Returning for season 2 on November 3, Amazon Prime’s Invincible is full of wildcard moves like shocking superhero twists that disrupt a charming coming-of-age narrative. And its myriad cast of voice actors is no exception. At New York Comic-Con, series/comic creator Robert Kirkman and showrunner Simon Racioppa spoke to reporters in a roundtable setting and told The Mary Sue all about it.
It seems like Invincible‘s voice cast falls into three categories: superhero alumni, comedians, and The Walking Dead alumni. Undeniably, if you’re a TWD fan and not watching this show, you’re missing out. All the besties have reunited! The main cast includes Steven Yeun, Gillian Jacobs, Andrew Rannells, Zazie Beetz, J.K. Simmons, and Mark Hamill. I could keep going!
But forming cliques was not the intent. “I think that we always try to think of the best actor for the role,” said Kirkman during the discussion. “I love that we have a wide range […] not only do we have big movie stars like Seth Rogen, but we have great actors like Grey DeLisle. She’s an excellent voice actor that’s done, you know, a ton of different things.” Also known as Grey Griffin, the performer Kirkman shouted out plays Shrinking Rae, Monster Girl, and Olga in Invincible.
If nothing else, the cast keeps voice sessions fun and different, according to Kirkman. “It’s great having Kevin Michael Richardson and Sterling K. Brown in scenes together, you know,” Kirkman continued. “And you’ve got absolute lunatics like Jason Mantzoukas and Ben Schwartz, [who] just will not do our dialogue, no matter how hard we try to get them to do our dialogue exactly the way that we’ve written it. It’s just a great mix.”
“I think it’s that diversity that actually brings something really great to the show,” continued Racioppa. “Linda Lamontagne is our casting director, and she just brings us a great variety of names. And we also ask for, like, a wild card pick. We’re like, ‘Who’s the craziest person you could think of for this role?’ And she gives us a couple of names of people you might not consider. You’re like ‘Wait a second, actually…’ and you talk about that.”
Besides Brown and Schwartz, some of the new Invincible cast members in Season 2 include Tatiana Maslany, Chloe Bennet, Cliff Curtis, Rob Delaney, Daveed Diggs, Calista Flockhart, Luke MacFarlane, Scoot McNairy, Ella Purnell, Tim Robinson, Rhea Seehorn, Lea Thompson, Jay Pharoah, and Paul F. Tompkins. “So I think we’re very lucky that, again, we have such a broad cast in so many different ways and they really just bring something different and something special to the show that you can’t get anywhere else,” said Racioppa.
However, that doesn’t mean the producers don’t have a wish list for potential future seasons of Invincible. Earlier this year at San Diego Comic-Con, Kirkman said that Bryan Cranston had to turn down a role on Invincible for scheduling reasons. Comedian Connor O’Malley (I Think You Should Leave, Joe Pera Talks To You) simply declined. (And as our Rachel Leishman observed at PaleyFest this year, Kirkman brought up O’Malley as a dream ‘get’ again! Come through, sir!)
(featured image: Prime Video)
