If you've watched any of the non-English versions of yesterday's new episode "Icy Prints", you might have noticed something weird: Without any fanfare, most of the voice actors have been completely replaced in the dubbed versions of My Little Pony: Tell Your Tale. The English voice actors remain, but for most other languages this seems to be a sudden downgrade.
Many dubs had had production continuity since the start of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, so this was completely unexpected. For example, Twilight Sparkle had been voiced in Latin American Spanish by Carla Castañeda almost continuously from 2011 to 2023, and the dubbing studio Iyuno-SDI Group Mexico was responsible for the Latin American Spanish dubs for this whole period. That seems to be over now.
It seems the original voice actors and voice directors weren't informed about this at all! Apparently, most of the new voices are so unfitting that there's even been some speculation that the voices might have been generated by AI. We probably won't be able to confirm anything yet, since the credits aren't available: the dubbing credits for My Little Pony: Tell Your Tale are only shown on Netflix, which still only has the first 40 episodes of the show right now. The voice actors are not credited on YouTube.
Below are the statements of various crew members who were unknowingly replaced.
Samanta Figueroa (Pipp Petals, Latin American Spanish) said she was grateful to have been part of My Little Pony and wished the new voice actors the best. She also said that Pipp meant a lot to her and would always be one of her favorite characters.
Fue muy bonito formar parte de MLP, estoy muy agradecida!!
— sam (@saaamfig) January 11, 2024
Hoy vi que cambiaron el cast de doblaje… sólo le deseo todo lo mejor a los nuevos actores. 💞
Pipp significa mucho para mi y siempre será de mis personajes favoritos 🤍
Casco al corazón, Pippsters y Bronies! 💗
Maggie Vera (voice director, Latin American Spanish) said she had no idea why the voices were changed.
No tengo idea porqué cambiaron las voces….
— Maggie Vera (@MaggieVera_) January 11, 2024
Leticia Amezcua (Izzy Moonbow, Latin American Spanish) bade farewell to her beloved Izzy, and said the truth was that she would miss her. She also said she hadn't known that her voice had been replaced.
Bueno, pues adiós mi querida Izzy, la verdad te voy a extrañar. Qué tristeza, no sabía que ya tenías otra voz. Adiós #mylittlepony5G pic.twitter.com/E7Fx8PQL2N
— Leticia Amezcua (@Multilety) January 11, 2024
Valca Ponzanelli (Zipp Storm, Latin American Spanish) broke the news to her Instagram followers that the voices had been changed beginning with the new season of My Little Pony: Tell Your Tale. She said she had no idea what happened, and that it was very sad.