Actors are talented people who bring our beloved characters to life with their wide range of voices and appearances. With the work that goes into these characters — from the design, to the sound, to the personality and backstory, it’s natural for fans to develop obsessions over these characters. Sometimes, however, fans can get too obsessed with these characters, to the point where they pointlessly exert these feelings by harassing the actors that can’t control the things these fans are upset about. Actors are not responsible for the casting process, or how the character is written, and actors certainly cannot change who they are. Acting is a difficult and underappreciated job as it is, especially as actors continue to strike to get the pay and respect that they deserve in the field. You wouldn’t harass waitstaff for an expensive product or a bad-tasting order. They’re not the manager or the chef. There’s never a reason to make a job even more difficult for the people who actually enjoy doing what they do.
For almost 10 years, Justin Roiland was the voice actor for “Rick and Morty”. However, due to allegedly being difficult to work with and evidence of domestic abuse and grooming minors, it made sense for him to eventually be replaced. Last year, season seven introduced new voice actors Ian Cardoni and Harry Belden for Rick and Morty respectively. Despite the understandable reasoning for replacing Justin Roiland, many fans of both him and the show have been very hostile to the replacements, to the point of leaving hate on their social media. On Ian Cardoni’s Instagram, you can find fans saying that his voice acting “sucks” and that it’s “trash”. Those who compliment the actors in the comments are met with responses shaming them for having a positive opinion. As someone who returned to the series due to being intrigued by these new voice actors, I fear getting the same harassment because I happen to enjoy their voices. With “Rick and Morty: The Anime” having new voice actors for the whole cast in the English dub, the hate continues to worsen. Fans continue to demand for Justin Roiland’s return despite the anime being announced in 2022, long before Justin Roiland’s removal from the franchise.
You may be thinking, “That isn’t so bad. Hate is a pretty common thing on social media, the actors can just ignore those kinds of posts.” Well, you haven’t heard the worst of it. For the live action “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” films, the franchise was rebooted and the cast was replaced, primarily due to the child actors getting older. Due to this reboot, the hashtag #NotMyRodrick was started as fans hated the recasting of Rodrick Heffley. Charlie Wright, the actor that replaced Devon Bostick as Rodrick, talked about how he was affected by this trend on his YouTube channel. In the video, he explained how he would constantly receive DMs and posts of death threats. “Being a teenager at the time, no one was really there to guide me through it or to like, help me really. I just had to like, suck it up and deal with it.” Along with the common struggles of an acting career that demotivated him, such as the constant auditioning and rejections, Charlie’s depression worsened due to the harassment he received. At the end of the video, Charlie lamented about how he felt like he didn’t do anything to deserve the harassment. He acted his “little ass off” in the movie, and the response he got was people wishing he was dead.
Not only have actors been harassed for their voices and appearances, some actors have gotten hate just for the character they play. One example is Valentino, an abusive porn director in the series “Hazbin Hotel”. Since Valentino is the primary cause of the popular character Angel Dust’s trauma, a hate campaign for Valentino was ignited. Many fans of the antagonist were harassed both online and in person for showing appreciation and cosplaying as Valentino. One Valentino cosplayer on Twitter described an experience she had at a convention where someone pointed and shot a fake gun at her, claiming to be “letting off some steam”. The cosplayer didn’t know the gun was fake at first and instinctively flinched. As someone who is new to cosplaying and going to conventions, I don’t want to have to worry about my safety because someone happens to dislike the characters that I enjoy. Valentino’s voice actor Joel Perez was eventually pulled into the harassment, constantly being tagged in posts and putting him in a position where he constantly needed to separate himself from the character. People still ask Perez if he shares similar characteristics with Valentino or if he supports the actions of the character. He always has to make it clear to people that voicing a villain for a series doesn’t mean he promotes the actions of that villain. “You can love me, and hate Valentino.” Joel said in an Instagram story. “Because I am what? An actor.” I don’t want to have to worry about possible harassment or negative interactions with other people at public events just because I like how certain actors portray certain characters or because I like how terrible and hateable a character is.
Actors love playing their roles as much as the fans love seeing these characters come to life. Ian Cardoni has been a fan of Rick and Morty since the very beginning of the series, Charlie Wright does not regret playing as Rodrick and considers himself to be very lucky to have had the opportunity, and Joel Perez is proud to know that he’s succeeded as an actor to make Valentino so hated as a villain. You can hate the character, you can dislike the performance, but there is never a good reason to send harassment and death threats to people who are just doing their jobs.
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