The Other Darrin / Pokémon

• The entire American voice cast was replaced (with the exceptions of Jimmy Zoppi, Ikue Otani, and Kayzie Rogers) toward the end through the Advanced arc (specifically, for the anniversary special and ninth season). This was due to Pokémon USA (now The Pokémon Company International) reacquiring the rights to dub the anime from 4Kids, and the then-current ADR studio, TAJ Productions, decided not to contract the original voice actors for future episodes, despite working with them very regularly in the past. Supposedly, there were some contract issues (specifically, the actors had a two-year "non-compete" clause in their contracts) and minor salary concerns, and to this day, not even the voice actors know exactly why they were replaced.
• When TAJ went out of business, DuArt and Video took over the ADR Production with Season 11, and began using members of the original voice cast to play additional characters (notably, Rachael Lillis, the original Misty and Jessie, returned for a few episodes to voice Maylene). Some even got their original roles back, such as Ted Lewis as Giovanni and Tracey, as well as Erica Schroeder as the second Nurse Joy.
• Also, the new voice actors were cast not on their own acting ability but rather on who could do the best impressions of the previous voice actors. This was obviously to lessen the change from one voice actor to the next, but no one was fooled. They would eventually settle into the roles but its still a bit jarring to someone who is more used to hearing the original voice actors as opposed to the newer ones. Obviously this issue does not exist with characters that were introduced after the switch.
  • This is most prominent with Misty, as she largely left the series a few episodes before the big VA change, as opposed to Brock, who stuck around until the end of the Diamond and Pearl series. When both characters briefly returned in the Sun and Moon series (almost 12 years after the VA switch), Brock sounds "normal" while Misty sounded a bit "off" since most people are much more familiar with Rachael Lillis' performance rather then Michele Knotz's rendition. On a minor note, Jigglypuff (who was missing from the anime for a good 14 years) also returned in Sun and Moon. She's similarly now voiced by Michele Knotz as opposed to Rachael Lillis.
• Not to mention James' original voice changed drastically nine episodes in (from Ted Lewis to Eric Stuart, Brock's voice) when the original began touring with a play (although he later returned to voice other major characters such as Tracey), and Meowth's voice changed after episode twenty-nine (from Matthew Sussman (AKA Nathan Price) to the late Maddie Blaustein) when his original voice actor semi-retired from regular voice work (although he continued to provide additional voices for a few years).
• Ash was recast once again after the 10th Anniversary Special. With that project, Kayzie Rogers took over Veronica Taylor's long-running role as the character, but Sarah Natochenny became his permanent replacement beginning with Season 9, and also re-recorded Kayzie's dialogue for the DVD release. Kayzie stayed with the show though, and ended up taking over as Max instead.
  • Also, right before the big switch, Officer Jenny was recast from Lee Quick to Jamie Davyous Owens for her last few appearances in Advanced Battle (Season 8) as well as for Pokémon Chronicles. After the big switch she went from Kayzie Rogers (10th Anniversary Special as Jamie Peacock) to Maya Rosewood (first Season 9/Battle Frontier appearance) to Emlyn Morinelli (rest of Season 9 to Season 13 as Emily Williams) to Lipica Shah (Season 14 to 16) to Saskia Maarleveld (Season 17 to Season 19) to Samantha Moon and Martha Harms (Season 20 onwards).
  • Nurse Joy suffered a similar fate going from Megan Hollingshead (leaving after her first Season 7 appearance) to Erica Schroeder (rest of Seasons 7-8, as well as Chronicles as Bella Hudson) to Diane Stillwell (10th Anniversary Special) to Michele Knotz (Seasons 9-13) to Alyson Leigh Rosenfeld (Season 14-16, and in the 21st movie which was set in an AU - coincidentally, she's dubbing over Chika Fujimura who voiced Nurse Joy in the Unova region) to Jennifer Forziati-DaCosta and Kate Bristol (Seasons 17-19) to Suzy Myers (Season 20 onwards). Schroeder later returned in a 16th Season episode voicing an older Nurse Joy, as well as in the 20th (and presumably 22nd) movie as a Kanto Nurse Joy. Hollingshead returned for Pokémon Journeys, which features a greater number of LA-based voice actors. In Horizons Erica Mendez voices that series Nurse Joy.
  • Cassidy also switched from Hollingshead to Andi Whaley at the same time. After the "big switch", Emlyn Morinelli took over the role.
  • The narrator is usually voiced by Rodger Parsons (originally credited as Ken Gates), but Mike Pollock took over 20 episodes into Advanced (Season 6) and continued narrating the episodes and corresponding movies until the cast overhaul in Season 9 when Parsons returned.
  • The Pokédex also got hit with this later in the first season of the dub. Originally, Nicholas James Tate did its voice, but when other projects kept him from being a full-time Pokémon voice actor, the role was recast to Eric Stuart. The voice change was explained in the show by an upgrade the Pokédex receives in "Who Gets to Keep Togepi?", which was the first episode where Stuart voiced the role.
  • Also, while Ikue Otani's Japanese voice for Pikachu is usually left intact, there were some early episodes where Rachael Lillis voiced it instead when Otani's voice couldn't be salvaged. Apparently Lillis was originally cast as Pikachu's English voice before it was decided to retain Otani's vocals, they still kept her on board for any additional vocals they needed to do for Pikachu, especially for American-made Pokémon commercials and other productions. In the climax of the dub of Pokémon: I Choose You!, Kate Bristol does Pikachu's speaking line.
  • In 2017, Kayzie Rogers (who has been mentioned quite a few times already) decided to retire from voice acting, so her current most prominent role, Wobbuffet, was given to Erica Schroeder. Her other most prominent role, Mimey - Delia Ketchum's Mr. Mime - was given to Michele Knotz. Her other roles were divided up amongst various voice actors such as Lisa Ortiz as Vaporeon and Laurie Hymes as Pelipper.
  • When Hoenn Elite Four member Drake reappeared in Journeys his English voice went from Brian Maillard to Edward Bosco.
  • Mewtwo was voiced by Jay Goede (credited as Philip Bartlett) in the original movie, and in Mewtwo Returns, he was voiced by Dan Green instead for reasons unknown. Dan Green would later come back for Mewtwo Strikes Back—Evolution and the Journeys episode "Getting More Than You Battled For!" with the dub of Evolution also having Billy Bob Thompson as Dr. Fuji. Female Miriam Pultro (who also voiced Caitlin) later voiced another Mewtwo in the 2013 movie, Pokémon: Genesect and the Legend Awakened and its prologue. In addition Masachika Ichimura's Japanese vocals were kept for Super Smash Bros. Melee, but the dialogue can only be heard if the player switches the game's language from English to Japanese. In English, Mewtwo's dialogue consists mainly of grunts and evilish laughs. This also applies to Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, where the late Keiji Fujiwara voiced the character.
  • Pokémon Origins ended up being dubbed in Los Angeles instead of New York, and while few original characters reappeared, the ones that did, such as Brock, Professor Oak, and Giovanni, ended up with different voices (Kyle Hebert, Johnny Yong Bosch, Jamieson Price among others). Red's voice was also different from the one he had in Super Smash Bros. Brawl (being voiced by Bryce Papenbrook instead of Michele Knotz). Justified in that they're different interpretations of the characters.
  • When Red returned in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, he was voiced by Billy Bob Thompson due to Rogers' retirement, sounding very similar to Bryce Papenbrook's interpretation of Red from Origins. And then once Pokémon Masters came out, he was then voiced by Brandon Winckler.
  • Professor Cerise’s assistant Ren (Renji) was portrayed in Pokémon Journeys: The Series by Billy Kametz in the first 93 episodes, and was replaced by Barrett Leddy from 94 on (with an In Memoriam card in that episode).
• In Japan, Akiko Hiramatsu temporarily replaced Megumi Hayashibara as the voice of Musashi (Jessie) while Hayashibara went on maternity leave.
  • When Ikue Otani went on maternity leave during Battle Frontier, they still used her voice clips as Pikachu, but Team Rocket's Mime Jr. was instead voiced by Tomoe Hanba.
  • Similarly, Mika Kanai took over the voice of Eureka (Bonnie) from Mariya Ise during her maternity leave.
  • Giovanni's seiyuu (Hirotaka Suzuoki) was replaced with Donphan's (Kenta Miyake) after his original one died before the end of Battle Frontier.
  • Miette, a character that was introduced as a rival to Serena, had her seiyuu (Saori Hayashi) replaced by another (Kei Shindō) after her first appearance due to the first one leaving the voice acting business due to stress and the scandal that followed one such breakdown. Before her second appearance, people have joked that Serena was behind it.
  • When Unshō Ishizuka passed away from esophageal cancer in 2018, the great number of roles he played, including Professor Oak, the Narrator, various minor characters and various Pokémon had to be filled in by various other actors, including Kenyū Horiuchi as the narrator, Professor Oak and Principal Oak, and Toru Sakurai being given most if not all of Mr. Ishizuka's Pokémon roles. In some cases, archive audio is used for some of the Pokémon voices he did, mainly for Pokemon like Onix / Steelix and Gyarados. He still managed to record narration roles for movies 21 and 22 in the series before his untimely passing.
  • Due to Tatsuhisa Suzuki going on hiatus from acting, his role as Raihan was recast with Yoshitsugu Matsuoka.
• A lot of the world had different casts for movies 4-7 (if they got the films at all) since Miramax distributed the films in North America, and international distribution ended up greatly mishandled.
• In the French dub, Meowth's voice actor (Nessym Guetat) moved permanently to France after the Advanced Generation. Guetat reprised Meowth in films 4 and 7, both of which were dubbed in Paris.
• In Latin America, Gabriel Gama voiced Brock until the beginning of Diamond and Pearl, then Alan Prieto took over. Similarly, May's first LA-VA was Anna Lobo, then Mariana Ortiz followed. In the case of Brock, Gabriel Gama returned for the season 13 dub after the change of studio dub from AF: The Dubbing House to SDI Media.
  • Ash was darrin'd by Irwin Daayán by the last chapters of the Season 11 and later their original voice actor (Gabriel Ramos) returned for the Season 12, although eventually replaced by Miguel Ángel Leal since Season 13, because SDI Media refused to allow Ramos to record alone in Argentina. While Ramos returned to Mexico in 2015, he would instead voice Remo, though he did return in Journeys to voice Ash's counterpart from the alternate world in a two-parter special.
  • Dawn's voice in Season 12 was changed from Gaby Ugarte to Leyla Rangel, due to a change of the dub studio, from Candiani to AF: The Dubbing House, but in season 13, after another change of studio, Gaby Ugarte returned to voice Dawn. Rangel would later voice Dawn in her guest appearance in Black & White, while Ugarte would come back again for Journeys.
  • A similar case happened with Paul, who was voiced by Gerardo García, but it had to be changed for Season 12. The first time that he appeared in that season, the voice was made by Gabriel Ortiz, and in the latest appearances his voice is Miguel Angel Ruiz, then, in Season 13, Gerardo García returned to voice Paul after the aforementioned change of studio.
  • Diana Pérez, the voice of Jessie, died in April 2021. As of season 24, Jessie is now voiced by Rebeca Gómez (who has previously voiced James' fiancée Jessebelle in her last appearance).
  • Other situations of temporal voice changes happened with Jessie and James. In various chapters during Season 4-5, Jessie's voice Diana Pérez was replaced by Elena Ramirez, and in middle of the Season 8, the voice of James was changed from José Antonio Macías to Gerardo García. The voice change was lampshaded by Meowth in the dub, when Macías returned for the voice of James, saying that he missed their ratitas kuki or something like that.
• In Spain, movie 3 and Mewtwo Returns were handled by a different studio (Tecnison) than the actual series (Telson). This meant that everyone except Tracey (Ricardo Escobar), Mewtwo (Luis Bajo), and Professor Oak (Roberto Encinas) had to be recast. Ironically, Tecnison would later assume the rights to dub Pokémon after Telson closed down in 2006. The dubbing rights now belong to SDI Media, like with most other versions of Pokémon.
• In Brazil, the voice cast was rarely changed (Tracey and Prof. Oak being the most glaring exceptions). The early movies were dubbed in another city — Rio de Janeiro instead of São Paulo — but the actors are flown there to dub (though a few ended up changed, such as Meowth).
  • Starting in XY & Z, the dub moved completely to Rio after over 18 years. This change did not go over well with longtime fans of the series. Beginning with Journeys, the dub moved to the Double Sound studio, and many of the voice actors refused to work at that studio because of delayed royalty payments. Julio Chaves, Professor Oak's voice actor, died in August 2021, so he too will be replaced in later episodes.
• The European Portuguese dub is really bad about this. Ash has gone through ten different voice actresses, and that's just an example. He has consistently been voiced by Raquel Rosmaninho since Battle Dimension.
• In Germany, Caroline Comrinck voiced Ash for the first three seasons before leaving the country to study in New York. Veronika Neugebauer took over the role beginning with Season 4, however, she suddenly passed away from cancer shortly after Season 11, and Caroline returned to voice Ash the following seasons. As of season 20, Ash is voiced by Felix Mayer.
  • In early episodes, Pikachu's German voice was done by Sabine Bohlmann before they decided to retain Ikue Otani's vocals. Bohlmann eventually reprised Pikachu in Pokémon: I Choose You!
• The Italian dub featured a lot of changes: Gary changed voices twice (Nicola Bartolini Carrassi -> Paolo Sesana -> Massimo Di Benedetto), Brock changed at the end of Season 2 (Nicola Bartolini Carrassi -> Luca Bottale), Meowth changed in Season 7 (Giuseppe Calvetti -> Pietro Ubaldi) and Dawn in Season 12 (Tosawi Piovani -> Ludovica De Caro). Misty was also replaced for the redub (Alessandra Karpoff -> Benedetta Ponticelli).
  • But the character with most voice changes in the Italian dub is probably Giovanni: Originally voiced by Tony Fuochi, he was replaced with Marco Balbi in the first movie and Oliviero Corbetta in at least one of his few Johto appearances. In Hoenn Fuochi came back, only to be replaced with Giovanni Battezzato during Sinnoh and most of Unova... then, in the last episode of Unova, he was replaced with Federico Danti. Meanwhile, the redub of the first seasons replaces all of them with Pietro Ubaldi (who is also Meowth's voice actor, thus making Meowth's impression of the boss during his fantasies flawless).
• The Hungarian dub is also bad about this. As of Journeys, Misty (Eszter Dudas) and Jessie (Erika Kiss) were the only major characters who were never recast in the series. The movies Mewtwo Returns, 4ever (except Erika Kiss as Jessie and Peter Szokol as Meowth), and Destiny Deoxys (except Balazs Szvetlov as Ash and Gabor Sotonyi as Brock) ignored most of the series dubbers.
• When the Hebrew dub resumed in 2016, Daniel Magon (who had already replaced his brother Jonathan as Ash), Maya Bar Shalom (Jessie) and Dor Srugo (who had already replaced four other actors as Meowth) returned for the XY series. However, James is now voiced by Gilan Shahaf instead of Liron Lev.
• In the Czech dub, Jan Skvor (who was previously Tracey) replaced his younger brother Radek as the voice of Ash beginning in Kalos Quest.
• In-universe, there was an episode where Bonsly and Mime Jr. are mistaken for actors and dropped into a movie in place of the real ones. Sure they look kinda the same to us, but one imagines any Pokémon viewers would tell instantly and have this reaction.