Till All Are One

Iconic and legendary voice actor Peter Cullen once said, ~Everybody’s going to approach a character differently, depending on what they bring to it on their intellectual level or their feelings from their heart and soul.~ Let me ask you this question, when I say the name Peter Cullen what automatically comes to mind? If you answered being the voice of Optimus Prime then you’d be correct. Yet he wasn’t just the voice of Optimus Prime as he did other voiceover work to his credit we heard growing up but didn’t realize it was him until we found out years later. In any case, as a voiceover actor Peter was most definitely well-known for being one of the most recognizable voices involving an 80’s cartoon character, especially for those of us who grew up watching and listening to his voice whenever Transformers came on every Saturday morning on television.

Without a doubt, Peter Cullen was and still is considered an important part of not only pop culture, but a generation of childhoods spanning from the 80, 90’s and all the way into the 2000’s. For it’s a thought provoking situation indeed concerning how truly prolific one man’s voice truly was to where just hearing it caused you to be instantly brought back to your inner child. I think it’s safe to say we still have goosebumps from the 1986 Transformers movie where you felt the conviction and determination in Cullen’s voice when Optimus made a brief speech before he transformed and rolled out to make his presence known to the Decepticons who attacked the Autobot base. Unfortunately, it was that same heroic gravitas in Cullen’s voice that we collectively mourned a fallen Optimus moments before and after his death, which continues to be impactful to this day.

As I said before, he wasn’t just the voice of Optimus Prime as he did other voiceover work to his credit we heard growing up but didn’t realize it was him until we found out years later. One of those aforementioned voiceovers was the Cartoon Network/Toonmai in regards to Dragonball Z promos, Sailor Moon, Voltron, etc. and it was totally obvious it was Pete’s voice. Truth be told, many of us weren’t really paying attention as kids and were far more concerned with the actions of cartoons we were watching than who was voicing the characters. Yet, now as adults we have a greater appreciation of the legacy he provided and left behind so much so he unequivocally became the standard bearer for any voice actor attempting to even try to step into the shoes, so to speak, in voicing Optimus Prime. Thinking about it further, whether it was voicing Prime’s voice or doing promo voiceovers for Toonami he was always able to get you excited and hyped.

If you think about it, if it wasn’t for Peter’s brother, Larry Cullen, Optimus Prime would have never existed at all. Captain Larry Cullen was a Vietnam veteran who served in Vietnam as a combat infantry officer and was the inspiration for the voice of Optimus. For the most part, Peter basically asked his brother’s advice on how a real hero should sound and brother responded by letting him know to avoid being an aggressively, loud “Hollywood hero”. Instead, what Larry advised him to be was “strong enough to be gentle” and the rest as they say is history. Of course, what Larry meant was his younger brother voiced him as a character not meant to be a mythical hero, but a guy. A guy with unbreakable morals. Unfortunately, his brother/Optimus ended up turning into a mythical hero with absolute legendary status due to what happened in the 1986 animated movie.

In retrospect, there is an old saying that basically goes: never meet your heroes. Personally speaking, I was fortunate enough to meet my childhood hero and was able to get a photo-op with Peter Cullen when I attended Megacon in 2019. Sadly, Peter passed away on August 26, 2006 and his death impacted generations of kids who grew up repeating/quoting Optimus Prime or other characters he voiced like Monterray Jack in the 1st season of Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers. The brief moment I was able to speak with him during my photo-op at Megacon in 2019 I felt like a little kid again. Ultimately, Mr. Cullen will never be forgotten and will continue to resonate and live on for future generations of fans to eventually discover an awesome individual who highly influenced pop culture unbeknownst to him. In the end, I leave you with the following 4 words that are seemingly a meaningful message bringing us together as fans: Till all are one.