We didn’t even have time to run through our favorite mixtape before the upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy animated series hired another voice actor for one of the space-faring heroes. Following the casting of Kevin Michael Richardson as Groot earlier today, the Disney XD series has brought in Trevor Devall to play Rocket Raccoon and growl all of the sarcastic dialogue that audiences can handle.
Marvel made the announcement on their Twitter page in a manner that noticeably lacked any explosions or large weaponry. Here’s a video of Devall sharing the news himself, as well as dropping into character to give audiences a hint of what to expect, just without the beard.
I like it well enough, and the gruffness in Devall’s voice is matched by the maniacal look in his eyes as he’s doing it. Too bad that won’t make it to the animation stage, unless someone out there is willing to do performance-capture for free. While I loved Bradley Cooper’s performance of Rocket Raccoon in the film, I don’t really consider it signature enough to make this his role, so I can’t wait to hear what kind of machismo-filled lines Devall gets to say for the show.
In any case, this isn’t even the first time that Devall has lent his pipes to the rodent, as he appeared (audibly) as Rocket for the 2014 Ultimate Spider-Man episode “The Return of the Guardians of the Galaxy.” Considering this was also the episode where Richardson voiced Groot, are we free to speculate that Disney is going to just port the rest of the Guardians voice actors from that episode into the series? In the ep, Chris Cox (Family Guy) played Star-Lord, Nika Futterman (Sanjay and Craig) played Gamora, and David Sobolov (Mighty Med) was Drax the Destroyer. So don’t be surprised if these guys are the ones we hear when the series premieres.
Here’s a shot of what we can expect the small screen version of Rocket to look like, as seen in the test footage released when the show was first revealed.
To be expected from an accomplished voice actor, Devall has been in several other superhero series as well as Guardians of the Galaxy. He played Pyro in X-Men: Evolution, Steve Rogers in Ultimate Wolverine vs. Hulk, and both Captain American and Cyclops in Wolverine vs. Sabertooth. His latest gig is for the series Dr. Dimensionpants, in which he’ll play a character called Cool Guy Unicorn. I smell a crossover episode!
More casting for Guardians of the Galaxy will be announced in the coming days.
