gen:LOCK First Impressions

Hey, everybody! I know it’s been a while since you’ve seen a post from me but I found some downtime to watch and write something! I wanted to especially talk about this brand new series that has been hyped up within the RoosterTeeth community for a little over a year now. It’s a show created and imagined by RT’s own Gray Haddock. If you don’t know anything about Gray, he’s done a bit of voice acting in his career but he was hired at RT as a visual effects artist and digital compositor back in 2011. Fast forward to the present, not only does he voice act for some of RT’s Animated series but now writes and directs gen:LOCK.

To put it in the simplest terms of genre, gen:LOCK is a mecha anime/series. It’s obviously set in the distant future where humanity has advanced technology so far that the military has walking mechs and citizens have state of the art social/entertainment tech. The story takes a turn as a dark organization known as the Union have weaponized nano-technology and have started to siege the world as we know it. It has become the Vanguards duty to defend against their takeover.

What really grabbed everyone’s attention these past few months, before its premiere, were the casting announcements. Get ready for big name drops because to us, as the RT community, it’s always an insane and exciting surprise every time they cast someone familiar or famous to do VA work.

First up to bat, our main protagonist: Michael B. Jordan as Julian Chase
I’m assuming we’re all familiar with who MBJ is at this point. He’s becoming really well known recently especially after the success of Blank Panther and his openness about watching/loving anime.

Next is the love interest: Dakota Fanning as Miranda Worth
Maybe her name might ring a few bells for some of you but what I just found out is she did the voiceover for Satsuki in My Neighbor Totoro.

Then we have a heavy favorite among television: David Tennant as Dr. Rufus Wheller
Fans of Tennant know him mainly as the Tenth Doctor in the Doctor Who series and as Kilgrave in Netflix’s Jessica Jones.

The list goes on with Maisie Williams,  aka Arya Stark from Game of Thrones, Koichi Yamadera, well known as Spike from Cowboy Bebop, Monica Rial, who has a vast career in VA, Asia Kate Dillon from Orange is the New Black, and Golshifteh Farahani, who you might recognize from Pirates of the Carribean. Of course, I can’t forget to mention their own in-house talent of Miles Luna, Blaine Gibson, Chad James, and of course Gray Haddock himself.

Now that I’ve told you some cold hard facts, I think it’s time to give my opinion on the first few episodes. I am honestly, truly excited for what this series will bring forth. It’s such a different angle from what RT fans are used to seeing and it just goes to show how much their company is still growing. I can tell how much effort is put into the writing for this series because I see little easter eggs that fans post on social media that I sometimes miss and it just makes me so happy. I think even if you might not enjoy their “style” of animation, you should be at least interested in the story and the amount of talent they have behind this series. The first episode is free for everyone to watch on the Rooster Teeth site and just like with CR, RT: First members see the newest episodes a week early but if you’re subscribed to VRV you’ll be able to watch there as well!