The cast of Critical Role took the stage to thunderous applause at Anime NYC this year. The venue's main stage was nearly overflowing; fans lined up long enough to wait for the event's main stage for a chance to see some of their favorite creators and voice actors participate in a fireside chat—and for a chance to ask them questions during the panel's Q&A. Critical Role originally began in 2012 as a group of friends playing video games and RPGs in each other's living rooms. Since then, the relatively simple setting for campaigns has grown into a multi-platform entertainment phenomenon featuring famous voice actors and some spectacular adventures. Now, Laura Bailey, Taliesin Jaffe, Ashley Johnson, Matthew Mercer, Liam O'Brien, Marisha Ray, Sam Riegel, and Travis Willingham are filling large rooms with fans.
This was the first time Critical Role had come to Anime NYC and one of the first questions host Ginny Di asked them was how they felt about attending the convention for the first time. Overall, the group found it to be a very enjoyable experience. Travis Willingham gushed about how cool New York City was and how much he loved it, while others commented on how surprised they were by the level of reception and raw energy from the fans.
Views on dubbingViews on dubbing
Views on dubbing
Views on dubbing
The first half of the event was dedicated to fan-submitted questions from Critical Role's Beacon Discord, with most of the questions related to voice acting (it's an anime convention, after all). The first question for the panel was about the filming process for the Legend of Vox Machina and Mighty Nein anime series. Specifically, host Ginny Di asked if the guests' process was different when thinking about and getting into character for these characters. Everyone shared their thoughts:
Travis Willingham: With anime, obviously you have a line and then you're trying to fit the lip flap. There's also a physical performance there. So there are a number of things that are informing your reading. For Legend of Vox Machina or Mighty Nein, it's a blank slate. We're also responsible for a lot of the dialogue ourselves and we could throw it out the window at any time. It's just these crazy guys in a small room that's not legal (audience laughs). So anything and everything can happen and we have a lot of opportunities to record it. We'll have an initial session, a reception, the animation will come back and we'll want to change the dialogue or add stuff. So they're very similar in that way. I think if you can—I think of anime as an acting training program. If you can do anime voiceovers, you can do real work.
Taliesin Jaffe: The group setting is also nice because anime is so solitary. It's just you in a booth and your nerves. As opposed to looking at other people and them being nervous. Although, also thanks to Covid we had to split up some of the originals. And so there were a lot of-thank goodness for anime. Because we're used to being able to split up our shows like we're all in the room.
Marisha Ray: Yeah. We shot the whole first episode and then the pandemic hit. And then I don't think we got back in the room together until the last episode of that season, or was that season two?
Sam Riegel: But that said, we used a lot of anime techniques and content when dubbing the battle and magic scenes, we had to use everything we had (grunts like an anime character in pain) (audience laughs).
Laura Bailey: It was a fun competition because we would have to take pictures in the room with the whole cast, and then see who could take the picture the fastest, you know?
Marisha Ray: Wait, is this a contest or is it just in your head?
Taliesin Jaffe: Oh not for you. This is not the contest for you.
Laura Bailey: It's just me. It's just me. Everything is a competition.
Liam O'Brien: It's not a competition because I'm the fastest (audience laughs). When you do any kind of voice acting, it's like you're in a kind of virtual holodeck. So when you're doing anime voice acting, there are limitations. So it's more like Professor X's Danger Room, where the walls move around and you have to shrink and slide under things and fit into places. And when we're doing our show or other non-voice acting stuff, it's more like the loading room in the Matrix. It's just whatever we imagine. So this is a different kind of holodeck.
Travis Willingham: There is a competition in response, though, especially if we go around the room and are like, we want everyone to die first in a fire, or everyone to fall off a big cliff. Whoever starts first, the last person always goes up to ten.
Ashley Johnson: Yes.
Marisha Ray: It's the truth.
Taliesin Jaffe: Just run the whole game, I'll catch up. I don't care. Not one kick. Give me three kicks, one punch, two ducks. I'm fine. Go. Go.
Liam O'Brien: It was one of our favorite times to laugh together over those records.
Ginny Di: Well, if you have to ask if it was a contest or not then it just means you lost the contest.
Marisha Ray: I like to think I'm competing with myself. So.
Travis Willingham: That's what losers say. (audience laughs)
Other questions for the panel covered topics like dungeon mastering for a one-off campaign set in the anime world, what would happen if two characters (Tohru from Fruits Basket and Jester from Mighty Nein, both voiced by Laura Bailey) switched places, which classic anime deserved a reboot like Sailor Moon did with Sailor Moon Crystal, and some more obvious questions for the guests about their numerous appearances in multiple films.
Q&A with the audience
There were a lot of great questions from the audience (and an incredibly long line of people to ask them immediately after the Q&A session began). Some of the highlights of the session, in addition to questions about the various roles the guests played and their character arcs, were the tips they gave to aspiring voice actors, improv enthusiasts, and those looking to start their own long-running gaming campaigns with the people around them. One fan asked about books that help with improv and the art of saying 'yes, and'.
Sam Reigel: I think there's a book by Charna Halpern [Truth in Comedy] [… ]. But honestly, it's amazing to be improvising with these people because what we do, we're creating a shared story. But a lot of what we do really comes from improv. And being able to say yes to each other and build things and build on the reality that we're creating together is amazing. And it's a great tool for actors and writers and just for life. You want to be the person in life who says yes to everything. In general. And if you can make that a part of your life in any way, whether it's professionally or personally, that's the greatest thing. So yeah, I really recommend improv and I'll be posting some books on my Twitter.
Sam Reigel's mother made a surprise appearance, revealing that when Sam was a kid, he wanted to be a minotaur when he grew up, something that humorously fits with some of the choices he's made in his campaigns as an adult. Towards the end of the session, another audience member asked about how to create meaningful D&D campaigns with a group and how to find that group in the first place.
Matthew Mercer: Part of building a campaign around your interests in what you like about the game is finding people at the table who share your interests. And a big part of that is having a conversation about what we like best. Do we like banging on tables or banging on doors and beating up monsters and looting them? Is that our focus? Do we like doing stories that are rich in plot and intrigue? Do we just like the thrill of heroic adventure? Are we more of a tabletop performer? Are we more interested in just getting through the story? Those are important conversations to have at the beginning. But not every table will be a good fit for you. [… ] But from your perspective, sometimes it can be difficult depending on where you are or what you have on hand to find the right table. Sometimes it's a matter of checking out your local game stores and looking for gaming spaces. There are local venues and online forums that can [đang] search for group scenarios and there are websites now that connect people with groups to play digitally online. And you can go ahead and do searches in those spaces for very specific types of games that you're looking for. [… ] That's mainly for online play but you can use those to search for some of those services online. Other than that, it's just a sort of internal search for the right group, part of the journey to becoming a tabletop roleplayer. Good luck.
Overall, it was a pretty interesting conference and I'm sure everyone in the room enjoyed it. If you want to check it out, the entire thing is available to watch on YouTube and you can watch it below.
Featured image via @HiroyaBrian
