Before there was Just Tattoo Of Us and How Far Is Tattoo Far? there was the show Impractical Jokers where one guy selected personalised tattoos as a punishment for his three friends.
Who are the Impractical Jokers? They’re a group of four friends from high school who compete against each other in a series of challenges, and if they refuse to do or say something then they lose. Whoever has the most thumbs down at the end of each and every episode gets punished.
The punishments range from public humiliation, to the Jokers being forced to face a personal phobia or fear. Some of the past 200 punishments have included:
- Q teaching sex education to his parents;
- Sal and Joe performing as the opening act for Imagine Dragons;
- Murr getting body parts pierced until he answers three questions correctly.
The 2nd of October, 2024 marks a full decade since Q, Sal and Murr were on the receiving end of one of my personal favourite punishments.
In ‘The Permanent Punishment’ episode the challenges involved acting as drug store security guards where they had to do and say as they were told, and then competing against one another to clip balloons onto unsuspecting grocery store customers without being caught.
At the conclusion of the episode, three of the four Jokers were tied with the same number of thumbs down. This meant that Joe was the winner and a triple punishment was in order.
After losing the episode, the three Jokers were taken to East Side Ink in New York City to be punished in the most permanent of ways – with tattoos.
There was no consultation with the tattoo artist, nor did Q, Sal, or Murr have the opportunity to see the design before going under the needle. Once completed, all four Jokers went outside to reveal their tattoos to one another and finally see for themselves what design Joe had chosen for each of them. Needless to say their reactions were rather amusing.
Compared to the tattoos on Just Tattoo Of Us and How Far Is Tattoo Far?, and the thousands I see daily on Instagram, the guys should consider themselves lucky to have received semi-decent tattoos despite having no say in the design or the tattoo artist.
The four remain friends – Impractical Jokers just finished airing its 11th season – although the same cannot be said for participants in the UK and US tattoo reality shows.
It was always my hope that one day Murr, Q and Sal would exact revenge on Joe by giving him his own punishment tattoo. Sadly, this is unlikely to occur as Joe left the show in 2021.
After an entire decade, several more seasons of the show, and even a theatrically released movie where another Jaden Smith portrait added to Sal’s tattoo collection, I’m still left wondering: does Will Smith truly love his son when even he doesn’t have one (let alone two) portrait tattoo of his own son on his body?
(NOTE: This article was originally published in 2019 on my old website – certain information has been subsequently edited and is correct as of October 2024)
The Tattooed Archivist 