R.I.P. Rachael Lillis
 

Rachael Lillis, the original voice of Misty and Jessie from the anime Pokémon, died at 55 due to cancer. :cry: I am devastated by this news, she was such a talented woman and this is way too young to go. R.I.P. Rachael. Thanks for making so many childhoods great.

https://comicbook.com/anime/news/pok...-lillis-death/

https://variety.com/2024/tv/obituari...ie-1236104010/

I'm so heartbroken. She was very talented. Her replacements for the Pokémon anime once PUSA took over weren't very good, although Michelle Knotz was a good Jessie. Such a shame so many of my childhood actors/voice actors are dying. RIP Rachel Lillis

Misty will always be Ash's best girl.

Somewhere a lot of angels just woke up with graffiti on their faces

RIP Jigglypuff

What a shame to die so young. :(

Her sister had just started a a gofundme a few months ago that got thousands of dollars too. Her voice as Misty and Jessie were iconic and she also did voices in Slayers and Revolutionary Girl Utena. A real shame.

Not familiar with her, but that is terribly sad to die so young.

Veronica Taylor, the original voice of Ash Ketchum, released a statement earlier today and now Eric Stuart (Brock, James) has released a statement.

https://x.com/eric_stuart/status/1823003262263419269

This is why I went to GalaxyCon in Raleigh, North Carolina to see the Original TMNT VAs and then the very next week to see David Yost, Amy Jo Johnson, and Walter Emmanuel Jones just recently.

I dropped off when Misty left (and Brock again temporarily), but I have heard her return appearance voice and it's not even like with Bill Martin where we could pretend James Avery had a cold from the toxins in the air. Lillis made her mark on Gen Y and I am grateful for her contributions.

The Japanese VA for Misty has been the same for all 26 years (including the final 10 episodes), as is most of the Japanese cast. It's a shame dub/english speaking fans only got the voices till 2006, but even then Misty was already long gone from the main cast at that point and didn't appear again till 2017 when the SM anime was airing and by then the show was completely different in terms of art style/animation. So it really wouldn't have mattered outside of Team Rocket's VA's staying the same.

Rachael Lilis voice work as Misty, Jessie, Jigglypuff and others is iconic and still memorable to this day. Losing her life at only 46 is a travesty and it's a shame she had to go out like this. Cancer is horrible.

Rest in Peace.

Wikipedia says she passed away at 55 and not 46.

Another figure from my childhood gone

I’m surprised that the press didn’t report her correct age.

Yeah, I mean Misty appeared less in later episodes of the anime but the actress who took over Jessie also voiced her in those episodes and it just wasn't the same whereas I thought her Jessie sounds very close to Lillis. Nice that her replacement expressed her condolences on Twitter. You'd think there'd be animosity between the original and replacement VA but I guess not.

If they had never replaced the VAs she would have voiced Misty all the way to the end of Ash's journey before she died.

It's funny how even though the new VAs have voiced for more than twice as long as the original actors ever did people still think of the OGs as the real voices of the characters. People still call Veronica Taylor as the real Ash and show tons of love to her on twitter, while Ash's replacement voice has to have her twitter account locked so no one can comment on her tweets, kinda sad for the new VAs but hey 4Kids really did nail it.

I saw posts from other countries paying tribute to Rachael Lillis even though she wasn't the voice of Misty there (she was still the voice of Jigglypuff). A true loss. That voice made Misty my childhood crush.

So sad to hear this. I grew up with the original Pokemon. I loved Team Rocket. RIP Rachael :cry: Any one see the tweets that some asshole called The Flaming Freezer made about her? :x

Depends who you're following, on twitter most Pokemon anime fans there are only in their early 20's, meaning most of them grew up with the DP series as their first series when they were kids (which is why you see them constantly post so much DP nostalgia there for Dawn, Paul, Ash's Infernape, etc). Most of them prefer Sarah as Ash or watch it in Japanese even if they still like the 4kids dub too.

But yeah, now that there's a huge age gap between demographics who grew up with the different eras of the anime, you're going to see more widely different opinions than say 20 years ago when everyone started with the first season. It's inevitable really, with a show that ran for 26 years over 80% of the current fanbase grew up long after the 4kids dub era or Misty in general.

I found out that Lillis also voiced Jessie, Goldeen, Vulpix, Venonat and probably other Pokemon as well.