CATDOLL: The leader incarnates as Xiaoyou. Hirano Aya's blog comments on the journey of "Parasyte"

The animation "Parasyte" released in October last year has a profound meaning and analyzes the good and evil of human nature in a unique way. As an important character in the animation, the parasitic beast "Right" left a deep impression on people, and the voice actor Hirano Aya also caused a lot of controversy. Recently, the leader published an article on his personal blog, talking about his feelings about the work, as follows:

Although it has been a while since the work was completed, I finally found the time to finish watching the animation "Parasyte".

It has been about 3 weeks since the last episode was aired. The live-action movie version is about to be released. I am surprised that I rarely have the opportunity to talk about Xiaoyou, so I will explain the performance here.

Of course, Mr. Shimazaki, who voiced Shinichi, and I have been interviewed by a magazine together, and we also talked about some things in the subtitles, so please refer to that.

I'm a fan of Parasyte, and I'm very happy about the news of the animation. But if I really have to voice You, I feel pressured, and I'm probably the one who has the biggest objection to "Hirano Aya = You".

But precisely because I liked the work, I wondered what I could do for the modern version of "Parasyte"... I kept exploring, and before I knew it, half a year of dubbing had passed.

...I feel like I have given my best performance. Xiao You is always fighting with himself. He restrains his emotions, prohibits any communication in the dialogue, and cannot sound too mechanical, so that the sound can be like the sound coming from a human throat.

I often think about my growth trajectory from the overall situation, so every time I check what stage I have reached. When recording, I felt as if I was acting in a battle-themed drama in every episode, and I felt unusually tired and nervous.

Personally, when I play a robot, I am aware of the robot's structure and tense my joints and muscles to make sounds. The difficulty lies in the changes in the facial bones, jaw, and facial muscles. By tensing these parts, I can show the characteristics of the robot.

But Xiaoyou is not a robot, so I can’t deliberately tense my muscles. Instead, I try to make my facial expressions and tongue movements more natural…

This aspect also requires careful consideration of the painting issues. Since Xiaoyou is a character with rich actions, he must show vitality.

In the first episode, when Xiaoyou just took Shinichi's right hand, I tried to abandon the questions that I had been accustomed to for so many years, such as "What is the structure of the mouth, what is the function of the tongue, and what is the relationship between breathing and speaking", and then I was able to make such a sound.

Thanks to this, I was reminded of last summer's performance of Lady Bess, when APART was over, my voice was exhausted and I felt very anxious. This was similar to the mentality when dubbing Xiao You.

Also, sometimes I suddenly have a question: Why does Xiaoyou want to maintain that posture?

From the eyes to the mouth is a straight line, and this structure is exactly related to what I just mentioned "tightening the facial bones". The important part of the parasite is the head. Although Xiaoyou only has a hand, he subconsciously regards the area near the eyes as the head. In other words, from Xiaoyou's eyes to the mouth, isn't it the same as the head to the back of a human?

In this way, I can make unusual sounds that are different from those of robots, and even though they have no emotions, they still feel like they are made by a part of the human body. Then, after all the planning, how can I grow through the simplest performance possible?

Then, Xiaoyou developed something similar to emotions, and in inverse proportion to the humanity that Shinichi abandoned, he slowly became like a person. Of course, we can't forget the fact that it is a parasite... This scale is difficult to grasp.

For me, there are some lines in the work that can help me grow.

"It's okay to kill it." "Don't you feel sorry for it?" "Is this... death...?" "Thanks so much... Shinichi." "It's a calm creature. How wonderful..."

There are actually more...but if I were to keep it simple, that's it.

If I talk about Xiao You’s story, it would be too long, so I’ll stop here.

In fact, I want to tell some more stories about my growing up stage… I’ll tell them again if I have the chance.

For more relevant information, please pay attention to: Parasitic Beast Zone