Randomness Thing

I apologize for not posting sooner, but I was very busy this weekend (translation: I’m enjoying summer break) so to make it up to you guys, I’m gonna make a LONG post! So if you don’t have an itunes account, you may have done a double take at the title. Yes, Angel Beats has been released in an English dub-though only 3 episodes have been released so far I believe, and yes, I am going to go on and on about how it’s both good and horrible at the same time.

Anyways, in the English dub of Angel Beats (I’m still getting used to typing this), Otonashi is voice by Blake Shepard. You might know him from Air Gear where he voices Akito. In my general opinion, Blake’s voice is rather suited for Otonashi since they both have a really soft sounding but somehow still strong voice. What I don’t like about Blake’s attempts at Otonashi is that he makes the character sound really boring. And when Otonashi freaks out, like in the second episode when Operation ‘Guild Parachute’ was mentioned, Blake sounds like he’s trying too hard. There are also some lines that Otonashi has that Blake seems to think the stupidest thing ever, and doesn’t put any heart into it. During the first episode, when everyone was fighting off Angel (Kanade), Otonashi thought to himself “I never thought buying time could be so intense,”. While I agree that’s a sort of lame line, there was absolutely no heart or effort in the English version. Blake blew it off in two seconds with a “Ok, I’m done this crap. Can we move on?”

Yuri Nakamura is voiced by Brittney Karbowski (I hope I spelled her name right). If you’re an avid fan of Soul Eater, then you must recall that Brittney is the voice provider for our favorite egotistic boy, Black Star. When I first heard Yuri’s voice in the English dub, I never made the connection until I saw the ending credits. Brittney still carries over the obnoxiousness that she used for Black Star, but the boyish ring to the voice is completely gone. She fits Yuri very well. My only objection with her voice is that…I don’t know if this will make any sense to you, but she sounds too…American in my opinion. During the third episode, when she’s complaining about Iwasawa’s new song and how it didn’t fit very well, there was something so saucy and American popular girl like that I was laughing on the floor. But other then that, I still believe that they casted Yuri very well.

Emily Neves does the voice of Kanade Tachibana (aka Angel/Tenshi). When I first heard that name, I couldn’t remember where it was from. It was then that I realized two things: She was one of the semi-finalists on American Idol a few years back, and she’s married to Andrew Love, who coincidentally voices Fujimaki. I actually don’t know much about her voice acting career, and I think Kanade is one of her very few roles. For me, there’s not much I can saw about how she voices Kanade. After all, I’ve only seen the first few episodes and Kanade barely talks at all in any of them, so it’s on no basis for me to judge. However, I really admire the way that she can pull of f the emotionless act so easily. A lot of people are under the impression that Kanade’s voice is very easy to do, since it’s just a monotone. Unfortunately, not many people could pull it off for a very long time. Anyways…moving on

You’re probably getting really bored by now, so I’m just going to talk about two more people: Hinata and Yui. Hinata is voiced by David Matranga, also known as the guy who voices Sanzo in Saiyuki and Adam Arclight in Needless. If you haven’t heard of either of those two shows, then you’ve probably never heard of him. When I first heard Hinata’s voice while he was talking to Yuri about recruiting Otonashi, I seriously wanted to murder someone, because it sound SO horrible. But then, it got eventually better as David got more used to the role as the supposedly ‘gay’, lighthearted and lazy member of the SSS. I was laughing so hard during the second episode when Otonashi asked Hinata whether he was gay, and David pulled off such a funny reaction. So if you watch the English dub, try not to be disgusted with Hinata’s voice right away. He gets much better.

Almost done guys! Thanks for bearing with me! Now on to my favorite character in this anime: Yui!

Alright, so Yui is voiced by Hilary Haag, whose more notable role is Riku from D.N. Angel and Rosette from Chrono Crusade. This is one of the few voices in the anime that I can call truly PERFECT. There is honestly nothing about Yui that Hilary forgot to capture in her voice acting role. Of course, this is all based off of what I’ve seen so far, and from the few clips of voice acting I’ve heard, Yui just sounds great. Bubbly, charming, hyperactive. I can’t wait to see her interaction with Hinata in the later episodes. Anyways…see you guys later! (Oh, on a side note, for everyone who loves Naoi, he’s voiced by Greg Ayres, the same guy who does Kaoru in Ouran High)