Dragon Ball fans in shock at Zamasu VA's "great apology" for Evolution film

Modified Oct 19, 2024 11:30 GMT

Dragon Ball fans accept the apology of Zamasu voice actor for the Evolution film (Image via Toei Animation).

Dragon Ball fans recently discovered that James Marsters, the Zamasu voice actor for the English dub of Super, did this job for free as a way to apologize to the community. This is due to him playing the role of Piccolo in the Evolution live action film, which has been historically reviled by the fandom, and the voice actor wanted to show he was sorry for that project.

While it is true that actors don't usually have a lot of influence when it comes to a film's direction, Dragon Ball fans still appreciate Marsters' gesture and even stated that he didn't need to do it to begin with. However, this goes to show the negative legacy of the Evolution film and how it is widely regarded as the worst piece of media related to this franchise.

Disclaimer: This article contains spoilers for the series. Any opinion expressed here belongs to the author and the people quoted, not Sportskeeda as a publication.

Zamasu voice James Marsters worked for free as an apology for Dragon Ball Evolution

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James Marsters recently did an interview where he revealed that he chose to do the English dub of Zamasu in Super for free as an apology to the fandom because of his role in the Evolution live action film. He played the character of Lord Piccolo and was one of the several reviled elements of the film, not so much because of Marsters himself but rather due to this being a massive misinterpretation of that iconic character.

The film came out in 2009 and was directed by James Wong, produced by Stephen Chow, and written by Ben Ramsey while being widely regarded as the worst anime live-action movie of all time. This is a direct result of the absolute mischaracterization of characters such as Goku and the aforementioned Piccolo and a general misinterpretation of the source material.

It is also worth pointing out that the negative backlash was also during an era where the series had seemingly ended for years, and this was one of the few times where there were new adaptations of Akira Toriyama's series, only adding to the criticism. Furthermore, there have been reports that this film was one of the main reasons for Toriyama to return with Super.

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It is also worth pointing out that Marsters used a pseudonym when it came to the credits of voicing Zamasu in Dragon Ball Super so only the people in conventions could discover who he was. That was because fans would eventually come up with questions regarding the Evolution project, which is something that he has admitted to not being of the required standard for this franchise.

Marsters is not the first member of the project to declare his disappointment with the film. Justin Chatwin, the actor who played Goku in the movie, apologized on social media to Akira Toriyama when the latter passed away in March of this year, stating he was sorry for how wrong they got the project.

"He's a real one for that. Zamasu was amazing," someone said.

"Bro went form a terrible movie to one of the best voice actors in all of dragon ball history," another person said.

"James Marsters has always been the GOAT. He was amazing as Spike in Buffy and later on Angel, And when i heard Zamasu the voice sounded godly (sorry for the pun) and really familiar. DB Evolution was 1 of if not the worst manga adaptation movie ever made but you sir are forgiven," someone else said.

It is fair to say that James Marsters has paid his dues with the Dragon Ball fandom after the Evolution failure, and his legacy with the franchise has been saved as Zamasu.

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Edited by Somava