Bryson Baugus and Kamen Casey Look To Strike Gold In Crunchyroll’s BLUE LOCK THE MOVIE -EPISODE NAGI-IN
Like your average sports-based anime, Blue Lock is about the camaraderie of teammates. It’s about the thrill of hard work and the joy of playing a low-stress sport where everyone can have a swell time. Right? RIGHT!?!
There’s a popular idiom that says you can’t make diamonds without a little pressure. For the characters of Blue Lock, that idiom is not only accurate, it’s a way of life. Based on the popular manga, Blue Lock tells the story of high school soccer players from across Japan who have been chosen to participate in a project designed to create the best and most egoistic striker in the world. With hundreds of players vying for the top spot, the competition is as ruthless as it is physically demanding.
In Blue Lock The Movie – Episode Nagi-In, Nagi Seishiro’s hidden jaw-dropping talent and persona are put to the ultimate test after he receives an invitation to the Blue Lock project. Alongside his classmate Mikage Reo, Nagi works to achieve a dream he never even knew he wanted. The film is directed by Shunsuke Ishikawa, with a script penned by anime screenwriter Taku Kishimoto. The English-dubbed version of Blue Lock The Movie – Episode Nagi-In stars Bryson Baugus as Nagi and Kamen Casey as Reo.
Bubbleblabber sat down with Baugus and Casey to talk about the cutthroat world of high school soccer, the complexity of their anime characters, and their favorite thing about voice acting.
Matthew Swigonski: In your own words, can you describe what Blue Lock is about to the casual viewer?
Kamen Casey: Any time anyone comes to me about the show, their impression of sports shows is that they’re friends who are all going to join up together and conquer the world as the underdogs. This is Squid Game-like. It’s very Battle Royale. Win or go home. It’s all dog-eat-dog. And so that’s my way of getting a lot of casual fans to watch. They’re like “Oh, I’m going to watch something friendly.” I’m like, “No, this is cutthroat.” Cutthroat soccer, win or go home is kind of my quick little spiel.
Bryson Baugus: Yeah, battle royale soccer for sure. Like you said, Kamen, a lot of sports anime that I’ve worked on, even outside of this is, it’s very much like, “Oh, well, we’ve got our teams together and no matter what we do, as long as we’re together, and we can play our best. That’s what’s good enough.” And this show, I think more so than any other sports anime, speaks to the more competitive side of a lot of athletes. It really hones in on what that drive is that makes people want to improve and want to get better. Some people can take it a little bit extreme. Some people can be a bit more casual about it. But this show is for the people that are extreme like “I want to be the best at what I do.”
Kamen Casey: I think that’s so true. I want to say I love that aspect, that they weren’t afraid to tackle because I feel like now in this day and age, it’s so much about inclusion. But there are these rare people among us. I love that in one of the first episodes they quote those outliers. Those Lionel Messi’s or Muhammad Ali’s, Kobe [Bryant]. If you want to be that great, you have to step out of the crowd. You have to go outside of the group and do that extra work.
Matthew Swigonski: Were you guys familiar with the manga before joining the series?
Bryson Baugus: I wasn’t personally familiar with the series but a couple of friends of mine had pointed it out when the seasons were coming around and they would be like, “Oh, this is the show to be in.” I think it came out around the same time as Chainsaw Man, which is a really good show as well. And I remember it was the same season and the friend of mine was like, “Yeah, Chainsaw Man’s cool. But Blue Lock, that’s going to be the sleeper hit, definitely check that one out.” I was excited to become a part of it when they gave me the casting call. It was super exciting.
Kamen Casey: I’m the exact same story honestly, but it was a lot of that “Chainsaw Man’s coming, Chainsaw Man is coming!” And then this soccer show. I’m thinking, “Okay, cool. Can’t wait to see more about it.” Then the more I read and just as casual I was like, “Whoa, this sounds really cool!” And then seeing that audition request pop up and I’m like, “What do I got to do, okay!? I want to be a part of that show. It’s so cool.”
Matthew Swigonski: So as a spinoff movie, do you feel like it captures the soul of the original or do you think it kind of steps out on its own?
Bryson Baugus: I think it really captures the soul of the show as well for people who haven’t seen the show. There are going to be nods to the series that you’re going to love to catch with familiarity. But I feel like it also really reintroduces the world very well from the perspective of somebody other than the main character of the show, which is Isagi. Blue Lock is one of those shows where it feels like the character designs and the backstories that they give these characters really showcase three-dimensional thought-out characters. Almost anybody in the show could be the main character of the show.
I feel like they can easily do a spinoff manga about Chigiri, which is my favorite character. They can easily do one about Bachira. That’s one of the things that I love about Blue Lock. A lot of the sports shows that tend to have a lot of staying power are the ones that do that. They go deep into their teams and their characters. They make sure that everyone is their own fully fleshed character as well.
Kamen Casey: I agree. That’s what was so much fun about watching the show and seeing it tied to the movie. It’s almost like if you ask somebody who’s your favorite Pokemon and no one’s going to have the same answer, usually. So this show can do such a good job of fleshing out all these characters. Usually, the main character has the coolest hair, and everyone else just sort of blends in. In this show, everybody has cool hair, cool eyes, cool stats, cool abilities. It’s almost like my hero in that way where there’s just so many different, “Who’s your favorite? Who’s your favorite?” There are so many arguments and debates and I love it. I hope it keeps going. I hope it gets its own video game!
Bryson Baugus: That would be awesome!
Kamen Casey: Let’s just keep it going!
Matthew Swigonski: You both touched on the characters. Could you talk about what defines your character? What makes their story worth telling?
Kamen Casey: Yeah, I’d say Reo is a rich kid. Might be unrelatable in that sense, but he’s relatable in the sense that he wants to prove his parents wrong. And that is his ultimate goal. And he’s going to figure out what he can do in his life to find his own dream and not the dream his parents want him to have. I think that’s what makes them so relatable. Such a great character to write around.
Bryson Baugus: For Nagi, I haven’t read the manga. I haven’t read a lot of the deeper lore about Nagi outside of what’s presented in the show. So I don’t know too much about his family background. They just introduce him as being a student of the same school. So I don’t know if he may have just happened to test super well and get into this super good school off of his innate skill alone or if he also comes from a rich background.
But what I love about Nagi is that he showcases not only that some people out there are just naturally good at certain things with little effort. But what I love about his arc in the show and in this film is that they also showcase that that can only get you so far. You can get a good long way off of raw skill and talent. But in order to completely go all the way you have to start caring and you have to start finding your own reasons for what you want to do. And then one of the things that I like to just sort of truncate his character to as well is that he’s that kid in college that you love to hate. The kid who would get a 100 on every test without ever opening the textbook.
Kamen Casey: What I love about this show is that I grew up on Dragon Ball Z. And Dragon Ball Z made me want to go workout or go training and overcome and be like an underdog! I haven’t really seen that in a while or maybe I just haven’t watched enough anime. But this one made me feel like a kid again where I was screaming at a TV, rooting and cheering. There’s that classic quote of, “Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard” and there is a lot of that in this show.
Bryson Baugus: What I love about Nagi as well as Rio’s relationship is that they go into Blue Lock together and support each other. Nagi is just in it for his friend. And then whenever he first discovers those moments where he’s like, “Wait, I’m enjoying this. I’m having fun. I don’t want to lose. I want to get better at this.” The way that the show develops this is super entertaining and super great.
Matthew Swigonski: It’s obvious that you both have a passion for this project. Do you think that makes a big difference for actors when they feel passionate about a project? Something tangible that can show up in their work?
Bryson Baugus: I feel like a lot of the best actors out there can put all of themselves and all of their passion for acting into any work that they do, even if it’s not something up their alley. I just happened to have become a good fan of this genre after having worked on it before. But I feel like a lot of the best actors can see a project and it not be their biggest thing and be like, “Oh, well this isn’t my type of show but I’m still going to give it my all because I love performing and I love telling stories. And I want to make sure that even if it’s not my thing, this is somebody’s favorite thing and I’m going to do my best for their sake.”
Kamen Casey: Yeah, I am from an athletic background, so when I went and switched over to entertainment, I’m very competitive and brought that same mentality. A chance to work is a chance to work again. So I’d say for actors out there, pour you’re all into it. Whether it’s one line, whether it’s a main character or a side character in the background, whatever you can do to be a star in your role, go for it. Study up. Do the research. Get off book and study the show. Dig deep so you can bring that to the table. Other people are watching and they’re listening and they can be like, “Hey, I like that guy. Maybe I’ll put him in my thing.”
Matthew Swigonski: What would you say would be the easiest challenge for a voice actor to overcome versus maybe the most difficult?
Kamen Casey: You don’t have to dress up for the job. I mean, once you’re in the booth you can wear whatever you need to wear. [laughs] That’s enjoyable. The hardest part I’d say is to trust that your voice is interesting. Sometimes by itself. Of course, you’re going to have your different types of voices. But trust that your speaking voice can be a character. And I think a lot of people are afraid to speak as themselves first and think they immediately have to become something else. And there are plenty of roles where your voice fits because you’re a person too with a voice.
Bryson Baugus: And much like what Kamen said in terms of not having to dress up, not having to memorize lines. I love that aspect of it. I did a lot of theater throughout college and high school and had to memorize lines. And I feel like I was pretty good at it. Especially once we got on our feet and I could memorize motion with words. But I love just having the script in front of me telling me what to say the whole time.
The hardest part about finding voices is sometimes whenever I’m cast in a role that’s not in my typical wheelhouse. Like even Nagi himself, I feel like vocally he sits pretty close to my natural voice. He’s just kind of my medium range. But the energy that he gives, which is my most important thing when approaching a role, is trying to match that energy of the original performance while also trying to do what the director is asking for.
Nagi in particular is very much like that lazy “Oh, I don’t really care. I just want to play video games. I don’t want to try too hard.” And in Japan, it can come across as “Oh yeah, he’s cool and collected and like he’s just so mysterious.” In America, a lot of those traits are very attached to something such as laziness and whininess. And so for me, especially with Nagi, trying to find that balance between sounding just kind of aloof, like a ghost wandering through the halls curious about the humans around him. That’s a good comparison that Jonathan Rigg the director always likes to make. I feel like we found that balance in this film and I’m really proud of the work that we’ve put in.
Blue Lock The Movie – Episode Nagi-In hits theaters on Friday, June 28.
