I know they wanted an authoritative voice, a lot less B.S., almost brooding.Īre you jealous of Will Friedle for the "ThunderCats, ho!" battle cry that he gets to do as Lion-O? Do you want Panthro to have his own? It kind of flowed out a little differently from the other guys I do. It was kind of a Michael Clarke Duncan-ish, Keith David-ish feel. Richardson: When I went on tape, I said, "Who is this guy, really?" And I thought: tough, strong, silent type. It could have been anyone: an Asian, a Puerto Rican, Caucasian, who knows? From what you and I remember from back in the day, he did have this nice, smooth, ethnic touch to his voice. Fortunately, Panthro is not really a big, black dude, but a big fat cat. And I tend to recycle them with different roles from time to time. Richardson: A lot of times when people cast me, they want this big, deep black voice. Since you were familiar with Earle Hyman's work as the previous Panthro, how did you try to make the voice for the updated Panthro different? I think that's going to come up in some future episodes though. In this new twist that they have on it, he's still a tough guy, he has some lightheartedness to him, however, he's a little more edgy. He had wisdom to teach to the rest of the ThunderCats, even though he wasn't the appointed leader. It wasn't just this, big brash tough guy. Richardson: From the original, he's tough, he's strong and has that gravitas to him, but he also had some heart. Why was Panthro your favorite Thunderian? How has his character changed in the new version? The fact that I was cast in the role to boot was just the icing on the cake for me. I had no idea that they were going to try to make a new one. So when they approached me for this job, I was blown away. Here I was, a big guy watching ThunderCats. I had some ankle surgery because of a sports injury and so I was in the hospital and it would come on every day more than once. Kevin Michael Richardson: I remember watching it back in the '80s. What's your previous knowledge of ThunderCats? How were you approached to play the voice of Panthro? Here's more from the interview with Richardson, who identifies with Panthro. Just think of a pimped out version of the old one. He'll show his silhouette and then he'll use the nunchaku, showing off his skills, but he uses the ThunderTank mostly. It's brief but it's really action-packed and a very cool entrance, I must say. It's when you least expect it and it's when the team really needs him the most. "I was very impressed with how they introduced him," he says. He was like a one-take wonder with the amount of lines he had to squeeze in such a short amount of time."Īlthough Richardson doesn't divulge any details about where Panthro has been ("The show will address that," he says) or how he meets up with Lion-O, it's not difficult to guess. "I saw a rough cut of it a couple months ago and I must say we were all in the room saying, 'Wow.' Atticus ( The Middle) played the young child in the episode. "It was really a heartfelt episode," says Richardson, who's also known for voicing Cleveland Jr. Here's a peek at Lion-O's first encounter with the Petalars: Through this short-lived race, the ThunderCats learn a valuable lesson about keeping hope alive. In "Song of the Petalars," Lion-O and his gang are running from lizard assassins when they happen upon the Petalars, creatures who live their entire lifetime in 24 hours. What's on your Watchlist? Create one and add favorites like ThunderCats After all of this misdirection, it's a relief to know that we'll see the real Panthro back, however briefly, on Friday's episode (8:30/7:30c on Cartoon Network). Later, a false Panthro is revealed to actually be the evil Mumm-Ra in disguise. In the reboot, Panthro is first reported to be killed in action. When ThunderCats made its triumphant return to television in July, fans were outraged that Panthro, an integral part of the original '80s-era ThunderCats team, was absent without a satisfactory explanation. "Someone said that on Facebook, and I was like, 'Really?'" "I noticed a little bit of a rumor about that," Kevin Michael Richardson, who voices Panthro in the Cartoon Network remake, tells. ThunderCats | Photo Credits: Warner Bros.
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