I was made aware that Philece Sampler, one of my earliest favorite voice actresses, passed away on July 1st from a heart attack. Like a lot of mourners of hers on DeviantArt, I’m mostly familiar with her as Mimi from Digimon, but I also watched Bobobo-bo-bobobo (I have no idea if I spelled that right) and remember her as Beauty in that series. Both roles really showcased her ability to get really manic with her voice.
I still remember her shouting “Girl power!” and “We have over 100 years of summer vacation left!” in Digimon and pointing out how illogical Bobobo-bo-bobobo was with its random fusions and my personal favorite, the “Fist of the nose hair!” Beauty almost seemed like a precursor to Lucy Heartfilia with how she was the cheesecake lady, yet also leagues smarter than the men (and some of the women) around her, realizing how little sense things made when you stopped for a few seconds.
It was this exuberance and slight mania that made me easily able to mentally hear her voicing a role she played in a series I didn’t watch, Kelly in Transformers; Robots in Disguise. I found out she voiced that role on the Transformers Wiki and found out Kelly was the “hard luck comic relief” of the series, a woman trying to avoid the Autobot-Predacon war and always ending up in the middle of it with numerous vehicles destroyed and/or scanned. Her dialogue, written down, just sounded right in Mimi/Beauty’s excited/distressed voice and while I still haven’t seen any episodes, I know Philece would’ve been a highlight of that show.
Her voice will be deeply missed, not many Voice Actresses have achieved quite the voice she did, that “Whaaa!” type mania/distress/exuberance in their delivery. R.I.P., Philece Sampler, you were one of the best.
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