With its gritty art style and a world built on society’s cast-off treasures, Gachiakuta has quickly carved out a unique space for itself this anime season. A significant part of its success with Western audiences has been its widely praised English dub. The tone, raw language, and powerful performances by the voice cast have blended perfectly with the series’ chaotic energy.
As the anime continues to gain steady popularity, the Animehunch team had the opportunity to sit down with two of the key voices bringing this world to life: Bryson Baugus, who voices the fiery protagonist Rudo, and Christopher Wehkamp, the voice of the cool and collected Enjin.
We had a casual conversation about their initial thoughts on the series and, most fascinatingly, how their views on their characters have evolved since the time they first got acquainted with them!
Animehunch Team: Let’s start from the beginning. How did you guys first come to know of Gachiakuta, and what were your initial impressions of the series?
Animehunch Team: And what about you Christopher?
Christopher Wehkamp: It was very similar for me as well. I did a panel with Zeno—Zeno somehow is the proselytizer of this show and story.
Animehunch Team: So, Jabber [Zeno] is the one who spreading the Gachiakuta agenda!
Christopher Wehkamp: Yeah! Yeah! Before the anime was even out! He was just all in, and he was really selling it to me. So, same as Bryson, when the sides came out, I had a chance to see it and decided to read a little bit. I just got hooked right away. I think the mysteries within the story kept me coming back, and now it’s like every Tuesday, I can’t wait to read more about it. That’s kind of how it started.
Animehunch Team: Did you feel that Gachiakuta was different from other typical shonen series you’ve seen, like established hits such as Naruto? Did it feel different from other works you’ve read before?
Bryson Baugus: Yeah, I think the power system is very unique in that it’s the whole idea of “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure.” I also love that it doesn’t rush to do a billion fights at a time. I like that it takes its time with the characters, develops the relationships between people, and expands on the world. And as Chris said, it introduces all these mysteries that you’re intrigued to find out more about. With other shonens, not to disparage them in any way, I feel like a lot of them tend to focus more on just, “Here’s a really cool fight,” and then the episode ends, and the next episode starts with another really cool fight. They don’t tend to take as much time to develop the world as I feel Gachiakuta has, for sure.
Animehunch Team: Since you both mentioned the auditions, can you tell us a bit about that process? What was it like, and which characters were you auditioning for? Was it always Rudo and Enjin from the start, or were you aiming for someone else?
Christopher Wehkamp: I only auditioned for Enjin, mostly because when I saw the sides, I just connected with his character design a whole lot. When I went in to characterize him, obviously he’s very cool, and I wanted to get that across. But he also has a really playful, goofy side, so I wanted to try to strike that balance between a super cool, chill, laid-back guy who can take care of business, who also has a really silly, goofy side. That was a really interesting challenge to try and walk that narrow path with the audition, so I focused all my time on Enjin. I didn’t audition for anybody else.
Bryson Baugus: I saw the auditions and I saw Enjin and I said, “I’m not auditioning for this guy.” I have a bit of a higher voice, so I tend to stick to more of the older teens, maybe the mid-teen range, so Rudo felt very at home for me. I had also auditioned for Zanka. I was pretty confident in what I did with Zanka’s audition, but I really honed in on Rudo. I feel like the dynamics of his character really showcased well in the audition that I did. I think it also helped that I was coming off having done a convention or two right before doing the auditions. Rudo has a bit of a raspiness to him, and so I think Rudo is one of those characters that actually having a “convention voice” helps me to get into character.
Animehunch Team: When you first auditioned, certain personality traits must have stood out. Now that you’re 11 episodes in and have spent more time with your characters, has your perception of them changed? Did you initially see your character one way, but after voicing them through their struggles, you began to see them in a new light?
Bryson Baugus: When I first saw Rudo, I feel like he was always presented on paper as this young, edgy, very angry kid who just wants to lash out at the world and go after those who did him wrong. But—and this is why I’m glad I read those first few chapters before my audition—I feel at his heart, Rudo seems more like a kid who just feels misunderstood. He’s very lonely. His birth parents neglected him, and he grew up in the slums, so he hasn’t really had many friends to connect with. I feel like at his heart, he’s just looking for people that he can connect with on a personal level.
That’s just my personal interpretation. Had I not read some of that initial stuff, I probably would have bought into this idea of him just being this really vengeful, one-note type character. But with the wider context, you see a little bit more about the inner soul of the character, and I think that’s something I try to incorporate in all my performances of him.
Animehunch Team: Understanding that there was more to him than a one-dimensional angry kid, how did you implement that in your voice acting?
Bryson Baugus: I try not to make him sound so angry all the time. He’s definitely got that abrasiveness to him, and whenever he’s entering a new unfamiliar territory where he feels there might be hostility, he still comes at it with a bit of a gruffness. But I feel like once he gets to know people, he tends to soften up a little bit. He tries to learn from others more so than try and shut people out, if that makes sense. He still has those moments where the anger kind of resurfaces, and I won’t get too much into spoilers, but he definitely has moments where that anger still seeps in and he has to learn how to cope with that. But I really do feel like the heart of Rudo is just a kid who’s looking to find that family that he never really had outside of Regto.
Animehunch Team: And Christopher, how has your view of Enjin evolved?
Christopher Wehkamp: You know, this is one of these exciting characters where I get to be kind of as ill-informed as the audience. It’s great because, on the one hand, we see what we have of Enjin on the surface. And then, as part of the great world-building and mystery of this world, his ultimate motivation is still kind of unclear, simply because we don’t really know his past. We don’t necessarily know how he came to be where he’s at, where he got his awesome breaker, and where it all originates from.
From what we see on the surface, he really cares about the people that are under his charge. The few times that we’ve seen him lose his cool have been when they’ve been threatened. So he definitely has that sort of paternal, very protective sensibility about his fellow Cleaners. He feels a lot of responsibility to keep them safe and in line. But yeah, I have so many questions. I’m so excited to go on the journey and figure out what the answers to these questions are. That’s the part I look forward to every week.
Animehunch Team: Oh yeah, I guess the whole fandom is with you on that one. Everyone has some burning questions regarding Enjin. Anyway, this was a great conversation, and thank you both for taking your time out to speak with us!
Both Rudo and Enjin will continue their journey in the upcoming episodes of Gachiakuta which you can stream on Crunchyroll. Meanwhile, we had a fun trivia section with both Bryson and Christopher which we will be uploading to our social media channels soon, so stay tuned!
© Kei Urana, Hideyoshi Andou and KODANSHA/ “GACHIAKUTA” Production Committee
