The VARIED Voices of Sonic 

The Japanese voice of Sonic, Junichi Kanemaru has been voicing the character since Sonic Adventure in 1998 for 25 years, meaning that in Japan, everyone knows his voice and his personality, I recommend checking out some of his lines and his English lines is stellar as he's also a teacher.

Roger has stated this sudden voice tonen change was decided by the voice directors

Jason Griffith is easily the best Sonic voice in my opinion. He can pull off a cocky Sonic voice and he just has a good Sonic voice overall. In fact, every time I think of Sonic or try doing a Sonic impression, I think of Jason's Sonic voice.

Never been a huge fan of Roger, but I liked him in Frontiers. Seeing a character who's usually fun and carefree be so somber and melancholic was interesting to see and I thought he did a good job portraying that. Jason will always be my favorite, though 👑

To give Rodger credit as Sonic, his voice in Frontiers matched with the overall tone the rest of the game had.

The hate for Roger is very concerning, his voice started to grow on me since he started voicing him in Colors, and he knocked his performance out of the park in Boom To say hes the worst sounding sonic ever is too much of a stretch And I've been playing Sonic games since the OG STH on the Genesis

I’m sad the man, the myth, the legend Ryan Drummond didn’t come back, but props to him for keeping his reputation instead of coming back to the blue rat.

You know I really wouldn't mind if Deven Mack voiced Sonic in the games because his voice for Sonic sounds pretty good and accurate to the best versions of Sonic's voice.

Glad I’m not the only one calling movie Sonic “Dewey Duck”

The day mike pollock stops voicing eggman is the day I go into a deep depression

The reason why Sonic Prime doesn’t have any of the actors from the games is because since it was produced in Cananda, it is required by law to primarily only use Canadian voice actors. While there are examples of American voice actors being Canadian productions, usually they only use voices actors from Canada EDIT: i have been informed that this is not required by law and that Canadian production companies get tax breaks for using an All Canadian voice cast.

Im surprised you didnt talk about Roger Craig Smith in Boom. I think his portrayal for that version of Sonic was spot on.

Rogers impersonation on Ryan’s voice is incredible

Griffith is my favorite English game voice because as he got more relaxed in the role and began toning down the aggressive tough guy aspect, I found some of the same somewhat chill, loveable dorkiness we got out of Junichi Kanemaru. Especially in Black Knight, he’s like a near perfect translation of it there. I miss him honestly

Honestly I understand your opinion, but I actually kinda like Roger's take on Sonic. It's not amazing but Frontiers and Sonic Boom are prove that Roger can be a good Sonic when given the right script and good voice direction.

My top 3: 1. Frontiers Roger 2. Boom Roger 3. 2006/2009 Jason Griffith

Imo Jason in Unleashed and Black Knight is the best Sonic has ever sounded and his range of personality as well an that is the voice I think of when Sonic is brought up

The depressed Sonic voice in Frontiers is practically at the end game, when he is tired and consumed by the cyberspace, and in Sonic Boom Sonic ain't lazy, just apathic when someone don't catch him

My favorite Sonic voice right now has to be Devin Mack. His performance in Sonic Prime is ELITE. He's funny and cool but doesn't try to hard, and I just like the tone of it for Sonic. Its like Roger mixed with Ryan.

What I have learnt from Sonic fans is that no matter who voices Sonic someone will always piss and moan about it. Here's my take on his voice, I don't care who voices him or what he sounds like I think each and every voice actor gave it their all and all brought their own unique takes on the character. In my opinion they're all good, I think that non of the actors deserve the shit they get because they didn't sound like the last guy who voiced him.

Personally I love Jason he can be chill cool cocky its perfect imo

imagine if chris pratt legitimately tried to voice sonic

Frontiers Sonic is the best sounding voice Sonic’s had since 2009. I can’t see him using that voice once and never again. Gonna suck if it goes away in the next one.

I ain't gonna lie when you showed that Roger doing a Ryan impression I almost choked

Your Roger take in Frontiers is spicy! Yeah, Roger is the most mixed out of the main Sonic VAs, I'll admit that, even if Sonic Colors DS was my first mainline Sonic game, and yeah, Lost World was pretty rough, but I think Frontiers was the best he ever sounded (as did all the other VAs). Sure, he could come off as more "normal", but that something that can be improved on as we saw in the Twitter Takeover that year. You made good points with, "A character should have a defining voice", but that's not full proof. Characters like Batman and Spiderman are super well known, yet there are so many voice actors/actors that did many different takes on them, and that's really cool to see. LandyRS is a VA who has a great take on Sonic in many fan projects, and he uses a voice of his own to do it. There's both pros and cons to having a similar voice and having some different takes as well. I do prefer Jason as my number one, but Roger is still a good voice for Sonic.

Sonic is literally unleashed Jason Griffith He is heroic, caring and reserved cocky but not annoying, he got very mature after the shadow the hedgehog game and yeah that’s growth and I like it Sonic is not goofy and dumb anymore

OVA voice was too great to put in the video, would have been unfair to compare the others against it

Something to note about Roger's performance in Frontiers. At the beginning of the game, while his voice is definitely lower than usual, his delivery is still very in line with his previous outings. However, Sonic is slowly being overtaken by cyber corruption, and he sounds more and more tired and worn out as the game progresses as a way of reflecting that. Compare the clip at 15:10 in this video to when he says the same line to Amy at the start of the game and you'll see what I mean

Damn, Roger's Sonic really did a number on ya, huh?

Deven Mack is the best sonic voice actor to me. I hope he does it for now on

Junichi Kanemaru, who's been voicing the character for almost 25 years is still my favorite voice for Sonic, mostly because it's consistent. Tbh, i personally think he's the best Sonic voice and vastly superior to the English actors, i recommend hearing his lines

L video, didn't mention Sonic's Schoolhouse... Anyways, now that the joke is done, it's time to get MY opinion on this... I like every Sonic VA, and never really thought about how different they are to each other because it's pretty easy for me to hear a character instead of a person, especially in media related to animation or games, no matter how the character sounds, acts, or is portrayed. (Also, as a Transformers fan, I'm just used to constantly changing voices of characters, so...)

At least Sonic's JP voice has had a consistent performance since SA1 and the entire cast hasn't been replaced like with the EN voice. I really like his JP voice and have liked it for a while. Now for english my favorites have always been Ryan Drummod and Jason Grifith. I'm with you, while Rodger is a great voice actor, he has never suited sonic outside of Sonic Boom for me. He works well in Boom due to the style of that show but I just don't like him in anything else. I don't get the praise for Sonic Frontier's Sonic voice and it's still not great

wtf, xpool? roger in frontiers sounds so cool and mature! i know that sonic has to be cocky and all, but changing a little bit the personality is like a breeze of fresh air.

I LOVE how you referenced sonic zombies. Barely anybody knows what that is nowadays.

Damn Kinda disappointed you didn't even mention Martin Burke, the voice in the Sonic OVA He's top 3 for me, easy I legit think he's my favorite voice for classic Sonic

18:37 Apparently, it hurts Roger’s voice to do a Ryan impression. (I think)

That Molly jar joke had me laughing every time, especially the last one.

If Sonic could Sonic better than Sonic, would Sonic be a Sonic or would he be himself or would be someone else?

My friend King Kong made fun of Roger sounding constipated while we were playing Frontiers. "TAILS! INVENT SOMETHING!" -King Kong attempting to sound consitpated, December 2022.

Ben is my favorite Sonic voice. He gets the hyperactivity and snark down, and embraces the cheesiness in a way that’s fun instead of cynical, partly helped by the lack of a script that has to make fun of itself every other scene.

I grew up with Roger Craig Smith honestly so he's my favorite 🗿

This was VERY Hooba Dooba of you, XPool.

4:53 i enjoy that, and also the japanese voice actors use English words, is really charming!

I liked Roger's voice in Sonic Frontiers. Yes, it technically does sound less like the character, but at least he's doing his own thing, rather than trying to do a shallow impression of Ryan or Jason.

I'm sorry, but I love the sound direction of frontiers since your able to take the game more seriously because of that. Feels like the characters are getting older and more mature.

Finally. Squash and Stretch. WINNING. 🔥🔥🔥

6:10 THANK YOU! I haven't heard much of any Sonic voice actors (except Roger and Deven) but what I have heard of Jason has him do this all the time and it kind of drives me crazy

Meanwhile Mario had the same voice actor for 30 years. Also great video!

I honestly really like all of Sonic’s voices. I really don’t think you’re fair to Roger; you’re of course entitled to the opinion, but I think he’s really good. I think his voice is iconic as the longest running (English) voice of Sonic. Either he or Jason Griffith is my favorite. Has anyone really ever been confused by the different voices of Sonic? Cartoon characters are always changing voices. And it’s not Roger’s fault if the writing and direction is inconsistent. It has never been consistent for any of the voices, and I don’t think it really needs to be super consistent.

ive always loved ryan drummond. his voice is always what i think of when i think of sonics voice.

Ryan Drummond is the definitive Sonic in my opinion.

Max Mittleman: Am I a joke to yo- Oh, he's not a VA of Sonic. Not yet at least.

Jason Griffith looks exactly like my barber and I love this fact

"MollyMcGee new VA of sonic" had me dead 😂 1:19

Well, it's really the dubbing directors' fault, Roger Craig Smith said that the dubbing directors wanted him to do a more mature voice for Sonic's voice in the game Sonic Frontiers.

“Which VA did you guys think abt when you think abt sonic?” Me: Penny. Also Deven and Roger but I watch too much Snapcube

Meanwhile in french speaking countries, we have had several different voice actors as well, although not as many as the english ones. The first one (maybe there were some others before for small commercials but i can't be certain) was Olivier Korol. He was also the voice of Ed in Ed Edd 'n' Eddy and Muraï in Great Teacher Onizuka, and he voiced Sonic in the 90s cartoons, and also, funnily enough, in Wreck it Ralph 1 and 2, even tho he wasn't Sonic's official voice actor anymore. The second one is Alexandre Gillet, who's a big dubbing superstar over here. He voiced Frodo Baggins in Lord of the Rings, Tetsuo in Akira, Jesse in Breaking Bad, Ryan Gosling, Mark Wahlberg, he's the second voice of Captain America in the MCU... He first voiced Sonic in the french dub of Sonic X, which surprisingly enough was based on the original Japanese version and not the 4Kids version. Then less than 10 years later, Sega began to make Sonic games dubbed in French starting with Sonic Generations, and they were smart enough to get the whole french cast of Sonic X back, including Alexandre Gillet. And he still voices everyone's beloved hedgehog to this very day in various games and shows, including Sonic Prime (despite the english cast being replaced) and Sonic Colors Ultimate (despite base Sonic Colors having had no dub). Tho I gotta be honest, i'm not a huge fan of his recent performance in Sonic Frontiers... The third one is pretty controversial, and it's Malik Bentalha, who voiced him in the two Sonic movies. The reaso behind the controversy is that he's what we call a "star-talent", aka a celebrity invited directly by Paramount to voice the character solely for the purpose of selling more tickets. Which enraged the Sonic fans, because Bentalha isn't a voice actor, and also because they wanted Alexandre Gillet back (he admittedly recorded the first trailer before Paramount decided to replace him). Now even tho Bentalha isn't the best, he clearly isn't the worst either. He still managed to capture Sonic's personality, even with even very little voice acting experience. But the communication around it clearly didn't help, as there were interviews of him where he mistook Sonic's intro with the intro of Motus (a french TV game) and where he didn't know who Tails and Knuckles are. So the fandom was clearly not keen on watching the french dub. Some people even preferred watching the Québec dub where Sonic was voiced by Maël Davan-Soulas, who ironically was the first french voice of Captain America in the MCU before moving to Québec. Someone even created an edited version of the movie where the Québec voice was alongside the rest of the french cast. I think it's also worth mentioning that Sonic's cameo in OK KO Let's be heroes was voiced by a fourth voice actor, which is Jonathan Simon. He also did a good job, even if his take on Sonic is actually quite different than his predecessors. It's a bit sad they did not bother contacting Alexandre Gillet considering they got Roger Craig Smith back in the original version, but due to OK KO's dub being recorded in Belgium instead of France, I guess it must have been too complicated.

I feel like I’m the only one who likes Sonic’s voice in sonic frontiers

7:44 HOLY SHIT SONIC ZOMBIES, HOOBA DOOBA

I absolutely completely agree, except for the people who grew up with Roger, he's...OK, and I respect him because he, like you said, is truly an amazing VA! But seriously, Jason, Devin, and Ryan are my serious favorites! Thanks to them for bringing my absolute favorite character to life 💕

Roger Craig Smith & Ben Schwartz are my most favorite Sonic VAs! They're the greatest & best voices of Sonic the Hedgehog of all time! Nothing & nobody will EVER change my mind!

why am i in jail what did i even do

Ngl i actually really dig the deeper Roger voice. It helps that he fucking nails some of those scenes. Like the yell he does on the last boss in Final frontier is great. Wouldn't mind him developing that voice.

Ryan to me will always be the best English Sonic. He perfectly captures what people love about the character and can make some of the cheesiest lines in the series sound amazing. He's also the one who sounds the closest to the Japanese VA Jun'ichi Kanemaru.

Devon Mack is my favorite voice actor along with Jason Griffith and Jaleel White

You must say the best roger craig smith line of sonic colors/colours is"no copyright law in the universe is gonna stop me

another sonic voice actor that i love that is also underrated is Martin Burke in Sonic OVA. ik its too high pitched but i love it for like a preteen sonic its just so cute

whats funny is that roger himself seems to dislike the new voice for frontiers , he initially thought the directors were joking when they said he should go that deep

No mention of Junichi Kanemaru, Sonic japanese voice actor is pain for me, he is actually the best voice Sonic, not only cause it's consistent, but because I actually imagine Sonic sounding like that in japanese

"Everything has an end" -sonic

My favourite voice actors for Sonic are Deven Mack and Roger Graig Smith. I'm surprised you didn't talk about Roger's voice in Sonic Boom. Also, Sonic was more immature in Sonic Prime because he was a dynamic character in the show, not a static one and by the end of the show, he was supposed to be much more mature. Now that season 3 is out, I think they nailed it. Definitely one of the best Sonic shows. Though the ending, not so much.

Fun fact:prime sonic It wouldn't exist if Sonic Boom had never been canceled for the reason that Sonic Boom originally introduced another dimension for the first time in a Sonic series. and why well uhhh because sonic prime yes we would already have sonic boom in that alternate universe

I feel like the only time Roger is above average with Sonic is when he played him in Sonic Boom. Because there, the humor and jokes were more cynical and less for a 6 year old to laugh at. And he just sounded and acted more chill than he did in the games. He was laid back, so for that version of Sonic, it works.

Ryan,Jason, and Devan gotta be my favorite voices for the hedgehog

In Spanish there was this man called Jonathan Lopez who passed away and today Sonic's voice is Angel de Gracia, but there have been only two Spanish voices in videogames so far and if Jonathan was still here he would've been the one and only all along

Who Cares? We all know the Best Sonic Voice is the One from Sonics Schoolhouse.

The appeal of Sonic to me - and something they actually keep over in Japan - is that Sonic is a cocky teenager who loves the thrill of throwing himself into near-insurmountable challenges. Sega removed the character’s ages so it wouldn’t be too weird how “mature” everyone is in Frontiers but it’s still weird. Sonic’s a kid routinely charging at gods the size of countries with the tightest grin on his face, he’s not my dad.

Honestly I think Roger's boom voice is my favorite and that's the voice that Roger should use for the mainline games

You forgot Patrick Warburton!

I literally had no idea Sonic’s voice from SegaSonic Cosmo Fighter sounded like that. Ew 🤮

I will say though that I did start to really like Sonics voice near the end of Frontiers. It was one of those things where if he can let that voice brew even more it would be amazing. I've had a problem with Sonic not sounding serious in serious moments and even if most of the dialog is pretty poor there are some gems in there

I’m always will always prefer Jason over anyone else because it’s the sonic I grew up with and even to this day his performances are my favorites in the whole series

Even if you are "not intrested in the mods", I still want you to cover srb2 mods

Jason Griffith at his prime was the best in my opinion hands down, especially as Shadow as well.

10:22 “Gimme a break! What’s with all this drama?”

Sonic X was the first media I consumed where I thought Sonic sounded like Sonic, so Jason is my favorite.

Oh come on, Roger wasn't THAT bad

Hey XPool, I'm pretty sure that Sonic's voice change in Sonic Prime was due to Canadian work laws because the studio that made the show is based in Canada

I honestly love Roger as Sonic. Not my favorite but I still like him

average balena lackey disrespecting roger 😭

Ryan Drummond will always be the best imo

Sonic's voice in Frontiers is PEAK, what do you mean?!

6:45 That's why he's the MVP!, That's why he's the GOAT! 9:04 Yeah, like you say right here Roger Craig Smith is a talented voice actor, who has had many memorable voice acting performances on his resume, but I don't think his Sonic voice really fits the character. 15:40 Even with Frontiers attempting to have a more serious tone like the 2000s Sonic games, Roger's Sonic just straight up sounds like Chris Redfield, Which I don't know if that's really any better than how he sounded before, but it's definitely not a Sonic voice. 18:04 Disagree with you on Prime, I actually think it's the best Sonic show since SatAM, and I do think Deven Mack has potential to be the next great Sonic voice with his voice being a mixture of Ryan, Jason, Roger, and Jaleel all at once.

I can't believe you didn't mention the voice of sonic in the sonic ova movie! :O

I agree with your suggestion on sonic's voice. The sonic voice supposed to be recognizable by previous actors instead of sounding on it's own like roger craig smith. No one knows if Roger's leaving the role of sonic because the evidence is clear that roger made that decision to leave since sega is trying to make change the direction after for what happen. I was expecting to see Max Mittelman should be next VA for Sonic but roger came back for the waste of time. At least Roger's still doing for the role of sonic just to get his job done along with the writing is changed because of frontiers, now he's improving for next decade, maybe less 5 or 10 years cause it depends on sega changes for voice actors being kept except Mike Pollock. Unless we have lucky that we got Ben Schwartz and Deven Mack

They need to either get Ryan back or make Devin the new voice

Honestly Roger is my favorite version of the character and I literally can't imagine anyone else doing it. Even the Prime actor just did a Roger impression. At this point he's the longest running sonic VA, and he doesn't seem to be going anywhere for a while. As well, people say they don't like Roger now, but people also didn't like Jason when he was voicing Sonic. I think it's really just nostalgia bias for each actor, and as time goes on more people will like Roger's Sonic, just like what's currently happening with Jason.

Yes finally someone who also likes Ryan Drummond as sonic

Happened to notice you neglected to mention Sonic’s voice in some early 90s commercials, the OVA film, & Sonic Schoolhouse