Sarah Natochenny voiced Ash Ketchum for the bulk of the Pokémon animated series, but she wasn’t the first to bring the character to life. That honor goes to Veronica Taylor, who portrayed Ash in the anime and movies for eight seasons. In other words, Natochenny was right there when Pokémon went from unknown to the biggest franchise in the world.
Taylor has had plenty of other roles since being removed from Pokémon, but millions of fans the world over still consider her to be Ash. It’s the voice kids grew up with and the one all sorts of amazing nostalgia is tied to. While the series has long since moved on from Taylor, some fans still struggle to do so. In a new interview with Kotaku, we learn that Taylor herself has also found it hard to close that chapter of her life.
“I don’t know if I fully have said [goodbye] to Ash. When we were all recast, or fired—however you want to put it—after the eighth season, it was incredibly devastating to not have a chance to go on with the show. I’ve had a bit of PTSD with the ending, of just how sad it is.”
Taylor used this reveal as a jumping point to talk about voice acting as a whole and just how volatile the industry is. If you’d like to see more from Taylor on her journey both with Pokémon and after, you can find the full interview here.
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marl0
3M agoI actually stopped watching the series after this happened back in the day, and never returned to it. To this day, any time I hear the new voice cast, it's so off putting to me that I just can't watch it.
mock turtle
3M agoI know they wanted a hard break from 4Kids, but that really was a shame. The original voices were so perfect.
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