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Voice Actor Maile Flanagan Reflects on 20 Years of Naruto




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LinkTSwordmaster



Joined: 23 Dec 2005
Posts: 816
Location: PA / USA
PostPosted: Thu Aug 28, 2025 10:48 am Reply with quote
I know it's not uncommon if you go back to the PS1 era, to have situations where the dub was an afterthought & someone's kid/cousin got brought in last-second to fill a voice in. The cast of the original Metal Gear has talked a lot about showing up and cramming into some weird residential house to record the whole game (is an interesting story, especially when it's as defining a title for the industry). It's not uncommon to hear the cast of Critical Role talk about showing up for some of their early anime projects and the voice director just didn't give a shit that day, and they'd be forced to compensate for a lack of quality direction just to get through the recording session.
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Whenever it came time to record lines, Flanagan reported that things were often done with little context. “It's always a cold read,” she said. “Unless you reach the manga, which....I ain't got time for that!” That last bit got another chuckle from the audience.

Flanagan continued. “But when put into context, you might record something and then a week later you'll finish the episode. “So if you last remember, we were walking in the woods when suddenly a giant toad pops out, right?” So they put it in context in that way, and just for context, right before this, just so we can get into it. How do I put myself in the context? Well, I better, because I'm being paid! You know, good actors can pull this off, and if you're a shitty one, you can't.”

I was getting JP episodes of Naruto on day 1. It's actually the series that taught me about fansubs and how they worked. Back when the show first launched, it felt like it there was a silent "promise" of sorts to the viewer that the show was going to be just as big as Dragonball Z and emotionally a lot deeper.

It's hard to defend where the show went in terms of quality over the years, especially because it's also the first series that taught me the concept of "filler", but that first bunch of arcs that leads to the big clash with Gara is such an awesome run of TV, regardless of what your overall opinion of Naruto is as an IP. I went from excited-to-show friends what they'd been missing by the time it hit North American TV, to severely underwhelmed when the first episodes landed on Toonami and the voice quality seemed a bit under par. There's a lot of complicated names flying around, and the cadence and inflection gets a bit muddled....

I don't think the quote was intentionally supposed to sound like one, but it feels like a bit of a hit to the gut - to figure the voice booth probably was having about as rough a time as it did to my ears 20 years ago. Ow.
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Aster97



Joined: 27 Apr 2022
Posts: 189
PostPosted: Tue Sep 02, 2025 9:36 am Reply with quote
Glad the fans are showing her love still.
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MFrontier



Joined: 13 Apr 2014
Posts: 20003
PostPosted: Sun Sep 28, 2025 11:42 pm Reply with quote
Still the voice I hear when I think of Naruto.
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