MePhone4

MePhone4, labeled as The Host, is a major character of Inanimate Insanity and Inanimate Insanity II. He is voiced by Mark Katz.

He has hosted in every episode so far, excluding the following:


 * 4Seeing The Future, where he was shot (And killed) by a gun and replaced by MePhone4S for a brief amount of time.
 * Everything's A-OJ, where he was arrested and imprisoned and Judge Gavel let OJ be the new host.
 * Theft and Battery, where he malfunctioned, rendering him unconscious, leading to MePad taking over hosting for most of the episode.
 * Mine Your Own Business, where he was shut down for the majority of the episode and MePad again stepped in.

Personality
MePhone 4's chief concern is making Inanimate Insanity as entertaining as possible, for himself and the viewers. He spends a lot of time renovating the elimination area in Season 1, and likes celebrating any anniversary the show has (for example, by starting Inanimate Insanity II exactly two years after the first episode of Season 1 aired).

This often means the contestants get the short end of the stick, as he comes up with challenges that range from mundane to relatively normal to disgusting to extremely dangerous. Most of them are very simple. Although he does seem to enjoy offering contestants rewards (like when he offered Bomb a trip around the world in Double Digit Desert), he generally shows little regard for their well-being. This is exemplified by the fact that he locked eliminated contestants in a cage in Season 1 (causing several contestants severe duress, including giving Paper a form of post-traumatic stress disorder) and in a closet in OJ's hotel in Season 2. This is partially because he is a very "out of sight, out of mind" sort of person, who sweeps his problems under the rug when they don't interest him (i.e., relate to the competition). This tendency comes back to bite him multiple times, such as when he is sued by OJ in Everything's A-OJ and when the memories he deleted come flooding back in Mine Your Own Business. It also hurts the contestants in various ways.

Though his negligence plays a role in the various problems on the show, it is worth mentioning that he does like certain contestants less than others. He generally judges contests fairly, but tends to make comments belying this bias during eliminations. The most material effect this has on the show was when he locked Bow in a box in part because she personally annoyed him. This caused her to go insane, which among other things led to Taco losing and Bow's death. It is also evident in the way he treats Toilet.

MePhone 4 was invented by Steve Cobs, though he differs from other Meeple products in key ways. He has "highly-advanced emotion emulators," meaning that he is able to feel emotions strongly, and has such a fondness for eating food that he describes himself as a "fat slob." His favorite food is cookies, which he often eats before he can give them to the contestants.

As revealed in Alternate Reality Show, MePhone and Cobs have a mutually negative relationship. When MePhone lived at Meeple HQ, Cobs had high hopes and expectations for MePhone, giving him various tasks. MePhone was very lazy in his attitude towards them because they didn't interest him. Though Cobs praised him when he did tasks well, he never showed warmth when MePhone tried to share the things he liked with him (such as when he showed Cobs his boat). When Cobs planned on replacing MePhone in the pursuit of more modern technology, MePhone had no idea Cobs wanted to replace him until his encounter with MePhone3GS in the closet, which showed him what happened to old inventions. Soon after, MePhone grabbed the as-yet-unborn MePad to save him from planned obsolescence and left the facility forever, removing his memories of Cobs. Meanwhile, Cobs has sent MePhones to kill him before (though it's unclear whether he was telling the truth when he called these "staged" or not).

It is notable that the things that, to this day, the things MePhone 4 prizes the most - reality TV and eating (Referring to why he calls himself a "Fat slob" - are the two things that Steve Cobs didn't like him doing. As such, MePhone 4 was deeply affected by the time that he spent with Cobs.

Appearance
MePhone4 is a black rectangular phone with a silver casing surrounding his sides. On one side, he has two volume buttons and a ringer switch, and on his top is a power button. He has a large screen on his front which has a glowing blue wallpaper. He has two cameras, one on his front and back, as well as a receiver above his screen, and a home button below it. On his back is a large Meeple logo.

Abilities

 * MeLife: MePhone4 can bring back any dead contestant (if he wants to) by simply clicking on a picture of them. However, it can only be performed if he has received a notification telling him to recover them.
 * Object Generation: Using an app, MePhone4 can make any object appear, such as a tree. He used this to create the challenges for Mazed and Confused, Kick the Bucket, and Alternate Reality Show. However, if he is glitched enough, this can occur accidentally alongside recovery, as seen in Hatching the Plan.

Voices
In The Crappy Cliff, he is played by Christian Potenza, who is best known for his role as Chris McLean in Total Drama Island. However, due to a change in voice actors, MePhone4's voice actor changed to Mark Katz in A Lemony Lesson.

The voice change was given an official canon explanation in Crappy Anniversary, it's revealed that a MeTunes update changed his voice after the first episode. It is revealed that MePhone can sometimes, with difficulty or major updates, switch back to his original voice.

Voice Actors

 * Christian Potenza (English) (The Crappy CIiff)
 * Mark Katz (English) (A Lemony Lesson – present)
 * Jojo93able (Italiano)

Trivia

 * MePhone4 is the first character to speak in the series.
 * MePhone 4 and his original voice actor's other character, Chris McLean, are sometimes noted for their similarity, because they are both blue-colored hosts who care more about their reality shows than about their contestants' well-being.
 * According to a Behind The Scenes video with Justin Chapman, an early unused idea was for MePhone4 to have a different voice in every episode, but this was dropped.
 * The only character other than himself who has eaten his cookies is OJ, who has said they taste awful.
 * Besides his enthusiasm for reality TV, MePhone 4 has been shown to be very excited about holidays.
 * He hates Paintbrush's tree in The Snowdown because it shows "commercialism" instead of what he deems to be the Christmas spirit.
 * It is possible that he hates commercialism because of Meeple's business practices, his reason being that they put out new products as much as possible so more people buy their merchandise; this leads to inventions such as MePhone 4 being rendered obsolete.
 * MePhone4 is revealed to be one year old in 4Seeing The Future, though it is not clear how old he was before removing his memories, nor how much time as passed since then.
 * MePhone4 is the only show staff to have been sued by a contestant.
 * A version of MePhone4 appeared in The Object Show Movie: Part 2 and Part 3 Sneak Peek, voice-acted by PhoebeBebe. This version of him is not canon to the Inanimate Insanity universe.
 * MePhone4 is Lactose intolerant.