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How much importance do you guys place in becoming familiar with the person behind the voice of an anime character? Are you familiar with many of the voice actors' (American or Japanese) names and their various works, or do such details not concern you that much when watching anime?

While I don't consider myself a dedicated "voice chaser," I sometimes do make the effort to look up a familiar voice in the closing credits. Usually this happens much more so when I am watching a dub than with hearing the Japanese track, since it's difficult for me to pick apart the voices in a language I am not familiar with (although some tend to be obvious given their roles, such as with Yukari Tamura being one voice actress I can easily identify). But even with just knowing a handful of the voice actors' names, there is probably about ninety percent of the VA pool that I am unfamiliar with.

I mean, I appreciate the work the voice actors do on both sides -- It's just that outside of watching an episode of anime, I don't really have that much time to really pick them apart from each other. Smile

I've never heard this term before so thanks for bringing it to my attention. I made a post about how I felt out of the loop because I didn't know all these voice actors. I can tell when someones the same guy but I usually don't care. The voice actor doesn't matter as long as they deliver to me. The only voice actor i can even remember is Johnny Yonh Bosch because I'm a big power rangers fan :p

This may sound rather odd, but i tend to have very strong feelings over the unimportance of knowing more than the voice of the VAs. I believe that as long as they speak and do their job, then frankly who cares about the rest. I do notice the same voices from time to time but it doesn't bother me, it's bound to happen. There aren't an infinite number of VAs out there, and yes, VAs take other voice acting jobs too, so their bound to to be heard in other anime titles... thats how they get their money right. I don't know any of their names, nor do i particularly want to. When i do recognize them i'll say something like (random perhaps true perhaps false example) ... " Oh, that sounds like Tohru in Fruits Basket" (while i'll be watching like... Gravion or something).

I think knowing the voice actors will lessen the affect that they have on the show. If i know the voice by the actor and not by the person their acting, (espeically in something where i don't see the VA, only hear thier voice), well then it really just kills it. So i think no need in knowing all that information. A close minded opinion, but i stand by it, with my chin held high, ... blinded by the sun.

-Elfen12-

Sometimes when I am watching a series, especially in Japanese I hear a voice I know I've heard before, but can't remember where, and it bothers me until I either remember or I jump online and look it up.

An example, this weekend I was checking out Bamboo Blade, (good show by the way) and the voice of Kojirō, the instructor for the club, was driving me crazy because I couldn't place him. Come to find out his voice actor, Katsuyuki Konishi, is not only the voice of Kamina From Gurren Lagann, but also Ozma from Macross Frontier, and he also plays smaller roles on a few other shows I've been following. Once I found that out, I forgot about it and just enjoyed the show.

As far as actually watching a series just because a certain voice actor or seiyuu is in it, it has not happend yet, so I would not actually call myself a chaser. Also, I know next to nothing about any of them outside of their work. Any information I pick up would just be a coincidence from watching special features or the like.

I wouldn't call myself a voice chaser, but I do seem to have a good ear for picking out who's playing what part as long as I've heard the voice before. The majority of the anime I watch is dubbed. Which is especially good considering how many alternate names some of the voice actors from L.A. studios use. Other dub studios like the ones in Canada, New York, and Texas I'm a little less familiar with, but I can always pick out a few.

Speaking of Tohru Honda... There was a point in my anime watching, and really there still kind of is, where I would at least try out any show that featured Yui Horie. I just always really seemed to like her characters, her voice work, and the shows that she appeared in. It was also the same for me, to a lesser extent, for Ayako Kawasumi.

Nowadays, if I'm on the fence about trying out a title, I'll look at the cast list and see who's doing the voices (in addition to the director, original creator, and character designer, among others). The people behind the voices have just always been an aspect that is fascinating to me.

Yes, I put a very heavy emphasis on voice acting. After the characters and writing, voice acting is the second most important factor in making good anime.

It's just like Hollywood. You can have a no-name director, a group of writers with a possibly average script, etc. But the movie is nothing without the actors. Case in point: I would not have The Last Samurai ranked as one of my top movies if not for Watanbe Ken playing the role of Katsumoto. Tom Cruise was okay. Heck, they almost picked Christian Bale (which might've been better), but Watanbe takes the film to a completely different performance representing the Japanese side of the film. Kudos also to his outstanding lead role in Letters from Iwo Jima. Or how about Pirates of the Caribbean, can you imagine anyone else playing Capt. Jack Sparrow other than Johnny Depp? Patrick Stewart as Charles Xavier? Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark?

In anime, the voices representing the characters can establish and possibly make or break the entire continuity of things. It's also reassuring to know that you'll have someone experienced playing the part. And eventually, you start to become familiar and expect nothing less than excellence when you see their names pop up or hear their voices in the future.

I'm more familiar with Japanese seiyuu since I watch pretty much everything subbed, and I do place quite a bit of emphasis on the cast. If a show looks interesting to me but I'm not sure whether or not to watch it, I'll go down the cast list and see if any of my favorites are in it. I've been known to pick up series just because Paku Romi features prominently in them, and I'm getting the same way with anime that Satou Yuuko has anything to do with, because she's got such a sweet, mellow voice and I love listening to her. I find that I can often gauge how well I'll enjoy things by the cast members I'm familiar with and how much I like them.

Same goes for dubs, sort of - I usually limit my dub watching to anything produced by ZRO Limit/Animaze since I'm familiar with the pool of actors they draw from and I know what I'm getting.

I don't think I've ever gone out of my way to find a particular voice actor like my Japanese friends would (such as a friend of mine going out of her way to see every show that features Souichiro Hoshi---main character of otherwise) but I can pick up familiar voices quite well in both English and Japanese and the anime I watch tends to pick voice actors from the same pool of people. I always look forward to hearing dubs though, since I almost always have seen the show in Japanese beforehand.I kind feel like another set of voice actors is like hearing the story all over again. The only problem I suppose comes from the fact that since I can recognize the voices so well, I associate past characters they voiced with their present.

Which reminds me, does anyone have the problem of thinking that all (english) voice actresses sound alike? it's probably just me, but an example I can think of is Wendee Lee and Michelle Ruff. IT's not that they're bad, but I get those two mixed up constantly and they're in most of the anime I watch -.-;;;

The cast never plays a role in whether I will or will not watch a series. I will see the presence of certain trusted names as a benefit of course, but it doesn't impact my decision at all. There are a number of voice actors and voice actresses who stick out to me in how well they portray their roles.

Carrie Savage is actually one of my favorites, if not the favorite, ever since I first watched Haibane Renmei; she was absolutely perfect for that role. She has the sweet, wholesome kind of voice that lends itself well to roles of that nature. There's Crispin Freeman of course as well, who might be a tad overused, but there's good reason for it. Holland in Eureka Seven is a great example of how good he is, as he was able to play that characters emotional moments perfectly, without compromising the characters rough persona in the process. Laura Bailey and Caitlin Glass were two I really began to appreciate after Gunslinger Girl. Caitlin is a great actress who can also sing quite well on top of that. Laura has very impressive range to the point I often don't even recognize her voice at first until I see her on the cast list. Then, of course, there's Johnny Yong Bosch, who I initially began to notice in Last Exile, and has always impressed me since then. It took him a bit in Eureka Seven to really adjust to his character, but he did well once he had. Then there's Kari Wahlgren, an actress with a very very distinctive voice, though she also has more range than you'd think. I honestly never thought for a second that it was her playing Cher in Wolf's Rain until somebody else mentioned it was her.

I wouldn't say I make a huge effort to become familiar with the actors and actresses behind the voices, especially since there's not a whole lot of information out there since this is a niche market and most people in the US could care less who Crispin Freeman is, regardless of how big he is in the anime voiceover world. If I see interviews by them or I come across an article about them or something along those lines, I'll still read it out of interest. I don't actively seek out information, but if it's presented to me I'll always take a look, probably more so with actors and actresses I'm more familiar with.

Familiar voices do tend to bother some people, but they actually don't bother me at all. Seeing Crispin Freeman in a number of roles is no different than seeing Christian Bale on screen in different roles; it has no impact on my immersion. In fact, with voice acting, it has less of an impact for me because it's only the voice that matches, the characters look completely different, where as there's only so much make up can do to change a persons appearance in live action.

At first I made no effort; if the voice fit the characters, I was fine.

Nowadays I do care. I'm more familiar with American VA, since I prefer dubs over subs, and naturally become excited when so-and-so gets a role in such-and-such series. You trust them because of that familiarity; and since the talent pool is pretty small compared to Japan, you hear them a lot.

Overall I think the voices do a lot for a series. If it's bad acting, no matter how good the plot or characters, you're going to hate it. They can make or break something for you.

midnighteve wrote:

The only problem I suppose comes from the fact that since I can recognize the voices so well, I associate past characters they voiced with their present.

The first anime I watched religiously was Lupin III. I saw everything I could (and taped most) on [as], and bought up all the movies and specials I could on eBay (When I was too naive to know that people sold bootlegs on eBay.) As a result of the TV show, I can pick out the voice of Tony Oliver at the drop of a hat. I think this stems from the fact that all the episodic characters were mostly voiced by one of the 5 main characters, and we had a grand old time picking out who played which roles. It was kind of challenging sometimes, except for the women. They were usually Michelle Ruff Wink

I also watched a lot of slayers in my youth, so Crispin Freeman will always be Zelgadiss.

I personally, don't really care who does the voice as long as they can act convincingly. I don't really follow who does what unless there's some extranious reason to look them up. I'm usually pretty darn good at identifying voices though so I could tell that it was the same actor even if they're using a different voice style.

Naitron wrote:

I've never heard this term before so thanks for bringing it to my attention.

Actually, it's a term that I'm not really familiar with myself, only that I have heard it thrown around every now and then on the net. It seems to mean something along the lines of tracking down a familiar voice; like how some people use imdb.com or ANN to check if it's "that one guy" playing a certain role.

I'll add that when the opportunity comes to finally see the faces of the voice actors, it can sometimes be surprising (along with it being a treat). I've not met any actor in person, but some of the extras that are included in anime DVDs have these quick interviews featuring them. Sometimes you might get a picture of what might the person look like before actually seeing them, and it might be totally different when you see them in those interviews... which in some ways adds to the whole familiarity of the actors themselves.

No, I wouldn't call myself a voice chaser. I have a pretty good ear for voices and I can usually tell when it's the same actor playing different characters.

Overall, it doesn't really matter to me whether a certain actor or cast is part of a show. About the only time I'll look someone up is if the voice sounds really familiar and I can't place who it is.

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