John Bernardy
The Teen Titans/Teen Titans Go! Cast
The Titans cast began their run in 2003 and concluded three years later after five seasons and a movie. I was crestfallen because it was probably my favorite American cartoon and I knew how rare it was to have that much secret sauce all at once. The characters were an amazing family unit and so was their voice cast. You really knew Cyborg, Robin, Beast Boy, Raven and Starfire by the end of the show, and their interactions dictated the vibe way more than the plot of the episode. As short as its run was, I knew—despite Cartoon Network cancelling it for undisclosed reasons—that this show was going to live through its fans forever. And I was going to be one of them.
I showed my wife-to-be “Can I Keep Him?”—the one where Starfire adopts Silkie—and it immediately became one of the most quoted bits of pop culture in our house. Its reputation only grew years later when our boys fell in love with that episode too.
I was pumped when I heard Teen Titans Go! was happening, and that the entire original voice cast was reprising their roles. Though I do admit the 2013 series was tricky to embrace, at first. Things come to mind like Beast Boy calling Raven “Momma,” and Starfire putting “the” in front of most of her the words she doesn’t the understand too the well. It was tricky. But once I leaned into how Go! was the sitcom version of Titans, then I leaned into its affectations. And when the Titans went on Family Feud to play against the Scooby gang—this really happened!—I enjoyed all the jokes.
Once our boys were old enough to watch TV, Go! was one of the first shows we could watch as a family and laugh loudly at the same jokes. Any multi-generational bonding experience will get high marks from me anyway, but I’m so glad ours was Titans.
The somewhat irreverent parody of Titans maintained base character traits at their foundations, though exaggerated to the the Nth degree like with Beast Boy and Starfire’s new vocal ticks. This is mostly anchored by the voice actors. They know the hearts of their characters, and how to meet the Titans and Go! characters in the middle.
Scott Menville plays Robin. He acts in live action shows as well as voice acting roles, but besides maybe Doc Ock/Superior Spider-Man in the 2017 Spider-Man cartoon, Robin is his most-known role. Titans’ Robin is an over-serious leader who will do whatever it takes to get the job done. He’s oftentimes the only one in the room who can make the tough decisions, but he has a loner streak. In Go!, Robin is an over-serious egomaniac who will do whatever it takes to win. He oftentimes has a bossy streak who can make decisions for the greater good of himself, so in that way his loner streak maintains. Except in Go! Robin is always played for laughs.
Most people probably know Khary Payton as King Ezekiel on The Walking Dead, but to me he’ll always be Cyborg, even when he pops up as a side character on shows like Ben 10. Payton’s Titans Cyborg, while often lighthearted, regularly regrets how much a machine he is compared to his human side. Meanwhile, his Go! version embraces the technology and celebrates how much cooler it is now that he can add parts to himself (like a waffle maker!). That duality played for tragedy and comedy is wonderfully done, and done subtly.
Greg Cipes is one of those “he’s everywhere!” kind of voice actors, playing TMNT’s Michealangelo for a stint, and is always Ben 10’s frenemy Kevin Levin, so he’s a lot of things to a lot of people. He always brings the fun vibes though, and it’s interesting to see him bring two entirely different levels of comic relief to the shows. In Go!, he’s a clown, but in Titans, we get to see how it’s also a mask BB uses to help cover any self doubt.
Tara Strong is another voice actor who really is everywhere. She replaced Melissa Gilbert for Batman: The Animated Series’ Batgirl, is Bubbles of the original Powerpuff Girls, is Unikitty herself, and has been the voice of Ben 10’s Ben Tennison since 2016. She’s a big damn deal. How those voices also produce the quintessential gothness of Titans’ Raven or the punk rock/gothness of Raven in Go!, I don’t know. But I’m glad she’s part of the team.
My favorite character of the bunch is the massively endearing Starfire, played by Hynden Walch. Star’s an alien in a strange land in Titans and Go!, but has a pleasant air of wonder in both. Hence mostly only adding the vocal ticks in Go! Her infectious positivity is brought hard by Walch, who you may also know as Adventure Time’s Princess Bubblegum. Being that precious without making viewers want to vomit is a really difficult line to walk, yet Walch appears to achieve it more effortlessly than anyone except maybe The Mandalorian’s Baby Yoda. That’s how good Walch is.
Honorable Mentions
This favorites could go on all day if I wanted to add in every voice actor I like. So I have to quietly and quickly laud Billy West (Stimpy, Futurama’s Fry, etc.), Dee Bradley Baker (Clone Wars’ Captain Rex, our family’s favorite sidekick Nazboo from Shimmer and Shine, etc.), Cam Clarke (Robotech’s Max Sterling, TMNT’s Leonardo, etc.), Rob Paulson (Animaniacs’ Yakko, TMNT’s Rapheal, etc.), and Barry Gordon (TMNT’s Donatello, Might Orbots’ Rob, etc). I also have to somehow breeze past Tiffany Grant’s Asuka, Greg Berger’s Grimlock, Gary Owens’ Space Ghost, and Kevin Conroy’s Batman.
These people’s voices got me through grade school or beyond. Each of them are talented actors in their own right. It pains me that I’m leaving out so many greats here. But hopefully I’ve done my job and have you remembering the voices that made impressions on you while you were growing up.
