"And now the act you've all been waiting for..."
Inkspec is a popular animation channel on YouTube, run by the mysterious animator of the same name.
The channel started in late 2015 with animations of animals/characters singing songs (a practice known as "memes" in the animation community). However, as time progressed, one character quickly stood out to become the channel's Ensemble Dark Horse: Spec, a demon with a TV head, with a Dark and Troubled Past. Spec became the channel's main output for a while until he was joined by four other characters: Phoebe, an Action Girl with a powerful amulet, Damon, a bird/skeleton/demon Wide-Eyed Idealist, Cerberus, an evil Hellhound, and Reggie, the Only Sane Man. These characters all came together into a Show Within a Show: Kelton, which concerns Phoebe moving to the titular town and encountering the four other protagonists.
(Note: don't get Spec and Inkspec mixed up. Spec is the character, Inkspec is the creator).
The channel can be found here.
Inkspec's animations contain examples of:
- Action Girl: Phoebe.
- all lowercase letters: Most of the episode titles.
- Ambiguously Evil: Spec. He never does anything that could be considered bad, right? Im sure that doesn't stop him from an occasional pickpocket. He certainly isn't helping his case by sneaking around, annoying his fellow characters, and always trying to steal Phoebe's amulet.
- Artistic License – Biology: The purple man in "Thief" gets his head split in half, arm chopped off, and intestines pulled out by a lightning strike.
- Best Friend: Damon is this to Phoebe; Reggie is the same to Spec.
- Big Fancy House: Spec lives in one in "Feeling Good".
- Blatant Lies: In "Kelton The Game: The Movie. Episode 6. Page 14", Spec stops Phoebe and Damon on their way out of town and asks where they're going. Damon says he needs to get to his hair appointment, which Spec easily sees through, as he doesn't have hair.
- Bloody Horror: The purple man in "Thief" has his head split in half, arm cut off, and intestines pulled out.
- Body Horror: "Chrysophilia" features (human) Spec turning into his TV self by having his body overtaken with glass and some kind of black goo.
- Break-Up Bonfire: "Don't Ask Me How I Am". Charlotte, Spec's girlfriend/wife from when he was a human, burns him out of all of their photographs together.
- But Thou Must!: "Kelton The Game: The Movie. Episode 6. Page 14", features a faux-let's play where the player is controlling Phoebe. She enters Kelton and encounters Damon, who politely asks her if she wants him to show her around. The player presses the "No" option, causing Damon to look hurt. The option comes up again, but this time with grey goo covering the "No" option, forcing the player to press "Yes".
- Cash Lure: "Damon Goes Fishing, Spec Wants Money, and I Cant [sic] Lip Sync", in which Damon and Phoebe sit on a bridge and attach bills to fishing poles, waving them above a jumping Spec in the dry riverbed below.
- Cool Shades: Reggie sports a pair towards the end of "Reggie and Spec Will Serenade You Now".
- Covers Always Lie: The thumbnail for
"Happy Valentines Day!!" features Reggie and Spec in a very intimate, Ho Yay pose. No such scene appears in the video; it ends with Spec getting shot in the head with Cupid's bow by Phoebe. - Dark and Troubled Past: Spec. After snatching a carriage and running away with his wife's cash, the carriage falls off a bridge and into the water. On the verge of drowning, the devil saves him in exchange for his body, turned him into a demon with a TV for a head and disallowed him to touch water. This may explain some of his later Jerkass behavior.
- The Dark Side: Cerberus spends most of "The Other Side" trying to convince Phoebe to give him her amulet in exchange for vast power.
- Deranged Animation: Occurs in "Birthday Gift for Burnt Lime", in which photorealistic versions of Spec and one of Burnt Lime's characters dance to "Mr. Blue Sky" by Electric Light Orchestra. It's pretty terrifying.
- Dude Looks Like a Lady: Spec has been called out by some viewers for having "feminine hips". A video was made about it.
- Early-Bird Cameo: Phoebe and Damon were actually created before Spec, although Spec as a character has been around for years-just not out to the public, but they didn't become popular until long after he had.
- Ensemble Dark Horse: Out of all the characters introduced in the first year or so of the channel, Spec became the most popular.
- Evil Laugh: Spec does one in "All Eyes on Me", although you can't hear it because it's blocked out by the music.
- Exactly What It Says on the Tin: "Everybody Loves Spec". A little too much, it seems.
- The Faceless: Inskpec herself has yet to show her face. In the live action videos her head is either just out of the shot or covered with a paper mask.
- Fly Crazy: In "Happy Valentines Day!!", Phoebe mistakes Cupid for a bug and kills him.
- Foreign Language Title: "Om Du Möter Varg", which is Swedish for "If you encounter wolves". The animation takes its title from the song used in the video, an instrumental piece by the band Detektivbyrån.
- Formula-Breaking Episode: "Thief" and "Stutter" were her first animations in over six months to not feature a character from Kelton.
- Friendly Rivalry: With Burnt Lime, another popular animation channel.
- From Beyond the Fourth Wall: Inkspec herself shows up (albeit offscreen) in "Can't Even Interview a Few Characters Without Everything Going to Heck", where she tries to interview Phoebe, but Spec, Damon, and Reggie keep interrupting.
- Hellhound: Cerberus.
- Instant Waking Skills: Phoebe possesses them in "The Other Side", as she's already dressed and alert seconds after being woken up by Cerberus.
- "I Want" Song: "Spec Has Dreams Like You, No Really", in which Spec lip-syncs to Finn's verse in "I've Got a Dream" from Tangled.
- Kill the Cutie: Cerberus rips Damon's arm off and stomps him to death in "Life Could be a Dream". Averted when we find out it's just part of a dream Cerberus is having.
- Laughing Mad: Spec in "H A".
- Magical Accessory: Phoebe's amulet, which Spec and Cerberus keeps trying to steal.
- Mexican Standoff: Occurs between Phoebe and Damon in "A Kelton Christmas" as they try to guess what's in the huge present under the tree.
- Rule 34: Inkspec seems quite upset that there has been slash art made that features Spec, especially because its not being shared with her. Apparently some of her viewers find him quite attractive.
- Running Gag: Several.
- Spec's "feminine hips"
- Spec and Cerberus trying to steal Phoebe's amulet.
- Self-Deprecation: "Kelton in 39 Seconds" sends up a lot of the tropes in the series.
- Slasher Smile: Cerberus is almost always sporting one.
- Stage Magician: Spec plays one in "One Time".
- Stealth Prequel: "Don't Ask Me How I Am" looks like a standard non-Kelton animation until the last few seconds reveals a photograph of the girl in the video and Spec as a human.
- Stylistic Suck: "Probably the Peak of My Animating Career", "Kelton in 39 Seconds", and "I Am Very Serious About Animation" feature purposefully amateurish caricatures of her and her friends' characters.
- Suddenly Shouting: "phoebe is dying.mov". A snippet of "STARSTRUKK" by 3OH!3 plays, with Phoebe screaming in place of the whistles.
- Trailers: "Dialogue Clip" is a small preview of a scene from the upcoming first episode of Kelton.
- Trauma Conga Line: Happens to Spec in "Kissing Strangers". A parade of Phoebes and Damons come by and each time punch him in the stomach and hug him, respectively. Luckily leads to a happy ending where Reggie comes by and they have a cute Ho Yay moment.
- TV Head Robot: Spec, although he isn't actually a robot.
- Shout-Out: In "Life Could be a Dream", Cerberus rips Damon's arm off and glares at the camera with a familiar smile.
- Vignette Episode: "A Big Ol Animation Dump", which collects fragments of unfinished animations that Inkspec stopped working on for various reasons.
- Wide-Eyed Idealist: Damon. He's always happy and nothing can seem to get him down.
