MYM canceled because Hasbro wanted to use AI voices. (UPDATE: Likely disconfirmed)

[CastletonSnob 3,053]

Recently, the French VA for Hitch revealed that a 2nd season of Make Your Mark was planned, but Hasbro wanted to use AI instead of voice actors, so Cort Lane, one of MYM's executive producers, decided to cancel the show.

https://www.equestriadaily.com/2024/05/french-voice-actor-for-hitch-claims.html

Someone in the comments translated the exchange:

 

Quote

I don't know if it has been made already in the comment, but just in case: I tried to translate everything the speaker said, because it's something everyone here should understand.

So - if I understand this well, this is an exchange between two persons : Guillaume (who apparently have links with Hasbro) and Matthieu (French voice of Hitch)

Matthieu: Hello Guillaume. I'm surprise to see your profile, but I see you have a link with Hasbro and My Little Pony. We were wondering (the FR cast) what was going on at Hasbro and why we don't do (=dub) the series anymore, I found it weird you follow me on Instagram. If you could tell me anything if you have any information, so we can understand the situation better., thanks.

Guillaume: Hello Matthieu. I'm surprised and actually sad that Hasbro Studio didn't tell you. Hasbro is doing very bad financially, the franchise had to sell its movie activities made by E-one (?) to Lionsgate, people were fired in two waves, 1000 employees each, and even with that the fourth 2023 trimester was catastrophic. What comes next won't please you: to raise benefits and pump the sells, Hasbro focuses on the Wizard firm for Dungeon & Dragons, and especially on a reconversion of its functioning: artificial intelligence. And we feel it deeply. When I say "we", I mean all the countries in the world that aren't the USA, especially in the audio-visual domain. We're done with voiceover actors and actresses, everything for children is generated by AI. We can feel it with the Tell You Tale series Season 2, where everything's flat, there isn't emotion in the voice anymore. Hasbro is proud of that because they can lower the international production cost, only the VO isn't impacted thanks to "sagaftra" (?) who fought way before us to protect the cinema and audio-visual artists. Small detail about the Make Your Mark series season 2 was indeed planned for May 2024, but Kurt Lain (?) is against the use of AI and prefered to stop everything (sidenote of the speaker : I don't know who Kurt Lain is? Maybe one of the creator of MLP?). Even though it isn't reassuring, I hope those answers will be useful to you, and I wish you the best

Fuck Hasbro.
 

EDIT: UPDATE: This might not be true after all.

https://www.equestriadaily.com/2024/05/the-ai-voiceover-drama-continues-french.html

Edited May 30 by CastletonSnob

[Misty Shadow 7,648]

I've seen comments of skepticism about MYM ending just because of a disagreement between Cort Lane and Hasbro. Regardless, I am still disappointed to see that the allegations of Hasbro using AI for the international dubbing of TYT now have merit. I understand that they're in an absolutely awful financial state, but I want the non-American fans of G5 viewing TYT overseas to be receiving good-quality voice acting done by real people. 

[Steve Piranha 29,411]

End of ponies just as they were about to get their footing 

[Fluttershutter 2,347]

I wasn't worried about this end of G5 thing but I guess that's probably it. 

[Cheerilee 26,567]

A pretty low thing of Hasbro to do, I would say. My opinion of them drops only lower.

[Iforgotmybrain 4,909]

I saw this yesterday. Absolutely infuriating on so many levels. Seriously didn’t think it was possible for me to hate Hasbro more than I already did.

[CastletonSnob 3,053]

UPDATE: This might not be true after all.

https://www.equestriadaily.com/2024/05/the-ai-voiceover-drama-continues-french.html

[Steve Piranha 29,411]

48 minutes ago, CastletonSnob said:

UPDATE: This might not be true after all.

https://www.equestriadaily.com/2024/05/the-ai-voiceover-drama-continues-french.html

That won’t improve G5 situation tho 

[EpicEnergy 23,007]

When I heard about it, I didn't take the news as fact thankfully because I know how allegations go. They can often be false or partially incorrect. It still seems to be uncertain as to how legitimate this is though. Whatever the case may be, I'm not going to take a side because I have no interest in this drama and allegations.

[Misty Shadow 7,648]

Looks like the comments of skepticism were right.  We just can't stop jumping the gun with just believing what we read and touting it as fact, can we? 

[Cheerilee 26,567]

2 hours ago, CastletonSnob said:

UPDATE: This might not be true after all.

https://www.equestriadaily.com/2024/05/the-ai-voiceover-drama-continues-french.html

Doesn't really change my overall opinion of Hasbro. I didn't really have much of an opinion on it either way since my opinion of Hasbro is already low.

[Iforgotmybrain 4,909]

So... Some random dude just made up these rumors? Not sure how to feel about EQD running that article now, definitely gonna start taking the stuff they say with a grain of salt. Still very confused about the situation.

Edited May 30 by Iforgotmybrain
e

[Otaku-sempai 346]

5 hours ago, CastletonSnob said:

UPDATE: This might not be true after all.

https://www.equestriadaily.com/2024/05/the-ai-voiceover-drama-continues-french.html

The most significant part of the article:

Quote

THE PLOT THICKENS. After loads of digging, G5 superfans have found who the french voice actor's Hasbro source is, and determined that this person doesn't appear to be a employee of the company at all. While dubs in other countries have fallen massively in quality, it's most likely that they are simply using lower end studios rather than actual AI.

I'm sure that we'll hear more about this soon. 

[Gaines 1,210]

On 2024-05-29 at 3:03 PM, CastletonSnob said:

UPDATE: This might not be true after all.

https://www.equestriadaily.com/2024/05/the-ai-voiceover-drama-continues-french.html

Can you edit this into your post? Just for those who don't bother to scroll through comments. If they don't see this update they might form the wrong opinions 
edit: thank you!! 

Edited May 30 by Gaines

[Misty Shadow 7,648]

35 minutes ago, Gaines said:

Can you edit this into your post? Just for those who don't bother to scroll through comments. If they don't see this update they might form the wrong opinions 

Honestly, I feel that from the outset, the title should have said, "MYM Allegedly Canceled", as to not be touting something unconfirmed as factual information. Now, it definitely needs to say something like, "Likely Disconfirmed", in parentheses. 

[ZiggWheelsManning 8,942]

4 hours ago, Props Valroa said:

Doesn't really change my overall opinion of Hasbro. I didn't really have much of an opinion on it either way since my opinion of Hasbro is already low.

THIS ^^  

[Megas 27,473]

I'm sure the guy is really happy that he might have ruined the VA's career for the sake of whatever point he was trying to make

[Otaku-sempai 346]

Equestria Daily's Sethisto reports: Hasbro Confirms Stance On Not Using AI For Make Your Mark. 

Quote

 

We now have irrefutable confirmation that AI was never planned for Make Your Mark. We already debunked the French VA who was found to have received false information from a fake Hasbro employee, but Hasbro themselves have dropped a rare response off and wiped out any possible rumors entirely with the twitter message above. I'll quote it here too: 

Quote

The #MyLittlePony ‘Make Your Mark’ series
has never used AI-generated audio or visuals at any stage of its production. We’re proud of our artists and actors who played a role in creating magical experiences that brought our characters to life and connected fans across the world. - Hasbro 

I've asked for confirmation on Tell Your Tale season 2's dubs since people have been speculating that those are AI for weeks now, but on the Make Your Mark front at least, you can rest easy.

 

No word yet on using AI voices overseas for Tell Your Tale Season 2. 

[Misty Shadow 7,648]

3 hours ago, Otaku-sempai said:

Equestria Daily's Sethisto reports: Hasbro Confirms Stance On Not Using AI For Make Your Mark. 

No word yet on using AI voices overseas for Tell Your Tale Season 2. 

Actually, there is word now. They "hit Reply too soon". 

Whether they're telling the truth or not, I'm glad they are taking this seriously by actually talking to us for a change. I'm more inclined to believe they're telling the truth, because...Cort Lane getting the final say on MYM's future?  There's another explanation for TYT's voices in the international versions of the new episodes sounding off too, the switching from eOne to Hasbro Entertainment producing the show with lower-end studios. 

[Rafa Stary 2,523]

I can say that none of the voices in the Brazilian dub sounded AI Generated so far, they definitely sound weird compared to the 2021-2023 voices, but it's more of quality decline. I'm not very sure how good current AI voice can sound though, so...

Also, we need to be cautious, I'm really not much into these, but I remember how last year there was this Naruto Game called Naruto x Boruto Ultimate Ninja Storm Connections, Bandai received countless accusations of having used AI for excerpts of the game's dubs, and the voices in some parts indeed sounded extremely AI-generated in multiple dubs, and as far as I remember, Bandai denied the accusations, and a voice actor said something very contradictory which made people even more suspicious of the situation.

It's a delicate subject so I'm not going to draw any conclusions or form an opinion, I'm just going to believe that anything is possible, Hasbro may not be lying but it's also not trustworthy.

[Otaku-sempai 346]

2 hours ago, Misty Shadow said:

Actually, there is word now. They "hit Reply too soon". 

Whether they're telling the truth or not, I'm glad they are taking this seriously by actually talking to us for a change. I'm more inclined to believe they're telling the truth, because...Cort Lane getting the final say on MYM's future?  There's another explanation for TYT's voices in the international versions of the new episodes sounding off too, the switching from eOne to Hasbro Entertainment producing the show with lower-end studios. 

Thanks for the clarification! 

[Sparklefan1234 167,542]

I'm glad this was all a misunderstanding and that Hasbro responded quickly. 

[RDDash 19,097]

Long story short Discovery Family came along and ruined everything because it's owns everything from season five of Friendsghip Is Magic and beyond. But that's just a theory, a pony theory. 

 

Edited June 1 by RDDash

[Sparklefan1234 167,542]

11 hours ago, RDDash said:

Long story short Discovery Family came along and ruined everything because it's owns everything from season five of Friendsghip Is Magic and beyond. But that's just a theory, a pony theory. 

 

I've always thought it was weird that Discovery Family's ownership of MLP starts with the fifth season of Friendship is Magic. 

For some reason I thought the Canadian government owned Gen 5.