City of Amnesia

I may be blasted out of the Big O fanverse for admitting this, but I didn't like the way Steven Blum played Roger Smith.  It's true that no one does smooth and sexy better than Blum, but when it comes to showing anger, suspicion or fear, he really falls down.  When angry, Blume often comes across as pissy rather than mad and he really over plays it when the scene calls for him to show that he suspects something.

Sometimes I wonder if Blum's acting was a major reason that Big O wasn't continued.  It's true that he's been on other successful series but with the exception of Cowboy Bebop, he wasn't the main character and didn't have to carry the series. 

Can you give specific examples of Blum falling short? I thought he was good.

Eh, it's your opinion.  I don't think anyone's going to try and run you off for it.  Personally, I think he was very well-suited for the role.  Roger is sort of a pissy guy-- he gets annoyed at the smallest things and tends to overreact much of the time. 

I will admit that I'm starting to understand why people get sick of Blum, as lately he really is in everything I've seen and he doesn't always seem to fit the parts.  However, I must politely disagree that his acting is in any way connected with the continuance of the show, unless you have read something that indicates otherwise. 

Now if Zola would have heard this.  The cannon would have been fired already by now XD.  I think Blum played a great role of Roger Smith who else would have done it the way he did.  Though I would have to say that Christan Bale would be the perfect Roger Smith in real life if there is a live action movie.

Ooooh...good one. I agree absolutely. But he would have to play more American Psycho than Batman Returns. Roger is not so reclusive or introverted as Bruce Wayne; rather, he's an arrogant cuss with a dash of pomposity (which Dorothy turns back on him so well).

TV

I liked Steven Blum's "Roger Smith". His Roger was a very "un-anime" character, yelling only when angry, and less prone to "flashes of anger". Sort of like "average person turned superhero" as opposed to "full-on superhero". I always liked these types of characters...

Excuse me while I consult "Batman Begins" (not ...Returns, remember that was Keaton, although still played well...). In the meantime, I was saying James Franco ("Harry Osborn" from Spider-Man) would do well. He played "rich" well, and for a brief period, he even played "arrogant rich" well.

All of your picks for live Roger Smith matter little.

We all know who the live action Dominus of Megadeus will be:

(http://images.askmen.com/galleries/men/vin-diesel/pictures/vin-diesel-picture-1.jpg)

See what I mean? He looks, sounds, and generally acts nothing like the protagonist of Big O.

Therefore, he's perfect, according to Hollywood.
War.

Yes, I should have known that. D'oh!

In my view he doesn't have the dignity and stance to do the role. But everyone sees something different in movies and actors.

Please don't say things like that. Even though you're right.

TV

(http://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/user_images/pics/1/3883000/ngbbs41b62bda27dbe.jpg)


Naw, he's too busy filming this gem

O_O

Um, hate me too, but i did think there were parts where blum yelled to be loud, not to be angry....
*jumps on moped and dodges speeding bullets*

Heyo,

Personally (not that anyone asked... ;)) I think he did just fine as Roger Smith. The only nit I have to pick is that it's Steve Blum, and he sounds just like Steve Blum, and he's in everything.

Portraying anger didn't seem so much of a problem as portraying fear. Roger is someone who tries very hard to deny his fear, but the scenes where we're shown this just end up feeling very, very weird. I mean mostly the subway scene in Terror Underground and when he freaks out in Angels car in Roger the Wanderer. He tries to talk himself out of it, but the internal monologues just sound very unnatural.

I believe this is more a result of the script than it is the voice actor. For the most part, the voice actors in Big O do an excellent job delivering their lines, so that it sounds right even when it doesn't make sense. But when you look at the script written out, the speech is all very convoluted. No one talks like that. I'm sure people will point out Schwarzwald as the worst offender, but he was crazy and supposed to be cryptic and difficult to understand. Vera really is the one that gets me each time... how does it go? "My hitherto unforeseen compatriots"? Yeesh. 'English is my second language' is no excuse (it would be broken, not completely ridiculous!) and they all do it. 

In other news: do you guys have any idea how awesome it is to see you posting?? We started watching Big O again (gosh it's been a while!) and I got the urge to come spam visit Paradigm and LOOK WHAT'S HERE! This is so awesome. So awesome.

~J

Gotta agree with moon. I think blum fell short on sssooooooooo many levels!
Blum made Roger sound like a robot, more so than Dorothy sounded. in fact i think Lee Sargant made Dorothy sound more human then Blum made Roger. He sounded like a braty 2 yr old with a large vocab. Blum couldn't carry the scenes along, and no emotional tone to his voice wat so ever. he should have at the very least made Roger sound happy when Dorothy was not hurt, angry when Norman had Dorothy move in, and even more so when Dorothy decided he needed an alarm clock.

... you didn't think Roger sounded annoyed/upset every time Dorothy woke him up?

For serious?

Lol that pic is awesome money.

Nah, Blum i'd say fit the role perfectly, to be honest i usually hate any english dub and will always watch my anime in japanese but big o was a big exception becuase it fit the setting so well

Love Jixie. Yes. Yes. Steve Blum sounds exactly Steve Blum, and he is in everything. He's probably the center of some temporal anomaly that allows him to record thirty different VA jobs in a week.
War.

are you suggesting that some conspiracy is afoot?

I though he did a good job as Roger, but say what you will, Steven Blum is in EVERYTHING and when you hear him in everything, he kinda wears out fast, and the fact he's Wolverine in a new X-Men cartoon is a horrid miscast.

Although I haven't heard him in enough roles (yet) to get sick of his voice, I've had that happen with other people who do voices. I think it's because if you hear it too much, you start to hear the characteristics and pronounciation of their normal voice (they do start to bleed through after a while). Then every character's voice sounds like "[voice actor] doing [character's] voice" not just "[character's] voice by ?". I could even notice it with Rich Little, Frank Oz, and Mel Blanc after a while, and they've done alot of voices. Although, Tom Hanks did a pretty good job of differentiating voices in The Polar Express.

As for Steven Blum playing Wolverine, it depends... If he does a "smooth, sophisticated" Roger-like voice, he will definitely sound miscast. However, if he uses his "Mugen" (Samurai Champloo) voice, or something grittier, he should do OK.

Wolverine needs to be much more gritty than Mugen was.  Even though he easily heals any damage the cigars cause, all that opium he had to have done back in his youth 100+ years ago should still affect him.

His reading of the simpel phrase 'Black Forest?' in episode 4 must be one of the worst performances on record--it was that bad despite its brevity.


However, surely it is to be understood that the reasons the English dubbers for anime are doing is that is becuase they are not sufficently skillfull as actors to obtian more meaningful or lucrative work? So I wouldn't worry about shis shortcomings too much. This is one reason I prefer to use the Japanese soundtrack with sub-titles.

Uh, or maybe they love what they do?  How insulting to assume that they're only doing voice work because they can't hack it as "meaningful" or "lucrative" actors.

Not in all cases, the voice actress who plays Dorothy is excellent.  She somehow hits all the right emotional notes despite having to speak in a monotone.   Not every talented actor or actress becomes a star.  The soaps are a good example of this, there are a lot of extremely talented people in the soaps who haven't been able to break into prime time or movies.   

While certainly your are entitled too your opinion, however making a blanket statement that ALL english voice actors are two bit hacks if grossly untrue. It's not the fact your like the JP audio better, it's the blanket statement that is a bit annoying.


Bingo! Tifaria is right on the money, a vast majority of US voice actors dub anime because they love what they do, not because that aren't "sufficiently skilled" too break into the larger acting market.

Patrick Stewart does dubbing work. If you even assume he can't hack it as an actor in the other forms of media, I beg to differ.
War.

I'd love to hear you say that to someone like Lex Lang, or Aaron Dismuke, or Robert Axelrod, or Michael Forrest at a convention.

Yeah, voice acting is a legit career (Mel Blanc, anyone?) and the fact you prefer to read subtitles rather than watch the scene is completely up to you... but don't say they have no talent.

Get the fuck out.

Damn. This forum knows how to hammer down the justice, one post at a time.

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I disagree. "Black... Forest?" There's an unspoken "What the hell?" implied by his tone of voice. It makes sense for Roger to feel that way, so I'm not seeing your argument.

How can a sentence that's two words long even be screwed up that badly that someone would hate it so much?

I love her work during the 1st season so much more than 2nd season.  And I love her as Millie in Trigun.