Anime as a medium is so powerful that we often get lost in its characters, their emotions, struggles, and growth. However, behind those emotional and powerful moments, there is a voice actor who is shaping our anime viewing experience. In this interview, I had the opportunity to talk with the Hindi voice actors of Jujutsu Kaisen to explore what it really takes to bring characters like Yuji, Gojo, Megumi, and Maki to life.
From balancing emotional depth to adapting cultural nuances for Indian audiences, this interview dives into the craft, instincts, and personal philosophies that define their performances. Before you jump to read the interview, a little FYI info.
Vidit Kumar plays Yuji Itadori with Lohit Sharma voicing Gojo Satoru. Meanwhile, Sahil Kulkarni and Mani Puhan voice Megumi Fushiguro and Maki Zenin, respectively.
While conducting the interview, I went with the following order: Yuji–> Gojo–>Megumi–>Maki for asking questions. Also, the following is a translation of the interview, which was conducted in Hindi. Thank you, Crunchyroll, for providing this opportunity.
Dewang: Yuji Itadori begins the story as an optimistic and compassionate character, but his worldview changes dramatically as the story progresses. As a voice actor, how did you approach portraying that emotional evolution?
Vidit: Initially, Yuji is a goofy, fun-loving character. It takes him some time to understand the seriousness of being a Jujutsu Sorcerer. However, as the story progressed and he continued eating Sukuna’s fingers, he started to understand the seriousness of it all.
So, initially, I used my mid-tones to voice Yuji, and as his story continued, I began to introduce maturity into his voice. This is something you can also notice in the original Japanese voice actor, Junya Enoki’s performance.
Dewang: Gojo is known for balancing two very different sides of his personality: a compassionate human, a humorous teacher, and an egotistical, overwhelmingly powerful sorcerer. How did you approach this duality while performing him?
Lohit: I, too, am evolving my craft as Gojo’s story progresses. I also don’t see him as egotistical but as a self-confident person. Like when he meets Sukuna/Yuji for the first time, he directly declares, “I am the strongest, and I will win“, and this confidence of his is what makes him charming, and fans love him for that.
I also believe that each one of us has a bit of Gojo within us; we suppress that side of ourselves due to societal/family pressure. That’s why when we see Gojo being confident, we feel connected to him as we express our true feelings through him.
The same thing happens with me when I dub him. So as the story progressed and his character started expressing his colours, I embraced them and painted my art with them.
Dewang: Megumi is one of the quieter, laid-back characters in the series, and much of his personality is expressed through subtle emotions rather than dramatic speeches. How do you convey those layers through voice performance?
Sahil: Personally, I am an upbeat and energetic person, so I remember our director telling me, “Sahil, it is not you, lower your energy a bit“. So every time I record for Megumi, I follow a process where I take a couple of deep breaths and imagine myself as sleepy and then lower my tone and then start my job.
This is also to ensure that Megumi always has this droopy energy, so I try to enact that. However, it does get tricky expressing emotions in such a low tone. So like everyone else, I try to take inspiration from the Japanese source and follow their footsteps while following the voice range, pitch and Japanese culture, while making sure the emotions come across naturally in Hindi for Indian audiences.
[Vidit joining in]: Following the Japanese is better as it is the source, and once you understand the context behind why the Japanese VA did this, repeating it in Hindi becomes easier.
Dewang: [To all VA’s] While translating from Japanese to Hindi, you are not just translating the sentences; you have to translate the culture as well. Do you guys have enough freedom to improvise?
All: We do.
Lohit: We do, but with guidelines.
Sahil: We try to find our way around while improvising, though the final call still rests with the director.
Dewang: Maki’s relationship with her sister Mai is one of the most emotionally significant parts of her story. How did that dynamic influence the way you approached the character? Did you draw inspiration from your real life?
Mani: Emotional shift [between Maki and Mai] was an important part of the story. As you know, since you have watched the series, Maki is a straightforward character; she is not very dramatic. Maki isn’t fighting an individual; she’s fighting the entire system.
She was never supported by her clan and many others, so when Mai, a support and belief system for Maki, goes away, she is broken, but she doesn’t succumb to that situation. She has to move forward, being in that situation, and destroy the system that makes her character very powerful in that aspect. Also, I am like that to some extent; I don’t give up early, just like Maki, so I relate with her, and it was fun playing her.
Dewang: So this question is a bit more character-specific. Yuji believes that every person deserves a proper death, even those who become his enemies. How do you interpret that philosophy, and what do you think it reveals about his character?
Vidit: So yeah, I agree with this philosophy. I believe everyone is different, and we’re all living this life for the first time. Who am I to say that bad things should happen to anyone?
Dewang: The exact opposite of this is Megumi. Megumi believes not everyone deserves saving, and he chooses who to protect based on his own sense of justice. Do you think Megumi’s philosophy, protecting only those who are righteous, is right or should compassion be universal, something which Yuji believes in to some extent at least?
Sahil: In the series, there is a dialogue of Megumi where he says, “I hate bad people because they lack humanity and common sense. However, I hate good people more because they forgive bad people“. I somewhat agree with this statement. Megumi has seen a lot in his small life.
I feel that he is the most grounded and realistic character in Jujutsu Kaisen. He takes realistic decisions, he is not a heroic type, blurting out things like I will save everyone etc. He instead makes human-like decisions, like I want to save the people I love.
He does not want to risk harming the people he loves to protect a stranger. I relate to that aspect of the character. I agree it’s not a hundred per cent right, but as long as I am protecting the people I love, and if an opportunity arises to save others, then I will. So it is kind of 50-50 and depends on the situation and the human instinct in that moment.
Vidit & Mani: [joining in…] you can never predict. It all depends on the instinct in the moment.
Sahil: […continuing] Even if it is written in the bio of the character or human that they want to protect everyone. That does not happen…always. In a situation, what your instinct tells you and what you decide defines your character, so we cannot tell what exactly will happen.
Dewang: However, there exists a character with immense powers in Jujutsu Kaisen, which is Gojo. Despite being the most powerful sorcerer, he chooses education as a method to protect a wider range of people and also the future generations. So, do you think the power [Ability to protect all] should reside with one person [An all-powerful being] or should it reside with the people?
Lohit: I don’t think everyone should have power or everyone should become the strongest, as that will give rise to wars, such is human nature. If we go with the education part, teach people how to harness their powers, but also teach them when to use it and for whom to use it.
Teach them right from wrong, and also how and why things are right or wrong. In that aspect, I think Gojo is doing the right thing by teaching the next generation, even though in the anime, he is sealed right now, so he is unable to teach at the moment.
Dewang: As Lohit said, the strong oppress the weak. The same thing has happened with Maki, which led to the destruction of the entire Zenin Clan. However, there is a fine line between Justice and Vengeance. What are your thoughts about it? Was the Zenin clan massacre a battle of justice or vengeance? How did you approach the character while recording Maki during this scene?
Mani: I think it began as vengeance. However, as the story continues, Maki turns to the other side. When I started dubbing for her during this scene, I was given instructions by our director on how to approach her. So, keeping that in mind and controlling her emotions is how I depicted her.
Dewang: While recording action-heavy anime, it exerts a physical as well as an emotional toll on your body and mind. Like in the case of Yuji, when he sees Nanami’s final moments [and after Sukuna’s massacre in Shibuya], the screaming and emotional toll on Yuji. How did you approach those scenes?
Vidit: Those were crazy scenes and next-level scenes. In those situations, I feel a normal human will simply let go of their emotions. In that moment, there aren’t any second thoughts. So I imagined how a normal human would react in that moment and approached it in that manner.
Yuji too reacted in the way I imagined he would react. So that became fairly easy. In such cases, I don’t need to follow the Japanese voice-over artist’s pitch as well. If their pitch is high for this scene, even if I try to enact the same pitch, my voice may crack or something else may fall apart.
So I focus on ensuring that my voice, even if it doesn’t hit the high notes, carries the angst and frustration the character is feeling in that moment. This allows me to keep my work as natural and as human as possible for such high-impact scenes.
Dewang: Lohit, this one’s for you. Gojo is such a confident and charismatic character in the Japanese dub. What kind of techniques do you use to keep Gojo’s presence as impactful in Hindi dub?
Lohit: This is not as technical as it may seem. After working for so long as dubbing artists, we all quickly grasp the situation and storyline in front of us. We get directions from our director, we read the script, and we are good to go.
Like in the current season [season 3], Gojo is sealed, so if he comes back in the future, I may not have watched the ‘n’ number of episodes where he is not there. So our director briefs us about the situation and informs us where the character is going ahead as per the story.
Additionally, I watch the scene before delivering my lines. As a viewer, the emotions you feel while watching the anime happen to me, too. Based on the brief I received and the scene I just watched, I get into the mood of the character and feel their emotions. It doesn’t take me long to get into that headspace. So I perform based on my understanding of the scene.
Now, the director who has watched all the previous episodes and knows what’s going to happen may give their input. Depending on the new input, I modify my performance and do a retake. This process goes on until we get it right. And I am sure, we have got it right till now, that’s why fans love our performances for the Hindi dub.
Dewang: So Megumi is more of a reactive character. That is, he is not actively seeking out things but more of reacting to situations happening around him. So, do you analyse what Vidit and other voice actors did in their performance? Do you modify your performance to react to theirs and match their approach?
Sahil: I try to keep my performances after these guys because then I get counters, of course. Additionally, since Vidit and my scenes are together mostly, receiving comments about his performance, it helps me to modify my performance and react to what Vidit has acted out.
Also, I take into account the Japanese performance for the scene and try to match my output based on Vidit and the Japanese performance. Megumi, I feel, is such a character who reacts to the situations happening around, and unless necessary, he won’t go out of his way to do something.
So when I receive information about these guys’ performances, it becomes easier for me to do my job.
Dewang: Maki’s character has some of the most challenging combat scenes. Do these combat scenes influence your dialogue delivery process?
Mani: Yes, 100% it does. As others have already mentioned, we have to follow the Japanese dub performance first as our priority. I watch the scene first and notice what the Japanese VA has done in particular moments. Additionally, the comments we received about each other’s performance also help in modifying our output.
And we have been doing this for so long, we have reached a flow state where we grasp the situation quickly, follow the Japanese dub, analyse each other’s performance based on the comments and add our own flair to the performance and improve our output.
Dewang: That is it from my end. Thank you all! It was great talking with you all. Thank you so much for your time.
This conversation made me feel that voice acting isn’t just performance, it is interpretation, instinct and deep understanding of human emotions. Moresoever, it is about having empathy towards others. Because to voice characters like Yuji, Megumi and Maki, you need to understand pain. To voice Gojo, you must believe in your own abilities and feel the duality of the human mind, where you can be the hero or become the villain.
Jujutsu Kaisen is now streaming on Crunchyroll in Hindi and other regional dubs.
