The Thing About Voices

Voices, be they in video games, movies, or TV shows, often present a problem for me.  I fall in and out of love with them on a near-daily basis, a phenomenon I find hard to explain, particularly to my husband.  Benedict Cumberbatch, Steve Valentine (Alistair from Dragon Age), Brandon Keener (Garrus Vakarian from Mass Effect), I love the sound of all of these voices.  And yet, I am not particularly attracted to any of them physically.  That's where the confusion sets in.

Here's the guy who voices Garrus Vakarian, one of my all-time favorite video game characters:

Brandon Keener, from what I've read online, is a generally nice human being.  And he takes a good head shot, I'll give him that. He's been in a lot of stuff, including an episode of Castle with Nathan Fillion.  That combination alone should be a no-brainer nerd-gasm, and yet he just doesn't do it for me.

However, put that voice of his on Garrus....

And I am instantly in love.  I can't help it.  Those deep gravelly undertones are obviously edited in (you can check out some samples of his best lines here), and maybe that makes it perfect.  I can listen to his dialogue over and over and never get bored.  He's an alien, obviously, a turian, who are known for being spiky and scary and supremely unattractive.  It's not that I find Garrus himself, as he's designed, sexy;  it's just the voice they put on him.  Yum.

Alistair, from Dragon Age: Origins, is designed and animated to be totally cute and endearing, and it definitely works.

In a lot of ways, personality-wise, Alistair reminds me of my husband: he's sweet and charming and funny and I totally just want to take him home and snuggle him every time he shows up in the game.  (Or in real life -- my husband, I mean). I think that's part of why I love the character so much.

He's also got the sexiest accent, a kind of Scottish/British combination that is so perfect I find it hard to believe it exists.  Or that this is the guy who produces it:

I mean, sure, he looks friendly and nice, but he is so not what I picture when I hear him talk.  He's had small parts in all sorts of TV shows, from Big Bang Theory to CSI, so there's no shortage of him on YouTube if need be.  But him as Alistair will always be my favorite.

My finding voices attractive becomes a little more complicated when they're attached to actual human beings, instead of just as my beloved video game characters.

Take Benedict Cumberbatch: (Yes, please! But only if he narrates the whole time... ;))

There's really no denying that he is attractive.  But it's his voice that makes him -- his face is just a little too stark and angular (the classic Sherlock Holmes description, hence his casting) for me, and he looks like he weighs about 100 pounds -- like I could snap him with a hug, and I am not exactly a big girl.  Yet every time I get a message and my phone chirps, "I've got a text!" in his voice, I swoon.

Oh, and in Star Trek: Into Darkness?  I could listen to him all day, just letting that voice wash over me. I'm just still not that attracted to him -- the slicked-back hair is sexier, to be sure, lending him a much more "bad boy" quality than is present in Sherlock, but I still wouldn't do him (as if that would ever happen, right).

There are others whose voices I find blindingly attractive: Michael Fassbender comes to mind, as does James McAvoy -- First Class and Days of Future Past are just pure joy for me.  And Fassbender I find to be an incredible actor, to be sure.  But my god, their voices...