"Bro please just recast her": Genshin Impact fans frustrated by Paimon's English VA's comments on recent controversy

The recent Genshin Impact Kinich English VA recast controversy is still ongoing, with more and more of the playerbase joining in everyday with their two cents. While the community's reaction was more or less in favor of the SAG-AFTRA strike (and the English VAs) in the beginning, the tide has now turned overwhelmingly against the EN cast, with even the Genshin Impact Chinese community calling for a recast of the English VAs.

Paimon's VA Corina Boettger has been very vocal about this issue from the onset, directly criticizing Jacob Takanashi for taking away the role of Kinich from an actor who was on strike. Recently, a TikTok posted by them regarding this controversy surfaced online, which soon made its way to r/GenshinImpact.

The TikTok consists of Corina commenting on how "if voice actors, both non-union and union, in a video game, want a game to go union, the game should go union" and that "nobody else's opinion that is super wrong anyway matters."

The voice of Paimon, everybody byu/Tenk-o inGenshin_Impact

This did not go over very well with the majority of the viewers, who did not take kindly to Corina calling the Genshin Impact community "idiots." Reacting to this, u/Historical_Yak2148 said:

"Bro please just recast her."

At this point, this seems to be the opinion shared by the majority of the fanbase, who have been calling for a recast of Paimon. While this has led to some animosity towards the character of Paimon herself, players have been encouraging each other to remember that Corina only plays the role of Paimon in one dub, and is not Paimon herself.

Comment byu/Tenk-o from discussion inGenshin_Impact

Meanwhile, u/Symej also agreed with the general sentiment, saying that Corina needs to be replaced immediately.

Comment byu/Tenk-o from discussion inGenshin_Impact

u/AsterJ helpfully remarked that throughout the entirety of the video, Corina never once brought up the initial reason behind the SAG-AFTRA strike — the need for protection from unethical AI usage.

A big portion of the playerbase shares this opinion, and feels that this issue is now straying from its original cause and is being used as a tactic to force Genshin Impact into becoming a union project. As u/GameWoods put it, HoYoverse already has AI protections (by way of Chinese anti-AI laws), so this move by the English VAs feels like they are forcing HoYoverse to turn Genshin Impact union:

"'The VAs want Genshin to go Union for a long time.' So that's incentive to lie and push your narrative. Like, they have to see how this sounds right? You knew the game was non union when you joined. And why does Genshin have to be union now, years later. Why are we forcing Hoyo to go union? They already have AI protections in place, there's no reason for it."

Contributing to this debate, u/Fabulous-Bag-3919 had the following to say:

"Oh we just join a non union project and break our union rule and when the game became more successful we will force the game to switch to union project trust me it's good for everyone. u can easily join the union for the chump change of 3000 dollars which btw is extremely cheap and don't forget the annual fee, every non union VA are supporting sag anyway."

The majority of the community (on both Reddit and X) seems to agree with this particular viewpoint, mentioning how the goalpost has now shifted from AI protection to 'strong-arming HoYoverse into turning Genshin into a union project.'

u/Rashanar chimed in saying that this kind of behavior was further dragging SAG-AFTRA's image down:

"Sh*t like this drags whatever image sag has down to the murky depths lol. not only is she bullying voice actors within the industry, she's claiming an air of superiority for... not even being part of the union to begin with lol sag's now permanently associated with voice actors who think it's okay to demean and belittle fans and voice actors alike. absolutely great for the cause."

This feeling is also shared by many, who think that the overall behavior displayed by the English voice actors hasn't helped their cause, and has instead turned people away from it and against them — as evident from the thousands of people demanding for Corina to be replaced.

---

Why did the Genshin Impact Kinich VA controversy start in the first place?

Kinich's original English VA was recently replaced (Image via HoYoverse)

Starting from Genshin Impact 5.5, Kinich's English original VA John Patneaude was replaced by a new actor, Jacob Takanashi, who announced on X that he was grateful for the role, and happy to join the team.

However, this announcement received a lot of flak from quite a few other English voice actors, such as Corina Boettger (Paimon's EN VA), Kayli Mills (Keqing's EN VA), Brianna Knickerbocker (Hu Tao's EN VA), and Shara Kirby (Candace's EN VA), to name a few. These VAs severely criticized Jacob for taking away the role of Kinich from an actor who was currently on strike.

The controversy has been ongoing since then, with the majority of the Genshin Impact playerbase calling out the English VAs for 'bullying' Takanashi and being 'extremely unprofessional.'

---

Follow Sportskeeda for more Genshin Impact news, updates, and guides.