English Dubbers Who Had to Find Their Voice

[ehh123]

Even in the best dubs, some voice actors may not immeditly know how to play their characters. They can sound a little awkward or use different kinds of voices before they get comfortable in their roles. Pokemon is no exception.

How long did it take before you think the actors of 4Kids and their PUSA (now TPCi) replacements found their characters' voices?

 

[kantoskies]

I'd guess it would take longer for the TPCi VAs to find their voices, as they were hired as sound-alikes.

 

[Jukain]

Hmmm...I'm not sure. It took both the 4kids actors and the TPCI ones quite a while to get used to their roles. I don't have an exact number since I didn't pay attention in the original series, but for TPCI, they settled in somewhere in the middle of Battle Frontier, or I just got used to it by then.

 

[Dogasu]

When it comes to the 4Kids dub, I found that I actually preferred a lot of the actors early on in the series as opposed to their performances in later seasons. I think Veronica Taylor sounded great in the early episodes but got too high by the time Ash got to Johto, and by the time Hoenn came around, I couldn't really stand Eric Stuart's performances as Brock and James. For me, at least, the 4Kids voice actors sounded the best in the early seasons and gradually got worse as time went on.

 

[Cybersai]

Veronica Taylor's Ash was pretty bad during the first 15-20 or so Kanto episodes. That Ash sounds nothing like her later Ash did at all.

 

[Dogasu]

And I actually preferred *that* Ash to the Ash we would get later on, since he actually sounded like a little boy then.

In later episodes, he just sounded like a woman trying to put on a little boy's voice.

 

[Charbok]

I preferred Ash's Kanto voice as well. I didn't really like it when his voice got so high during Johto and Hoenn, especially Hoenn because he and May almost sounded identical. I could turn away from the TV for a second and wouldn't know if Ash or May were talking.
And Eric Stuart's James was really bad in scenes where James was suppose to show emotion. His goofy James fit but his serious, emotional James didn't work at all. The episode where he and Jessie release Weezing and Arbok is a good example.

As for TPCi, Ash improved a lot from Battle Frontier to DP. In BF we got the infamous "No. Snorlax." line. DP is when I started getting used to the new voices (but the dialogue is a different story.)

 

[Lord_Mewtwo]

For the 4Kids dub I think that everyone started to become their characters about halfway into the first season, but then shortly after Nathan Price quit voicing Meowth, and Maddie Blaustein took over, and it took her about 10 episodes to become Mewoth. For May & Max it took Veronica Taylor & Amy Birnbaum 5 episodes to become them.

For TPCi's dub it took Sarah Natochenny 219 episodes until I could start taking her Ash seriously, so that would be halfway into Sinnoh League Victors. She's no Veronica Taylor, but she's tolerable now. It took Bill Rogers a whole season until he became Brock. I never had problems with Michele Knotz as Jessie. It took Jimmy Zoppi until the Start of Best Wishes until he got James & Meowth to a tolerable level. Everyone else (Dawn, Paul, Iris & Cilan) took 5 episodes to get into the character.

 

[Froakie]

On Bill Rogers' facebook fan page, somebody asked him this question, and he said "Took a little getting used to, but I had lots of coaching and after a while, it sort of became second nature." I'm assuming this is the case for most of the TPCi dubbers who came in too, none of them really had the voice they have now back in Battle Frontier. I'd say Jessie is the closest to how it's been since the switch.

 

[WatcherMark]

I wonder if we would ever have gotten used to Kayzie Rodgers voicing Ash if she'd been kept on as him...

 

[Blackjack Gabbiani]

And I actually preferred *that* Ash to the Ash we would get later on, since he actually sounded like a little boy then.

In later episodes, he just sounded like a woman trying to put on a little boy's voice.

Really? I had the opposite reaction, especially since he's deeper in the first episodes in a way that ten year old boys really aren't (not usually anyway, I know there're exceptions). He sounded either like a woman trying to do a young man's voice and not getting the age right, or a boy trying to sound older than he is.

I think in general, the reason the 4Kids actors took less time adjusting to the roles is because pretty much everyone had already been in the business for a while. Listen to the original dub of Slayers and you'll hear a lot of familiar voices (Slayers dub also notable for getting Lisa Ortiz to emote, proving she CAN do it. We just...don't hear it much).

 

[Frost]

With Ash it's kind of hard to say because Veronica Taylor went through about three different voices with him. There's a clear difference to me between early Kanto Ash, late Kanto-Johto Ash and Hoenn Ash. I rank them as early Kanto > Hoenn > late Kanto-Johto.

I agree with Dogasu that Eric Stuart James started out good, but by late Johto, was much worse. I never had a problem with his Brock voice, though. Rachel Lillis was always good as Misty and Jessie.

Sarah Natochenny was awful for her first year or so, but I think she does fine now. I still can't stand the PUSA voice actors for Brock, James and Meowth. Michele Knotz Jessie was always the best of PUSA's crew IMO.

For Eric Stuart Brock, Rachel Lillis and Michele Knotz, I don't think it really took them that long to "get" their characters. Maybe a few episodes at most, and a lot of that was probably because the early episodes of Kanto hadn't really decided which directions they wanted to take the characters themselves, e.g. is Brock a girl-loving goofball? are Team Rocket serious or comedic? etc.

 

[Cybersai]

PUSA Brock was always good, but he really became
Brock in the ep he caught Bonsly.

Hey, and Michelle Knotz Jessie wasn't her only good voice. Her first and last performance as Misty back in 2006 was very good.

How ironic is it that they found a great voice for Misty when said character never appeared in any episodes when PUSA started dubbing?

 

[Rex Kamex]

For Ash... Mid-Kanto... but I guess as early as after the St. Anne arc...
For TPCI Ash... I stopped watching Pokemon as faithfully as before since the start of the Battle Frontier arc, but D&P, by the tag battle, was when I thought Ash's voice started to kick in. Hearing his "C'mon, what's wrong with you?" in a commercial did it for me.

 

[AshK]

For the 4kids dub I think ash's voice got much much better by the time Johto rolled around. And she did his voice the best during Hoenn... I dunno I just liked how he sounded especially after yelling out attacks. In regards to TPCI Ash's voice actor made me shudder in pain during battle frontier lol But starting in Hoenn and now in Black and white the voice sounds great and natural. It even rivals the original in my opinion.

 

[Bikini Miltank]

I've heard it said by impressionists that an impression doesn't need to be dead-on as long as it sounds natural. I think Jimmy Zoppi's Meowth is a good example of this: he spent a while trying to be Maddie Blaustein, and sounded weird as a result. The Meowth we have now is deeper-toned and gruffer than Maddie's Meowth, and yet somehow 'feels' more like Meowth than the early efforts to do a more thorough impersonation did.

I don't think he ever got Oak right, but Oak appears so infrequently that he probably doesn't get much practice.

 

[투 애니원]

I'm still waiting for Cilan's VA to find his voice. Its just not flamboyant or lively as the original. Probably because I'm to used to the original voice.

 

[sonic10158]

It sounded like Ash had a sore throat for the first 20 or so episodes before Veronica Taylor perfected his voice

 

[Enzap]

In my opinion, PUSA Ash didn't start sounding normal until Black and White. It was... eh, alright in DP and kind of annoying in BF. Now I think he sounds much better.

 

[Blackjack Gabbiani]

I think the biggest problem with Stuart's James wasn't the voice but the delivery. For some reason he changed his delivery about mid-Johto, even though it was the same voice we knew he could do very good things with. I wonder if that was his decision or a director or what.