimmers shoot at him-
[id: MePhone4 standing fearfully behind a large, glitching shield he generated.]
He only generates a shield here. Even though he thinks this is Cobs, someone he has even more reason to defend himself from. I’m unsure if it’s an inability on his part, but i have to wonder- if he can generate a shield, what’s stopping him from generating weapons? Other than not wanting to?
(It’s also worth noting that, while this is smaller, he does nothing when contestants hit, yell at, and threaten him. He doesn’t even really react a lot of the time, and at most, it’s just some sort of remark. This is just also really different from most of the hosts i’ve seen, who generally get mad/violent over that.)
But the thing that really clicked it all into place for me- the most obvious reference to this theme beyond the first clip in S1- was actually something he said in III.
[id: MePhone4 pointing at Nickel (off screen) with an upset expression. Captions: MePhone4: “Wait, you used my Pic-Nix tables… to try to hurt someone?”]
Look at the way he reacts to Nickel using the Pic-Nix tables to try to make Clover slip. He looks genuinely sort of upset about it, and promptly bans Nickel from using them anymore!
This is definitely a pretty consistent part of his character- and with some key details about him, it makes a lot of sense- even with his weird jerk persona.
Bare with me here. We know:
He was created and woke up on the Cloud, where he lived until he escaped and presumably almost immediately started his show
We can easily infer he had no real socialization outside of Cobs and possibly other Meeple products. This creates an environment where he ONLY knows what he’s being told by them, and can only really learn their behavior.
The only other example we know he had was Reality TV- a very fake, exaggerated, sensationalized view of the way other people act. That’s it.
But we also know that there are times when he wants to do the right thing, or is immensely upset by darker things. We know he witnessed the death of 3gs (and panicked, and ran away from him), and we know he made the CHOICE to save MePad. He could have left on his own- it would have been safer for him and carried less probable legal risk. We know it wasn’t for personal gain- he didn’t actually NEED MePad for anything, because he did Season 1 without him. He just did that because he wanted to protect him. This was a rescue.
SO my general read on him right now is: He learned his more inconsiderate and careless behavior by living on the Cloud with those as his only examples. He learned the way a show host might act, and the things that go on in game shows, but very little about how life actually works and how people would normally interact with each other. Because these were his examples, his ability to operate outside of them is really limited, and something he’s slowly beginning to learn (he’s a lot more tame in III, and even in S2, he does immediately begin to change his behavior after he was called on it in Episode 7).
All he can really be sure about is that he doesn’t want to act violently, which we can easily assume comes from his unfortunate upbringing– to the point of apparently being kind of helpless when in danger- and further, he has a serious problem with the idea of his powers being used negatively (especially by someone else- which also makes a whole lot of sense re: his past). Cobs probably never would have wanted him using his powers for something like this (allowing friends to freely generate whatever food they ask for from a table that seems to just use his technology), and when Nickel did use that tech to try to cause harm (however insignificant) to someone, i think it struck a nerve.
I don’t think MePhone4 is a bad person. A weird arrogant jerk, yes- and while i don’t think that’s entirely his fault, i also don’t see him ever fully growing out of his general attitude- but i think that his heart IS in the right place. I do genuinely think he is trying to be good. I just don’t think he really has much reference for how. All in all, MePhone4 is a wildly interesting character and host.