Spot the Voice: Metropolis Edition
So I really do enjoy playing "Who's That VA" because odds are fairly good at this point that I will either be right or at least pleasantly surprised (where the latter is often more fun than the former!). For example, I watched the dub Osamu Tezuka's "Metropolis" this week and heard a lot of familiar voices:
For starters, I pegged Duke Red as either Jamieson Price (Oikawa, Count of Monte Cristo) or Paul St. Peter (Leomon, Count de Morcerf). Turns out it was totally Jaimieson Price. I think I was thrown off by the... earnestness(?) in his voice, which hasn't been present in most of his other roles I'm more familiar with.
Kenichi was easy: Brianne Siddall (Koromon, Tommy, Jim Hawking) with her very distinctive boy-voice.
Tima was played by Rebecca Forstadt, who had a few minor characters in Outlaw Star (and even played Jim Hawking's love interest in one episode, so it's not even the first time she's been The Girl opposite Ms. Siddall's Guy).
Atlas was voiced by Scott Weinger, aka that guy from "Full House" and (probably more famously) Disney's "Aladdin". He also has a very distinct voice, although it sounded more subdued than usual due to the seriousness of the character. Still, pretty easy to tell (and sort of a weird place for him to turn up, although it looks like he hasn't done any other dub work before or since).
I even recognized the voice of Tima's nurse as TK's mom (Barbara Goodson). Again, a fairly distinct voice, who I've definitely heard pop up in other places (she has done a ton of voice work, though, so that's understandable). And I guess she's Naota in FLCL? AzubbazubbaWHA? I totally did not know that, but it's awesome.
I was totally thrown by the President. I thought he sounded a lot like Beau Billingslea (Ogremon, Jet Black, Bertuccio)-- particularly the scene were he's at the table reading the newspaper. But no, apparently it was Richard Plantagenet, who has a lot of "additional voice" credits, but otherwise hasn't been in anything I've seen. Whoops!
Now for the surprises, aka the ones where I go "oh man I know that voice I know that voice where have I heard it before it's driving me crazy!"
Pero was Dave Mallow. Totally should have recognized him as Angemon right away, but didn't.
And then there's Rock. He sounded at least somewhat familiar, but couldn't think for the life of me where else I had heard him, except I thought mmmmmmaybe he could be the guy that did Autor in Princess Tutu. Uh, no. Turns out it was Michael Reisz.
Michael Reisz.
MICHAEL REISZ.
*FANGIRLS*
I had to watch most of his scenes again just to double-check. It barely sounds like him! Waaaay darker and with more subtle emotion than either of his major young-protagonist roles. Rock does have some Matt-voice moments though... particularly when he's confronting Tima at Duke Red's (definitely one of his big moments to shine, since so many of his lines up to that point had been fairly short and clipped). The laugh kind of gives it away, too. But not enough that I could actually tell while watching! So yeah, my mind is totally blown. A pleasant surprise indeed!
Is it coincidence that almost everyone I even have a hope of recognizing has had a part in one or more Digimon series? No. No it is not. :B
As for the movie itself, I was also pleasantly surprised. I had seen an unofficial sub of it back in 2003, and I apparently didn't remember it very well-- for example, the character of Atlas completely slipped my mind. Plus the quality was fairly terrible, so I missed a lot of the gorgeous scenic detail, the fluid animation, and some subtle plot points, so it was a bit like watching it for the first time again.
A mini-review: The story was all right. Without giving too much away, I almost found myself more interested this time in the first half of the movie rather than the second half. And the character animation was definitely a bit excessive at times: there was a lot of pointless gesturing and "extra" movement that took away from the overall impact of a pose and made the characters seem fidgety. And although I'm all for cute and appealing things, Tezuka-style characters make me realize there is a time and place for everything. The huge eyes, long eyelashes, and chunky rubber-hose limbs on EVERYBODY really seemed out-of-place in a movie of this nature (although I do kinda like Duke R's curly eyebrows). The jazzy music does a far better job than the character design of seeming at first glance really incongruent with the rest of the movie, but then ends up feeling appropriate, and I feel like a lot of it (the upbeat jazz at the beginning, the scene with the fireman-robots, the climactic scene) was used at least somewhat ironically in order to make a statement about the city and its people. Also, yay for art deco!
And now I am more in-the-know about Osamu Tezuka's Star System, so I will probably spend some time reading about that, because it seems really interesting from a character-evolution standpoint.
Ciao!
For starters, I pegged Duke Red as either Jamieson Price (Oikawa, Count of Monte Cristo) or Paul St. Peter (Leomon, Count de Morcerf). Turns out it was totally Jaimieson Price. I think I was thrown off by the... earnestness(?) in his voice, which hasn't been present in most of his other roles I'm more familiar with.
Kenichi was easy: Brianne Siddall (Koromon, Tommy, Jim Hawking) with her very distinctive boy-voice.
Tima was played by Rebecca Forstadt, who had a few minor characters in Outlaw Star (and even played Jim Hawking's love interest in one episode, so it's not even the first time she's been The Girl opposite Ms. Siddall's Guy).
Atlas was voiced by Scott Weinger, aka that guy from "Full House" and (probably more famously) Disney's "Aladdin". He also has a very distinct voice, although it sounded more subdued than usual due to the seriousness of the character. Still, pretty easy to tell (and sort of a weird place for him to turn up, although it looks like he hasn't done any other dub work before or since).
I even recognized the voice of Tima's nurse as TK's mom (Barbara Goodson). Again, a fairly distinct voice, who I've definitely heard pop up in other places (she has done a ton of voice work, though, so that's understandable). And I guess she's Naota in FLCL? AzubbazubbaWHA? I totally did not know that, but it's awesome.
I was totally thrown by the President. I thought he sounded a lot like Beau Billingslea (Ogremon, Jet Black, Bertuccio)-- particularly the scene were he's at the table reading the newspaper. But no, apparently it was Richard Plantagenet, who has a lot of "additional voice" credits, but otherwise hasn't been in anything I've seen. Whoops!
Now for the surprises, aka the ones where I go "oh man I know that voice I know that voice where have I heard it before it's driving me crazy!"
Pero was Dave Mallow. Totally should have recognized him as Angemon right away, but didn't.
And then there's Rock. He sounded at least somewhat familiar, but couldn't think for the life of me where else I had heard him, except I thought mmmmmmaybe he could be the guy that did Autor in Princess Tutu. Uh, no. Turns out it was Michael Reisz.
Michael Reisz.
MICHAEL REISZ.
*FANGIRLS*
I had to watch most of his scenes again just to double-check. It barely sounds like him! Waaaay darker and with more subtle emotion than either of his major young-protagonist roles. Rock does have some Matt-voice moments though... particularly when he's confronting Tima at Duke Red's (definitely one of his big moments to shine, since so many of his lines up to that point had been fairly short and clipped). The laugh kind of gives it away, too. But not enough that I could actually tell while watching! So yeah, my mind is totally blown. A pleasant surprise indeed!
Is it coincidence that almost everyone I even have a hope of recognizing has had a part in one or more Digimon series? No. No it is not. :B
As for the movie itself, I was also pleasantly surprised. I had seen an unofficial sub of it back in 2003, and I apparently didn't remember it very well-- for example, the character of Atlas completely slipped my mind. Plus the quality was fairly terrible, so I missed a lot of the gorgeous scenic detail, the fluid animation, and some subtle plot points, so it was a bit like watching it for the first time again.
A mini-review: The story was all right. Without giving too much away, I almost found myself more interested this time in the first half of the movie rather than the second half. And the character animation was definitely a bit excessive at times: there was a lot of pointless gesturing and "extra" movement that took away from the overall impact of a pose and made the characters seem fidgety. And although I'm all for cute and appealing things, Tezuka-style characters make me realize there is a time and place for everything. The huge eyes, long eyelashes, and chunky rubber-hose limbs on EVERYBODY really seemed out-of-place in a movie of this nature (although I do kinda like Duke R's curly eyebrows). The jazzy music does a far better job than the character design of seeming at first glance really incongruent with the rest of the movie, but then ends up feeling appropriate, and I feel like a lot of it (the upbeat jazz at the beginning, the scene with the fireman-robots, the climactic scene) was used at least somewhat ironically in order to make a statement about the city and its people. Also, yay for art deco!
And now I am more in-the-know about Osamu Tezuka's Star System, so I will probably spend some time reading about that, because it seems really interesting from a character-evolution standpoint.
Ciao!