New Rick And Morty voices will be “sound-alikes,” producers confirm
Rick and Morty will both still sound a lot like ousted co-creator Justin Roiland, per the show's panel at Comic-Con. "The same characters. No change."
Aux News Rick and Morty
Producers of Adult Swim’s Rick And Morty have confirmed that, when the show returns for its seventh season—its first without co-creator and star Justin Roiland—it’ll still sound at least somewhat familiar. Speaking at Comic-Con today (per Variety), the show’s staff stated that the new voice actors brought in to replace Roiland as its title characters will be “sound-alikes,” who’ll be doing their best to replicate the show’s various “Aw jeeze”s and flagrant burps.
That’s in contrast to one of the other shows that cut ties with Roiland earlier this year, after news that he was being investigated on domestic violence charges (since dismissed) became public. Hulu’s Solar Opposites opted to ditch the Roiland sound entirely, hiring smooth-voiced Brit Dan Stevens to voice main character Korvo, instead. (The show poked fun at the controversy with a recent trailer, where the alien Korvo gets shot with a “voice-changing ray.”)
But not so for Rick And Morty. Executive producer Steven Levy fielded an audience question about the new voices at the show’s SDCC panel today, responding that “It’s sound-alikes.The characters are the same characters. No change.” (The room apparently broke into cheers at this, although we’d be hard-pressed to think of a more thankless job than the one these actors have signed on for.) Levy also emphasized (possibly futilely) that he doesn’t want the voice casting to be the defining element of the show’s seventh season. “We are closing in on the end of our process of the recast, but I do want to say it’s gonna be great,” Levy told fans. “I am thoroughly impressed with everything that’s going on, including all the work on season 7. Truly, that’s the thing I don’t want to be overshadowed. The show is as good as it’s ever been.”
Catch up on Rick And Morty: Hulu
18 Comments
Sean Kelly, one would hope.
If they wanted Rick & Morty to sound exactly like Justin Roiland without continuing to pay or support Justin Roiland, they might as well have just gone all in on A.I.I used to hate when animated characters were recast, because the new voice almost always sounded noticeably different. Now that I’m older, I can appreciate that they want to leave room for the new person to interpret the role instead of trying to perfectly mimic the previous voice.
This right here. I have no love for AI, but we have a perfect application for it in this situation.
I have no love for Justin Roiland and fell off the R&M train years ago, but I truly cannot think of a WORSE precedent to set than for a corporation to fire a voice actor and replace them with a computer without compensation.Beyond the fact that it’d sound like shit, we should ABSOLUTELY not allow studios to replace people with computers in any instance. This is just some creep who got cancelled, sure. But, once that precedent is set, the next time they use it would 100% just be some talented voice actor who asks for a raise.No. Just fucking no.
It’s not quite there yet; there’s still a robotic cadence to high-quality AI voice simulation, and the cheaper stuff has reverb. Not impossible, but smoothing out all the inflection derps would cost more than hiring voice actors.
AI can’t do performance for shit though. Darth Vader, a largely unemotional character, sounded really flat in Obi Wan. If they can’t nail something as robotic and one note as that, then they’re nowhere near getting a comedy performance out of AI yet. Plus, there are a billion voice actors who could do the impression flawlessly. Pay one of them to do that.
Oh, I strongly disagree about Darth Vader in Obi-Wan Kenobi. He sounded so much more vibrant and threatening on OBK than in Rogue One. I also could’ve sworn someone actually performed Vader’s voice in OWK and A.I. was just used to match JEJ’s voice, like an aural deepfake, but I guess I could be wrong.Impressions are not the same as performances. That’s why Carl on The Simpsons sounds completely different and not like some doing an impression of Hank Azaria as Carl. I hope I wrongly conflated “soundalike” with “impression.”
And introducing our new star, Rustin Joiland!
If this is anyone but Steve Allen you’re stealing my bit!
Be-urrrrp, behold, Morty! The ultimate pog!
It’s probably a good thing that Rick and Morty’s voices are easy to imitate, judging by all the impressionists on YouTube. There’s even a video of Roiland reacting to some of these, one of them he thought was so good, he feared he’d be out of a job. If only he knew!
Recasting Early Cuyler made Squidbillies unwatchable.
“That’s in contrast to one of the other shows”-You mean the only other show lol
How is this different than replacing Crispin Glover in Back to the Future 2 with a lookalike? Seems like a similar lawsuit or complaint from the union will come into play here.
I swear, the ears of hundreds of YouTube impressionists perked up when they heard Roiland had been fired.
The most thankless job? I’m certain after the first episode of the new season drops, the new voice actors are going to be lavished with praise on their social media.
they have the supremely talented Heather Anne Campbell on the writing staff. why not reboot the show, rule 63 the thing. “Ricki and Martha.” HAC, a world-class comedic improviser in both roles. They’ve circled the infinite multiverse thing without really using it too much, why not get stuck in and show us some different R&Ms? Go full Fionna and Cake.
So the domestic violence charge has been dismissed. Is this because he is innocent or someone wouldn’t peruse it? Did he justifiably lose his job or get screwed over. Legit question, not trolling.