We have Bryce Papenbrook
who voices Eren Jeager, we have
Trina Nishimura who
voices Mikasa Ackerman, and
we have Mike McFarland, who is both
the ADR director and voices
Jean on the show.
Welcome friends.
Thank you.
All right.
Hello, hello.
Hello, hello. Very excited to have
you all here. I was talking to you
during sound check and we've been
planning this for a little while.
So first, just thanks for being
here. Trina and Bryce, how did you
both get cast and Mike for
you how did you kind of come into
the project?
For me to come into the project...
I direct at FUNimation on the
regular. I'm one of their staff
directors.
I've done contract
work and stuff working with them for
a long time.
It was a show that I had heard
of that had not been
placed into a booth for dub
production yet.
And I had heard a lot of buzz about
it and I looked into it myself
and like, Ah, the buzz is justified.
This show is awesome.
So I at least put
in my hey, when this when this
hits, I'd love to do it.
And I guess the producers are like,
Yeah, that sounds good.
Mike should do it. And as far as me
being Jean, I auditioned for
it seeing that I was one of the
people that was up for it.
It was put to a committee of
producers to listen to and they're
like, Yeah, that's the dude.
So I initially read for Sasha,
whom I love because she loves
potatoes and I love potatoes,
and I read for Armin and then
I asked Mike who he'd
like for me to read for, and he was
like, I'd like you to read for
Mikasa. And I was like, Well, that's
not going to happen.
But sure, I'll read for it and
I read for her. And I was incredibly
surprised that I was cast
because so many people wanted to be
part of the project and so many
people really connect with the
show.
So I just lucked out,
and I'm incredibly lucky
to have been cast as Mikasa, and I'm
eternally grateful.
Thanks, Mike.
I was really fortunate to
be able to just read for the show.
I was a fan of the show before I got
that audition, so I knew
what I was getting into.
And like Trina, I picked three
characters I read for
Eren, Armin and Levi.
And when I got the call from Mike
that I was cast as Eren, I really
tried to play it cool on the phone
because we hadn't hung out that
much.
He was just like and very
professional. He's like, Hey, this
is Mike Macfarland from FUNimation.
I love what you did in your
audition, and we'd like you to play
Eren in Attack on Titan.
Is that interesting to you?
Are you?
And I'm like, Yeah, thank you, Mike.
I can't wait.
I'm so excited to do that.
Click, Yes, oh my.
Yeah. And like just fanboy and
screamed.
And it was just
such an incredible
moment
to start this really
amazing, life-changing journey.
That's awesome. I love how you
played it. Cool, like, maybe I could
fit it into my schedule, Mike.
Yeah, I like
Tuesdays work best, Tuesdays.
Yeah, I did kind of want to get from
you guys the situation of how
you record this, how you
schedule it, and are you all
always in the same room when
something happens?
What do you do to make an episode of
Attack on Titan?
I'll use this season, for instance.
It goes up
subtitled in streaming and stuff
like that sometime on Sunday.
Yeah.
I would say that we
have materials to work with a little
before that, and I get some sort
of idea of of
who I need and for how long.
By Wednesday evening, we
start scheduling people and then
Thursday morning we start, and by
the following Wednesday
it's complete.
Wow. When do you get like a script
and how do you prepare
to do that? I know you really live
in these roles.
You do them weekly from episode
to episode.
When do you figure out what you're
going to say and how do you convey
that? Or how do you prep for it?
Trina, we can start with you on this
one.
I just love it like when you're
asking the question, both Bryce and
I got like a giant smiles
here like GUH.
So what's really amazing
about dubbing and about
FUNimation and about
specifically working on
Attack on Titan is that
Mike has allowed both myself
and Bryce to kind of journey
through this world with
the characters.
It's been such an amazing experience
and so very special
to to myself and
from Bryce's smile, I'm going to say
to Bryce too.
But it has been
really.
We don't get the scripts in advance,
and I've been fortunate
enough to work with Mike on a few
other projects prior to Attack on
Titan, Evangelion and
Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood.
And so I kind of....
Mike allowed
me to go through the
entirety of the story as
it unfolded.
So I avoided spoilers, which is much
harder than you would think.
But I can. I'm sure Mike can speak
more to that than I can.
I'm looking at him, but I'm not.
This would be looking at him, but I
see him here. But you know, I'm
looking at you, Mike.
Obviously, the manga comes out
first, so the manga is the first
thing that I start with.
I started season one by watching the
anime, and there was
a gap between one and two and that
became read the manga time in order
to figure out what's
going to happen to story wise.
So I've known for a little bit how
everything unfolds in the manga
continued to come out. I think
through 2020, I believe with
with Eren and with
Mikasa and a lot of the main cast,
if they want to know things or if
they're like desperate, like, I have
to know this and like I will tell
you, but it is a spoiler.
Do you want to know this?
And I'll leave a little moment and
decide yes or no?
Most of the time they're like, No,
I'm going to find out the same way
that if I would, if I was watching
this, you know, and I want to find
out in the moment that I'm recording
it in the booth so that I can have
that emotional state to go into my
performance.
Yeah avoid everything on the
internet.
There are spoilers everywhere.
Trina, I want to talk about Mikasa
little bit because,
Mikasa as you said, is very
different from your normal speaking
voice. What would you say is
the biggest challenge of voicing
Mikasa and what are your favorite
parts of voicing the character?
I think the biggest challenge
in voicing Mikasa is
that you have to fit a lot of
context into very
few words.
I mean, we were recording,
I think it was it was a few days
ago we were recording and
Mike and I were talking about the
scene and he was explaining some
things and and we were going through
all of these different scenarios and
all of this information.
And then it was like, OK,
and now it's the line.
And it was a two word line right?
It's like, I need to say all of
these things in two words.
Yeah, cool. Cool, cool, cool.
And it I mean it.
I think that's also my favorite part
about me is that
in general, in life,
we're only afforded a certain
amount
of of time
right to express
ourselves in an efficient and
effective way.
And if you were to take away
civilization and put
yourself into the world of Attack
on Titan, where every moment
is life or death, that
time is as much shorter
and Mikasa at her core,
is devoted to her
adopted family, and she's devoted to
helping her
tribe.
And I think that.
Coupled with, you know,
how how much
love she has
and how much she's been through and
how all of the trauma
and all of the things that she's
been through
doesn't change who she is at her
core is what I love
the most about her.
Talking to Bryce specifically
and the kind of very different
voices that Eren can take.
And I think the big transition here
is right from season three to the
final season when, you know, he's a
bit all grown up, a bit bit less
of a talker...
bit more into war crimes.
But so
what was your transition
like from the young, like,
bombastic, very yelley kind
of Eren to the more
stoic kind of Eren
that we have in the final two
parts of the last season?
Yeah, I've played Eren four very
different ways.
Itty bitty Eren angsty
teenage Eren, much
bigger Eren.
And now this newest version
of Eren and coming
up with the voice was very much a
collaboration between Mike and I.
I was really fortunate in that
I had been exploring my
lower register with another
character before this final
season of Attack on Titan came back.
So I had been experimenting with
different things.
Typically, the kind of characters I
play kind of skew younger
because I describe my voice as
Benjamin Button voice acting
disease, where it hasn't changed
since middle school.
So, so recently.
I've had more opportunities to
explore that lower range, and it was
really exciting to be able to do
that with Eren.
We had no idea
that was going to happen.
I was totally shocked
when I discovered, you know what
was going on, and
you know that that really big
change.
But yeah, I think
a good way to describe how
different this is.
We had a running joke
going through season one
up until, you know, the end of
season three
Armin, in another character played
by Josh Greely, he's incredible
as a much higher
pitched voice than Eren and he's
the thinker of the group always
knows the right things, right?
So Eren would say something
like, let's go kill them.
And immediately I would do my
impression of Armin going "EREN NO!"
That's
that's how I would describe him the
first three seasons, Eren, no.
And in this season,
you know, he's thinking
about these things.
He's he's being clever
about the way he's rolling out his
strategy and Eren
doing that is absolutely
terrifying.
Now, as a viewer and someone who
has loved the character for so,
so long and I do
not know the ending, I have not read
the manga.
I'm questioning his motives
and what he's doing.
But I still want
the best for him.
I'm hoping that there's something
some reason for him to be
doing these things, even though it's
looking darker and darker.
Since you guys haven't really been
diving deep into spoilers.
Do you have any ideas on how the
series is going to end, do you
think?
No.
Mike knows it all.
Collective and mikes like, oh boy,
do I.
I have guessed the twists and turns
wrong every step of the way.
Yeah.
So I would not be confident I would.
I would. Yeah, seriously.
But
knowing that Mike, he holds all
the answers and he's giving us these
nuggets only when we need them.
Feels really great knowing that
we have such a great, you know,
captain and director steering the
ship.
I've been kind of watching back.
I've watched the sub version, I've
watched the dub version.
Something very specific is different
in both versions, which I didn't
anticipate it being very different.
And that's the Titan screams
whenever a titan yells in the
Japanese version, it's distinctly
different from the American version,
which is kind of more of a sounds
more like a monster to me, at least
in the English dub version.
Who does the titan screams in the
English dub?
And I'm surprised.
Did you think about porting them
from the Japanese sub at any point?
The actors for
each of the titans that can shift
perform the Titan screama as
well, and for
the random other ones?
I mean, it really just depends.
But as far as like.
The Titans that can go back and
forth. I don't I don't want to spoil
it for anyone who hasn't seen very
much in the show, but there is an
armored titan that you meet in
episode one and there's a colossal
titan you mean in episode one.
And whoever those titans happen to
be as far as like, why are they?
Are they not people, et cetera,
et cetera?
The same actor plays the
the the larger version as well
as the people size.
Tell the rob story.
Oh, what's the Rob story?
There is an actor named Rob who
may or may not play a titan,
but every so often they'll be.
I think it's only happened once or
twice where I'm like, OK, you can do
it right here because it makes
sense.
There's enough effects on the voice
where by the time that it hits
a mix it's just, *Titan sound* you
know, I can hear all these things
that are kind of dinosaur and
monster and a whole bunch of other
things all kind of stacked up
sounding.
But if there's any words
being said, you're not going to be
able to tell, well, the
word Rob is close enough to
roar where this person named
Rob sometimes goes "Rob"
for his roar.
The Rob Roar.
But by the time or by
the time, by the time that it's by
the time it's mixed, it doesn't
sound like that. I mean, now that
the info is out there, there's going
to be someone like, it's this one.
No you can't. Yeah, yeah,
yeah. There's there's too many
effects on it.
Considering that, you know, we have
the the actors themselves
doing the titan roars.
How many times would you say that
you've had to do an Attack Titan
roar for
the years?
Do you have to do them every episode
or do you kind of bank the sound
files and kind of recycle them?
There's no banking of sound files.
There is only screaming
as loud as possible whenever
needed. Going in I knew the
intensity and I knew what I was
getting myself into and I was
willing to take myself there.
But I've been very physical
through this show.
You know, there's moments where Eren
bites his hand in season one.
I bit my hand so hard I
left bruises, but it sounds
real.
In season two Eren's
extremely unhinged, so
I literally unhinged my
jaw during recording
to let that pain and
suffering and that insanity
come through because it's what
this show deserves.
I had somebody in the chat Exatal,
ask about what your
personal favorite moments
for your characters are.
If I may soapbox for a moment.
I think for me, having been
dubbing for so long
and having watched.
Having watched female characters
change so drastically from when
I first began to voice acting to
now, I think
all of Mikasa's fighting scenes are
amazing because when
I started a female protagonist
was never the most
skilled fighter and she was never
she was.
Her motivations were always very
different than what Mikasa's are.
And I think that that shift in
general, not only in
in the world of Attack on Titan,
but and in anime, but
in our
collective cultures and psyches
across the world, is really
special to me
to be able to play a female
character that's strong and
that fights. And that
isn't the typical gender
specific thing that a
girl should be is.
It's very special to me and
to that note.
Attack on Titan tackles
a lot of
gender role issues, socioeconomic
inequality issues and
other issues throughout
that are prevalent throughout all
of society and all of mankind.
So I guess the fighting
scenes are my favorite, even
though they're the hardest to record
vocally.
It's like saddest for me.
Scary, gory stuff is not my
cup of tea, but being
able to watch a female character
like fight and be
the most skilled fighter has been
very special to me in my career.
And Mike, talking a little bit about
Jean as well.
Can you talk a little bit about your
experience voicing Jean and
the transition to
the final season, given that, you
know, when Jean started out
very much like a interior kind
of guy wants the military police
but now craves more
freedom and he craves more of a life
for himself.
What's been your experience?
I feel like Jean would be
the character that.
Like the most, like
every man thinking man,
whatever you want to say would
aim for like, Oh, if I'm good
enough, I can be the safest.
I want that.
You know, like I would like to be in
this area of
of, you know, the safest place that
I could be and not die
and not be, you know, find
my life shortened inside the jaws
of a giant creature.
But then as you go
along and train and you find out
that you're actually really good
at these skills and not just good
for the sake of getting out of it,
you know, you have that ongoing like
Spiderman mantra mentality
of like, you know, with great power
responsibility. Like with great
skill comes the responsibility
to use it to the betterment of
mankind and to the betterment of
your friends and family.
And I think that reluctantly,
because you see him like like so
many times, like, all right, fine,
I'll do it.
Like he grows to be
where I think that he
takes on that responsibility
willingly and sometimes in a loving
way, like he cares about the people
around him, whether or not he's
going to say it to their face
because he's probably not.
But he cares about his tribe,
he cares about his people, and he
does want to.
He does want to do the right thing
and not just the right thing for
himself.
Guys, I've had a great time speaking
with you today, and I could I could
honestly make it go for another hour
if I wanted to.
Oh, is it time already?
It's time already, but I know,
right?
I just wanted to thank you all so
much for being here with us today.
Bryce Trina, Mike, I wish you the
best in finishing up the
dub for the final season
and what lies beyond.
I hope we have you back on someday.
So thanks for being here, y'all.
Thanks for having us!
Thanks for having us! Bye!