Bleach English Voice Actor Discussion
 

Viz Media announced the English cast for Bleach today:

Ichigo - Johnny Yong Bosch
Rukia - Michelle Ruff
Isshin - Patrick Seitz
Karin - Kate Higgins
Orihime - Stephanie Sheh
Tatsuki - Wendee Lee
Ishida - Derek Stephen Prince

Source: Toon Zone & Animenewsnetwork

So what do you all think about this.

I have yet to see Bleach, though everyone tells me I should...I really should watch it one day >.> But looking at the list, I still find it funny that a power ranger does anime voices XD but Michelle Ruff...her voice almost always sounds the same with every character and that gets to me x.x; Wendee Lee isn't too bad though. The others I'm not too familiar with.

I hope this Johnny Yong Bosch is better than the little clip I saw of the Eureka Seven Renton dub. I really hope. : /

Well, he has done several different anime. Naming one popular one, he was the voice of Eriol in CCS. He also did Reji in Gatekeepers and I can't remember what else.

He was also Vash in Trigun and Kiba in Wolf's Rain.

A big WTF on Tatsuki's VA. I could get used to the others though.

hmmm so he is the VA for vash and kiba? might not be too shabby then

JYB as Ichigo is looking like a strong candidate for miscast of the year if it sounds anything like Vash or Renton.

Orihime's VA is the same as Eureka in Eureka Seven.


Hrm.. I can't say I'm displeased with her performance in Eureka Seven, altho Orihime and Eureka are about as far appart as two characters can be

As with just about every role that JYB gets, I agree it's a miscast. The best VA performance he's done was for the 2001 re-dub of Akira, and even that was lacking.

Maybe it's just his natural voice altogether that puts me off. It's slightly "nasal" and extremely American. It might work for Vash since Trigun wasn't connected to Japan or Japanese culture, but Bleach is drenched in it. Are there just not any Japanese VAs who speak English? I know there are people from Japan who can speak very fluent English. Why aren't any of them working in the industry?


Oh, I don't think ANYTHING could be worse than using JYB as Renton. It was like Renton was a grown adult stuck in a young teen's body.

I denied Johnny entrance to the ball at Metrocon on accident :>. From what I remember in Trigun, I don't think I'll mind him doing Ichigo.

Could be worse, could've been Richard Cox

1. Richard Cox doesn't do voice work for Studiopolis so techinically it couldn't have.

2. JYB is about the opposite end of what Ichigo should really sound like, so I don't think it could've been much worse. Studiopolis has a whole lot of talent and they cast this hack for the singlemost important role in the series. Don't know about you but the thought of Ichigo sounding like a whiny teenager who hasn't hit puberty yet unnerves me to no end. He is going to flop horribly at Ichigo's darker moments like when he goes Hollow. Liam O'Brien or Steve Staley would have been ten million times more appropriate for this role. JYB should've gotten Hanataro, or if they really wanted to give him a "cool" character, Hitsugaya, but in my opinion he's not suited for Ichigo in the slightest.

And the rumors that Liam O'Brien was close to being cast as Ichigo just throws salt all over the wound. Ichigo's dub voice is in serious jeopardy unless JYB manages to adapt to a vocal range he's never worked in before. The rest of the casting looks good, but one character can bring down an entire show. I hope JYB proves me wrong and does a good job, if he does I'll eat a plate of horse maneur.

Well most anime is licensed mostly for North American release, so it makes a lot of sense that the voice acting sound like voices that the demographic (in which case, Americans) is used to hearing. I'd probably shit my pants if I heard a dub with an abundance of characters with Asian accents. I doubt there's any kind of abundance of Japanese voice actors that speak English fluently enough to come over here and do it for our voice overs. Japanese voice actors are also insanely popular, some are even celebrity status, so voice acting for English dubs would probably be a pretty big pay cut as I understand voice over isn't that lucrative a profession.

Oh and I agree Renton is a pain to listen to. The rest of the cast is awesome but with Renton getting 70% of the dialogue it's just a perpetual pain in the ass. If Ichigo sounds even remotely like that, I'm going to committ hara-kiri with a frisbee.

Could be worse. As in Kuwabara's-English-dub-VA worse. (Yu Yu Hakusho, for those who don't know the show or don't know which Kuwabara I'm talking about)

That had to be, like, the worst-sounding VA for him. :twitch:

I'm pretty sure it couldn't get much worse than one of the most cocky and gruff sounding anime characters getting voiced by a man who's main line of work is in playing insecure, angsty teenagers with high voices, which Ichigo doesn't have. This is Studiopolis we're talking about, and "it could be worse" is something you almost never hear said about their voice over work.

I hope JYB surprised the pants off the ADR director for this otherwise Bleach dub could be singlehandedly brought down by one of his cliched-to-hell-and-back voices.

For the record I think his Vash was pretty crappy too. About the only thing I've liked him in is Fafner and Last Exile, and even then it could've been better.

I dunno, Kuwabara's VA not only sounded horrible, but didn't fit his character either. He sounded like some "exists for 10 seconds just to get the living crap beaten out of him by the main character" thug. Not only did the VA not fit Kuwabara at all, it made him sound like a complete idiot. It was pure pain to listen to Kuwabara's English VA. I was mentally scarred. >.>

I'll be scarred too if Ichigo sounds even remotely like Vash or Renton.

Miscast of the Year, I said.

JYB is the most ****** voice actor but he gets hired because he carries some nerd weight for

a) being an ex power ranger

and b) being asian but sounding white

miscast in whatever role they put him in. I could do a better job.

Someone please put that eng actor fake dub sample vid up. that was even better then JYB could do.

Click here for the actual link..I know last time they said JYB was gonna be Naruto and that didn't come true...

OK I'm gonna have to agree...I don't have anything against JYB's voice, I think It works as Vash, Kiba(wolf's rain) and even Renton (Eureka7), but he has to change it up seriously for Ichigo...I don't think he's ever screamed as much as he's gonna scream in BLEACH...It just boggles my mind how every english shonen dub (except for YuYu hakusho) the main character has a timid voice (Gohan, Goku in DB, Yoh Asakura, Luffy, Naruto, Ginji, etc, and now Ichigo) You can set your watch to this $hit...I think his voice should be closer to Ban Mido in Getbackers (Don't know who did that one)..He should have some bass in his voice, and when all else fails call the god of VA's Steven Blum...Yeah I know he does everthing but he still would make a great Ichigo...But maybe JYB has us all fooled since I can't recall him ever playing a character this bold..He might surprise us...Hopefully he will...

Damn I just remembered he was Claire Leonelli in Heatguy J...He was dope in that one, perhaps his best (He was psyco-melodic in that one)...and he's Ghram in The Mars Daybreak (Now he does a good job of sounding like an actual grown-up man in that one--I suggest you guys watch an ep to see)

Anyways I hope Gin gets that sly country engrish voice like his dialect with L***r some time ago...

edit: Ishida is Keitaro from Love Hina?!! :uhoh: Uh-Oh...

Too bad JYB speaks fluent Japanese...