Fred Tatasciore Is The Voice Of Lord Zedd In 'Power Rangers Cosmic Fury'
The casting is a microcosm of what the future of 'Power Rangers' may entail
On Wednesday, the review embargo lifted for Power Rangers Cosmic Fury, two days before its Netflix release. I was obviously not one of those people. But those who got the season in advance were able to pick and choose what details to withhold in spoiler-free reviews beyond the topics they were forbidden from talking about within. SentaiFive’s review suggested that Star Trek: Lower Decks fans would be surprised to know who voiced this season’s villain, the returning Lord Zedd. ComicsOnline however was quite upfront, revealing it to be Fred Tatasciore.
Tatasciore’s casting came about because his voice actor for Dino Fury, Andrew Laing, abdicated the role due to online harassment. His previous Power Rangers roles included the villain Venjix from Power Rangers RPM and Beast Morphers. Condemnation-needing from a moral standpoint, it’s also a bit mind-boggling from a logic standpoint, as Zedd’s original voice actor, Robert Axelrod died in September 2019. Even when Power Rangers wasn’t in a position to have such long-reaching reprisals, he wouldn’t have been able to do it anyway. It’s unfortunate that fans couldn’t keep their boundaries.
Tatasciore is an established and prolific practically ubiquitous American voice actor who is well-known as the voice of the Incredible Hulk in a significant handful of animated Marvel productions, starting with Wolverine and the X-Men and most recently the 2017 Spider-Man animated series. He’s also been the voice of DC Comics character Solomon Grundy nine times since 2015, with the latest being the just-released Scooby-Doo! and Krypto, Too! Recent Looney Tunes series including Tiny Toons Looniversity have seen him take up Yosemite Sam and Taz.
When Barbara Goodson and Richard Horvitz were confirmed for Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Once and Always, it was utterly astounding to fans who had seen the show foster its pool of New Zealand actors like Laing for 20 years. Once and Always was the first time a New Zealand production was able to reach back and get previous voice actors. While this is the show’s first step in building its American pool whether this original continuity continues or not as they leave their kiwi production home, it’s not his first time in the franchise. Remember 2017’s Power Rangers movie with Stranger Things’s Dacre Montgomery, Aladdin’s Naomi Scott, and Mortal Kombat’s Ludi Lin, Bryan Cranston, Elizabeth Banks and Bill Hader? Tatasciore did all the noises from Goldar, who admittedly wasn’t as much of a functioning character in this iteration. Tatasciore’s very used for creature voices too in the line of Frank Welker and Dee Bradley Baker, like as Devil Dinosaur on Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur.
While the franchise has featured other prominent voice actors like Johnny Yong Bosch, Neil Kaplan, and Alex Borstein, these were early roles for them, and before they became famous. There was another time though when Power Rangers used more household names in American voice acting too. The 2007 video game Power Rangers: Super Legends was a 15th anniversary celebration with plots featuring Zedd or SPD’s Emperor Gruumm depending on the console. Included in the cast were Yuri Lowenthal (Ben 10, Spider-Man from Insomniac), Keith Ferguson (Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, DuckTales), and Nolan North (Blaze and the Monster Machines, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles). This was probably the lowest-profile recasting of the next few weeks, considering Super Mario Bros. Wonder will reveal Charles Martinet’s successor(s?) for his slate of characters on October 20, and Rick and Morty moves on from Justin Roiland five days earlier on October 15.
Source: ComicsOnline