what's up with zod and ursa's voices?

[Jack Tripper]

i'm sure this has been brought up and answered, but what's up with zod and ursa's voices in the donner scenes? im watching SII extended edition on vhs and their voices sound nothing like their lester counterparts. they almost sound cartoony and they're not powerful/intimidating sounding at all. did the donner dialogue audio get screwed up or something? i'm dying to know!

[crazy_asian_man]

This is just speculation on my part: I think a quieter Zod would have played scarier (look at how quiet his voice is in relation to how violent the moon attack is)- so, perhaps that's why Zod does seem less menacing... in fact, he's calm for the White House Donner scene as well, and it worked fine- he only 'lost it' when he screamed at Supes to kneel before Zod at the Planet.... it doesn't match with Lester's version, of course... but was consistent in its own right.... there just wasn't enough finished scenes to contrast how dark and violent the rest of the Zod scenes would have been.

As far as Ursa goes, though, I think SHE would have been redubbed under Donner at times. The original voice for her did not match her look at all in some parts. (Her more feminine voice also pops up in Lester's fortress scenes in the IRC- very different than the rest of the film).

[Jimbo]

Jun 17, 2009 1:50:08 GMT -5 Jack Tripper said:

i'm sure this has been brought up and answered, but what's up with zod and ursa's voices in the donner scenes? im watching SII extended edition on vhs and their voices sound nothing like their lester counterparts. they almost sound cartoony and they're not powerful/intimidating sounding at all. did the donner dialogue audio get screwed up or something? i'm dying to know!

I'm thinking that their voices in the Donner scenes are the original production voices. When S2 was in post-production under Lester's helm, the actors came in and dubbed over their production voices with the ones we're familiar with. Since much of their scenes originally shot by Donner were reshot by Lester or removed from the theatrical version, those parts never got re-dubs. Then when reassembling the Donner Cut, they used all they had. So sometimes we get snooty Zod, and we get cold Zod, and we get girly Ursa and we get evil Ursa.

[crazy_asian_man]

I'm thinking that their voices in the Donner scenes are the original production voices. When S2 was in post-production under Lester's helm, the actors came in and dubbed over their production voices with the ones we're familiar with. Since much of their scenes originally shot by Donner were reshot by Lester or removed from the theatrical version, those parts never got re-dubs. Then when reassembling the Donner Cut, they used all they had. So sometimes we get snooty Zod, and we get cold Zod, and we get girly Ursa and we get evil Ursa.

That's probably what it is-

Though- Zod's voice change doesn't bother me so much as Reeve's and Kidder's..... when it just may be extremely poor voice doubles. Or was it a result of the audio tapes' "cooking" process mentioned in the RDC docs? Either way..... some of those line readings really hurt the ear and pop out....

(helium voice) "I'm not a coward, zod!"

[Jimbo]

Ugh, the voice doubles.

One thing I did notice. In the ABC cut, we hear Zod say "I trust you are not wasting my time, Lex Luthor" as they fly to the Fortress. In that version, you can clearly hear Stamp's voice.

In the Donner Cut, it's dubbed over by someone who is obviously not Stamp.