Kazuyuki Sogabe
Kazuyuki Sogabe is an actor, born 1948.
Before the microphone there was a guitar. Kazuyuki Sogabe formed the band Slapstick in 1977 with two other voice actors, Toru Furuya and Toshio Furukawa, and played guitar in it while building one of the busiest anime careers of his generation. He came out of the Theatre Echo company and was with Aoni Production by the end.
His voice did a very particular job. It was smooth, unhurried and just slightly too pleasant, which is why directors kept handing him villains: Saga in Saint Seiya, Kunzite in Sailor Moon, Largo in Bubblegum Crisis, Rei Ginsei in Vampire Hunter D, Android 13 in the Dragon Ball Z film, Gore Nova in Lost Universe. He rarely played the shouting kind. His antagonists tend to sound reasonable, which is a great deal more unpleasant.
The range underneath that is wide, and the credits run from the 1970s to the end of the 1990s: Takashi Chiba in Aim for the Ace!, Ippei Mine in Voltes V, Akira Yamamoto in Farewell to Space Battleship Yamato, Reverend Allan in Anne of Green Gables, Marty Tohn in Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honneamise, Taku Yamabana in Cyber City Oedo 808, Wakkein in the first Mobile Suit Gundam film. That is a working actor through the mecha era, the OVA boom and the television series that came after both.
He was born in Funabashi in 1948 and died in 2006, still under contract.
Movies (26)
- Dragon Ball Z: Bardock - The Father of Goku (1990)
- Dragon Ball Z: Super Android 13! (1992)
- Dragon Ball GT: A Hero's Legacy (1997)
- Vampire Hunter D (1985)
- Saint Seiya: Legend of Crimson Youth (1988)
- Royal Space Force - The Wings of Honneamise (1987)
- Mobile Suit Gundam I (1981)
- Cybernetics Guardian (1989)
- The Tomb of Dracula (1980)
- The Dagger of Kamui (1985)
- Ghost Sweeper Mikami (1994)
- Crusher Joe (1983)
- Odin: Starlight Mutiny (1985)
- Megazone 23 (1985)
- Farewell to Space Battleship Yamato (1978)
- Cyborg 009: Legend of the Super Galaxy (1980)
- Metal Skin Panic MADOX-01 (1987)
- Two Down Full Base (1982)
- Dead Heat (1987)
- Hell Teacher Nube (1996)
- Aim for the Ace! The Movie (1979)
- TO-Y (1987)
- Ziggy: Soreyuke! R&R Band (1991)
- Campus Special Investigator Hikaruon (1987)
- The Humanoid (1986)
- Black Lion (1992)
TV (30)
- Sailor Moon (1992)
- Saint Seiya (1986)
- Turn A Gundam (1999)
- Bubblegum Crisis (1987)
- Anne of Green Gables (1979)
- Ghost Sweeper GS Mikami (1993)
- Fang of the Sun Dougram (1981)
- Dream Hunter Rem (1985)
- Shadow Skill (1998)
- Cyber City Oedo 808 (1990)
- Kimba the White Lion (1965)
- Queen Millennia (1981)
- Lost Universe (1998)
- Aura Battler Dunbine (1983)
- Fighting General Daimos (1978)
- Voltes V (1977)
- Attacker You! (1984)
- J9 Series (1981)
- Patalliro! (1982)
- Trider G7 (1980)
- Time Bokan Series: Yattodetaman (1981)
- Braiger (1981)
- Starship Troopers (1988)
- Aim for the Ace! (1973)
- Bubblegum Crash (1991)
- Battle Angel (1993)
- Goliath the Super Fighter (1976)
- Hurricane Polymar (1974)
- Her Majesty's Petite Angie (1977)
- Run Fast! Ruben Kaiser (1977)
Where to start with Kazuyuki Sogabe
The headline credit is Saint Seiya, and Sogabe has the best part in it, playing both Saga and his brother Kanon. The show is 1980s tournament anime at its most operatic, and his voice is the still centre of all that noise. Saint Seiya: Legend of Crimson Youth is the film version of the same energy.
If you want the craft rather than the franchise, go to Royal Space Force - The Wings of Honneamise, one of the most beautifully made animated films of the 1980s and one that asks its entire cast to underplay. Vampire Hunter D and Cyber City Oedo 808 are the OVA years at their most stylish, both with Sogabe as the antagonist.
For the other registers: Sailor Moon gives him Kunzite, which is where a whole generation met him first, Anne of Green Gables casts him against every villain he ever played, and Bubblegum Crisis and Dragon Ball Z: Super Android 13! are the loud fun. Mobile Suit Gundam I is the historical one.