I think I'm in the minority but the little I've heard of James Marsters, the less I like him voice actor wise. Mostly why I don't have the audio books yet. I heard a tad of the books online as a sample and was not impressed. I would prefer that Paul Blackthorne had read them or maybe even the guy that does Angel. I like his voice better. JM's voice just annoys the heck out of me maybe cause I didn't like him as Spike and he's not what I would call my favorite actor. *shrugs* But everyone has their own preferences.
Its not as bad as you might think. I had heard them before, but when I found out it was spike doing the reading I thought I would only be able to picture buffy characters for the rest of the books. But it draws you in surprisingly well. My only beef with them isnt really him so much as the production itself. He speaks rather softly when reading the internal and descriptive stuff (which ill admit can induce some lethargy in the way any deep, soft male voice does), to the point where I have to turn up the volume to static levels. But its when Harry is shouting Fuego at the top of his lungs, so does Marsters, and it will nearly blow out my speakers. But thats not the voice actor, thats post-production. Where's the level balance?
OK, rant complete. I feel better. To be fair, it may just be my copy (its SK) thats not refined, since at one point Marsters also screws up a line, drops the f-bomb, and then backs up and does it over. Weird huh?.
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