Amanda Celine Miller addresses Cannon Busters diversity and She-Ra season 4

Amanda Celine Miller shares why she loved voicing for Flutterina in She-Ra season 4, the possibility of a season 5, and script writing for anime’s most diverse series yet, Cannon Busters.

While we’re sitting here waiting for the release dates of She-Ra season 5 and Cannon Busters season 2, Hidden Remote had the chance to speak with voice actor and script writer Amanda Celine Miller about her time working on both Netflix projects. While she says She-Ra‘s season 4 character Flutterina was a total departure from the characters she usually voices for, the diversity of Cannon Busters struck a positive, personal chord.

Both television series share the commonality of setting new standards for their animation origins. She-Ra and the Princess of Power was originally a female-focused series from the 80s, focused on a sword-wielding girl name Adora (known as She-Ra) who joins a royal rebellion to fight against her former friends and teachers of ” The Evil Horde.”

Meant to empower young women during a time where men dominated the world of superhero shows and comics, She-Ra was rebooted for Netflix by Noelle Stevenson and the show has since been nominated for a number of awards, from an Emmy, Golden Trailer, Broadcast Film Critics, and Annie awards.

Amanda Miller, known to most as the voice of Boruto, joined the cast for its latest season as the pink fairy darling of She-Ra’s group, Flutterina.

In a similar way to how the show She-Ra stands apart from traditional American cartoons, the show appealing to adults and teens alike, LeSean Thomas’ Cannon Busters is out to prove Japanese anime is also ready for a change by being one of the first anime to have such a diverse main cast. Miller, responsible for the show’s dubbed script, even says additional changes were made to the show to cater to multi-racial anime fans such as herself.

Miller sat down with Hidden Remote to talk about what these shows meant to her and why others should give them a chance.

Hidden Remote: You’re known for roles like Baruto and Sailor Jupiter, but more recently you took on the voice of Flutterina in She-Ra season 4. What attracted you to that role?

Amanda Miller:  It’s unusual because I never seem to book young, cute, pink characters and I was like, “Oh my gosh I get to be this fangirly, adorable, fairy princess-looking person.” I was so excited. Even when I do play females, they tend to be more tomboys or warriors. Flutterina was a really cool departure for me.

Hidden Remote: Was it an interesting challenge seeing what your voice was capable of doing in that kind of a character?

Miller: Yes. It’s interesting because if I had gotten that role ten years ago, my voice could have been even higher pitched. Then she would have been even cuter, if you can believe it.

I also like how fans can relate to her fangirly side where she’s just totally obsessed with She-Ra.

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Hidden Remote: Was this a show you particularly enjoyed? You’d worked on many other animation projects before, but was there something about this show that stuck to you?

Miller: Well first off, the fact that I’d go into the room to record and the voice director was the incredible Mary Elizabeth McGlynn from Naruto and Cowboy Bebop was amazing. The whole team was a bunch of badass women and we just had fun.

I usually recorded by myself but every once in a while I got to record with Merit Leighton who plays Frosta and Aimee Carrero who plays Adora, or She-Ra. It was such a women-powered project and everyone was full of light and positivity. It made it really awesome to come to work.

Hidden Remote: You voice for Flutterina, but you also voice for Moon Guard and “Ripped Older Woman,” as it says on IMDb. I know you guys are finished recording for season four, and fans are really hoping for a season five. 

Miller: All of us on the show have to be very tight-lipped about it. Netflix likes to guard their secrets like Fort Knox. Which makes sense, because then it gets people hyped when they do finally drop the news.

Hidden Remote: Then maybe a better question would be, if She-Ra is renewed for a season five, is Flutterina’s character–and maybe other voice acting opportunities in the show–be something you’d like to continue working with?

Miller: Oh yes, that’d be super cool. I wish I could talk more in-depth about it, but I don’t want to spoil anything.

Hidden Remote: This year was kind of a big year for you with landing a role in the new She-Ra season and working on the video game Rage 2. But on top of that you wrote the English script for Cannon Busters, an anime created by American LeSean Thomas, adapted into Japanese for its premier and your were responsible for translating it back into English. That’s not common with a lot of anime. Were there particular challenges that came along with that?

Miller: In the beginning, we weren’t sure how much they wanted us to stick to the original English script, because there were some changes made with the Japanese. It was a learning process for all of us, even LeSean.

A lot of people want the Japanese to be the pure version, but in this case the original English version is the “pure” version. But LeSean was up for changing a lot so it made the script more of a living, breathing thing. From one adaptation to the next, this show was evolving into what the creator’s vision actually was for the show.

Hidden Remote: This is not the first time you’ve done script adaptation. You also wrote the dubbed script for the anime Last Hope, the french TV series Lastman, as well as the new Norwegian Christmas series on Netflix Home For Christmas, which premiered this month. Have you always wanted to get into script adaptation?

Miller: I want to be a screenwriter. I want to be a Tina Fey or a Mindy Kaling. I want to be an actor who creates her own shows, but the adaptation scripts are a really fun way to keep those muscles sharp. You’re not just copying the English translation. You have to give it life.

Sometimes the translations you have to adapt from are very, very literal and they don’t sound like how a human being would talk, so you have to write it in a way where that joke does come through and make sense and where the words still sound like something that character would actually say. I enjoy that challenge of it.

Hidden Remote: Another unique aspect to Cannon Busters, in addition to it being created by an American, is that it has a lot more diversity in its main characters than anime we’re used to seeing. 

Miller: Yeah, I loved that. In the original pilot LeSean used the Kickstarter money to create, the main character of Sam was still a girl of color, but she had this straight, typical anime girl hair. But between the pilot and the finished version of the show, LeSean decided to give Sam’s hair a more poofy texture. I told him how much I appreciated that because I’ve got big, curly hair. I’m multi racial and I don’t usually see anime characters with my kind of hair, so this was cool because representation matters.

LeSean said that he wanted people to see that anyone could be an anime character, any skin color and any hair texture. This isn’t a show about people of color, the characters just happen to be that on this awesome space adventure. I hope everyone watches it.

Hidden Remote: This is one of the first times that a diverse anime character is at the forefront of the story, rather than being in random plot pockets on the side. 

Miller: Yeah and it was nice having this anime be created by somebody who also is a person of color. Sometimes you see African-American characters in anime that are pretty stereotyped because the person creating them doesn’t actually know any African-Americans. I’ve seen anime where they make just the black guy rap and I’m like, “Oh, god.”

So, to have LeSean be an African-American himself, it was cool because you didn’t see as much stereotyping or cliché tropes.

Hidden Remote: Were there parts of this script or certain characters that were particularly fun for you to work on?

Miller: I feel like Philly The Kid really has my dry sense of humor. Since he can’t die, or at least he’s not sure how many lives he has left, it gives his character this sardonic look on life. I really enjoy when something dark like that also allows for some comedy. How many of us are like “Yeah, sure, bring it,” when it comes to dying? That’s how Philly is.

There’s also an episode where Sam meets this pimp kind of guy and she’s like, “Will you be my friend?” and he assumes that she’s a prostitute. Sam’s not trying to be seductive at all, but a lot of things she says could be taken that way. That episode had a lot of double entendres and it was a fun challenge.

Hidden Remote: At comic cons, you’ve talked about anime being a “passion project,” and not the most profitable of careers to have. But you obviously still have a drive to work on these shows. What is it about anime that makes it so worth it for you?

Miller: Anime just has really good stories. As anime fans will know, it’s not just cartoons. It’s real adult stories with beautiful animation and you get to have more emotional depth than western cartoons, though I’d say She-Ra is a show that’s starting to change how American animation stories are done. It’s becoming a lot more engaging for adults.

We’re also in an exciting time now for fans of anime. Before, it was understood that if you weren’t Japanese, you couldn’t make an anime. But people like LeSean are changing that idea and anything is possible now. There’s so many ways to be involved in anime and create stories everyone can enjoy.

New season release dates have yet to be announced for She-Ra, but some are suspecting Cannon Busters season 2 will release in August 2020. Are you looking forward to the new seasons for Cannon Busters and She-Ra? Leave your thoughts in the comments below!