Headcanon Voices - My Twst OCs
(sighs) So, less than a month after I said I would NOT be doing this...I’m doing this. Go figure. :P
People keep asking me what voices I headcanon for my OCs, especially for Twisted Wonderland. I decided, just for a lark, to finally provide a dreamcast of English voices for my major TW OCs. (I probably won’t bother with Japanese voices...at least, not right now.) I decided to go with voice actors who primarily work in video games and anime dubs, and I wanted to make sure they had done recent work that felt like it matched the age range of the characters. With help from various people, and a lot of research, I think I’ve finally figured out the voices.
SO...here is the Dreamcast of headcanon voices for my Twisted Wonderland OCs.
Nakoda Spivak = Landon McDonald
Initially, I was going to give this to Daman Mills, but after I reminded myself of McDonald’s voice in “Bungo Stray Dogs,” and then listened to his work in “Demon Slayer” and a couple of other places, I chose him, instead. I don’t know if McDonald can sing, but in terms of his speaking voice, it is EXACTLY how I would imagine Nakoda to sound...provided you just give him those tell-tale hisses. ;)
Billy Géant = Stephen Fu
I love Stephen Fu from a few roles, but it was specifically his work as Noe in “The Case Study of Vanitas” that made me choose him here. His voice in that role has a certain mixture of grit and resonant depth that I felt Billy needed, but it’s still light and young, which I also felt was needed. In that specific role, he also shows two different sides: Noe is one half gooberish cinnamon bun who can be insanely cute and sweet, and the other half is...well...a vampire. A very, VERY powerful, strong, and dangerous vampire. He can flip on a dime from downright TERRIFYING to just the cutest little guy in the world. That’s EXACTLY what Billy should be: one moment a big loveable dunderheaded child, the next a rage-fueled disaster machine who can be fiery or icy depending on the situation.
Elias Inque = Brandon Johnson
I only just recently discovered Johnson for his work as the title role in “Skeleton Knight in Another World.” That role alone was all it took to convince me. In the part of Arc, the main character, he proves to be equal parts an over-the-top pseudo-villainous ham, a somewhat goofy and geeky sort, and a fairly down-to-Earth, rational person...AND, surprisingly, a massive glutton who is CONSTANTLY thinking of food. That’s basically Eli in a nutshell. I can even imagine him using his “normal voice” for Arc as Elias, while he transitions into his “bold knight” voice for when Eli becomes the Phantom Blot. Seems fitting.
Reno Rovar = Adam Gold
I really don’t know Adam Gold well at all. However, after @belliesandburps shared with me clips of him from “Cookie Run,” I was convinced. Case closed.
James Killian = Ricco Fajardo
Initially, I was going to cast Kieran Flitton here, even though I’ll confess I don’t know Flitton very well. Things changed when I discovered Fajardo’s work as Achilles in the game “Smite.” I knew Fajardo already from a few places, but it was Achilles in “Smite” that convinced me. Just like with McDonald as Nakoda, the instant I heard his work in that role, all I could think of was, “that’s James. That is EXACTLY how James should sound.” Heck, even some of his dialogue sounds like stuff James would say, in PRECISELY the way James WOULD say it! So that settled things in an instant.
Smitty McCarthy = Joshua Waters
Waters is a bit of an odd one here. This is a case where it’s less one or two specific ROLES that convinced me, and just the actor in general. I was most heavily influenced by his work as Miyano in “Sasaki & Miyano.” The soft, “smol” voice he uses for Miya in that show sounds very much like how I would imagine Smitty often sounding. The energy is different - Miyano’s personality is NOT the same as Smitty’s - but the specific SOUND, the QUALITY of the voice, is just about on the money. Knowing Waters’ other work, I think he’s a fine choice.
Maelstrom Baleno = Kellen Goff
I know Kellen Goff best for playing Sasaki in “Sasaki & Miyano” and Overhaul in “My Hero Academia.” Neither is the voice I imagine for Maelstrom. XD Much like Joshua Waters as Smitty, this is a case where it’s less about a specific role, and more about the actor. Goff has an INCREDIBLE range, and can do a lot of really cool things with his voice that you wouldn’t guess just hearing his neutral, natural tones. It was a combination of hearing a few roles of his, including his characters in Cookie Run, Volke from Fire Emblem, Glamrock Freddy, and a few others that made me decide he could, very likely, handle Maelstrom. While his natural voice is quite light, he’s shown he can bring depth and danger to a voice with ease, so while he may be unconventional as a choice, he seems possible to me.
Theodore Hamilton = Jalen K. Cassell
Theodore was quite possibly the hardest character to cast. I kept changing the voice right up until the last minute with him. The problem is that Theo is different from my other OCs because he’s based on a female source. Not only that, but it’s a female source with a VERY iconic sort of voice: the Wicked Witch of the West. Whether you go with Mila Kunis or Margaret Hamilton, how does one turn that heckling, cackling, snarling, shrieking voice into the sound of a handsome anime boi? I considered several actors: Brandon McInnis, Chris Guerrero, even a few who ended up with other characters, like Goff and Fu. Jalen K. Cassell won out because he had the right balance of youthfulness and slickness, while also showing the ability to snarl and get vicious and even surprisingly gruff and dusky. And he can cackle with the best of them, as far as his laugh goes; a perfect match for any wicked warlock.
Grit Gravelle = Bryce Papenbrook
This was the easiest voice to choose. Simply put, Grit is a LOT like Shindo from “My Hero Academia.” So it seemed only natural to use Shindo’s voice for his own. Case dismissed.
And there you have it, folks! I must admit, I’m slightly unsure about a couple of these voices (specifically Maelstrom and Theo), but the rest seem right on the money and are unlikely to change. Now please, everybody, stop asking. XD
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01/10/24: Had a great day fleamarket shopping. Found my usual fun, goodies. My first find was four dvds for $5.00. Then it was a big lot of stuff. The guy with a lot of media was there and for $29 it was all the items in the second pic. Four seasons of Archer, Legend of Korra, South Park and other discs. Two ps2 games, one ps4 game, two ps1 games and a dreamcast one too. And two old toys from the 90s. After this, it was for $6.00: a collectable card game and a Dogman plushie. Followed up by two Demon Slayer manga for $2.00 each. And after that a ps2 Guncon 2 controller for $5.00. Next place, I found some older stuff too. Dvds, VHS and comics, all for $10! I got another forbidden Disney item. A sing-along for Song of the South! And the last thing I bought was Napoleon Dynamite for PSP for $3.00. My first fleamarket find for the year is off to a good start!
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Kpop Idols as Disney Princes/Males
Might do a part 2 later
Honestly, a lot of these might not look quite like the character, but I’d love to see them playing the character.
Hendery as Prince Eric (The Little Mermaid)
Park Jinyoung as Prince Phillip (Sleeping Beauty)
WinWin as Prince Florian (Snow White)
Woodz as Prince Charming (Cinderella)
Kai as Li Shang (Mulan) (yes, I know there are Chinese people I could use, but honestly to me Kai is perfect)
IM as Flynn Rider (Tangled) (honestly I’m not really sure of like anyone as Flynn Rider, but he’s who I felt best about)
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The Problem with Dream Casting
So, something that has come up multiple times recently - in private convos and via Anonymous Asks that I...well...couldn’t really figure out a proper answer to, is “dream casting” my OCs for Twisted Wonderland. I may or may not do such a thing in the future, but right now, I’m really not planning on doing it much. And I figured I’d go into the reasons why.
First of all...his is something that goes for ALL my OCs, not just TW, and that is...I don’t really feel I NEED to dream cast my characters. The only time I did that was with my World of Gods cast, and that was because I just thought it would be fun to do in that specific instance. And it was! Usually, however...I tend to have a sort of general voice in my head for what a character sounds like, but I neither require nor desire one specific voice for them. Since I don’t have a specific voice in mind, that means I have to go and try to seek one out, and that can be a pain.
The next three points are specifically in regard to my TW cast.
One: if I DO think of a specific voice with a character, sometimes that voice in my head would only work, like, ten or even twenty years ago. XD Much like my friend, @belliesandburps, I feel like you should always cast a voice to match a character’s age as closely as possible, and sometimes even the finest voices just don’t match the age of the characters, or at least, they don’t anymore. Actors age, or even pass on, and their voices usually age with them.
Two: I want the voices to match the style of the universe we’re talking about. TW is essentially an anime or anime-style world, so if I WERE to dreamcast people, I’d want voices that have that sort of “anime quality” to them, meaning I’d pick voices from people who specialize or once specialized in English dubs. Sometimes this means voices that I think would work very well would sound kind of odd if named aloud, especially if they are celebrity performers. There have been some good celebrity voices in anime before - see various Studio Ghibli movies, for example - but they are special cases, not the norm.
And three: TW could, at any moment, get an English dub of its own. In fact, I believe an English voice cast for the future anime version WAS unveiled lately. (I believe. Maybe my memory is incorrect.) And we want the voices to be as unique as possible. With so many characters already made, finding names that haven’t been “taken” for my OCs is tricky to do.
EXCELLENT EXAMPLE OF ALL THIS: if I had to choose a specific voice I imagine in my head for my Captain Hook OC, James Killian...it would be Tom Hiddleston. More specifically, from the time Hiddleston himself played a young Captain Hook in the movie “The Pirate Fairy.” In that film, Hook is about the age James would be, and Hiddleston plays that part EXTREMELY well. I do find myself thinking of his performance in that movie from time to time when writing for James or seeing art of him. HOWEVER, you will note that such a choice sort of breaks ALL of the rules: that movie is now about a decade old, and not only is Hiddleston a celebrity performer - which, for some, would already be a bit iffy - but to my knowledge, he has never handled any anime or anime-esque franchises, at least to date.
And saying my dream cast for James is “Tom Hiddleston from ten years ago in an anime setting” is not really that catchy a way of explaining the voice. :P
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