When the Star Wars spinoff Obi-Wan Kenobi came out, many presumed that James Earl Jones had returned once again to loan his iconic deep voice as the ever-so-iconic Darth Vader. Although they brought back actors from the prequels, like Ewan McGregor as young Obi-Wan and Hayden Christensen as Anakin, Jones was not brought back, and he won't be involved in future Star Wars projects going forward.
Because Jones is 91 years old, and hence, doesn't exactly have the same voice he did when he was playing Vader in the original Star Wars trilogy, he reportedly will no longer voice his most well-known role. Instead of having Jones record dialogue as Darth Vader, the Obi-Wan Kenobi producers ultimately had artificial intelligence recreate Jones' voice as Darth Vader in the series.
Vanity Fair reported that the 91-year-old actor was not present for the recording of Vader's voice for Obi-Wan Kenobi after the actor stepped away from playing him. "The company worked with Lucasfilm to generate the voice of a young Luke Skywalker for Disney+’s The Book of Boba Fett, and the recent Obi-Wan Kenobi series tasked them with making Darth Vader sound like James Earl Jones's dark side villain from 45 years ago, now that Jones’s voice has altered with age and he has stepped back from the role." The article then went into detail regarding how they managed to recreate Vader's voice. "Programmers 'training' the A.I. To replicate Jones's voice and editors piecing together the output worked from corridors in the interior of their apartments."
The last time Jones returned to voice Darth Vader was in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, which was released back in 2019. Darth Vader is not the only well-known character that Jones returned to voice in the past decade, as Jones voiced Mufasa in Disney's live-action version of The Lion King. At his age, it seems appropriate for him to stop because, much like anyone else, when you reach a certain age, your body cannot function the way it used, whether it's your legs, your ears, or in Jones' case, your voice.
It probably is best for all parties because anyone who watched Lion King 2019 could clearly hear that Jones was not capable of recapturing Mufasa's voice 25 years after he first did in the animated version. That's not his fault. He was 88 when the new one was released compared to 63 when the original movie came out. While Jones has one of the most well-known voices ever, it makes sense that being at the age he is now, his voice has simply been worn down over the years. That was inevitable whether Star Wars fans want to acknowledge it or not.
With the advanced technologies we have now, the Star Wars franchise should be able to endure not having Jones' actual voice involved going forward, should they include Darth Vader in future projects. Evidently, no one could really tell that it was AI providing the voice instead of Jones himself. Plus, if Jones had been voicing him, it could have potentially made the Obi-Wan Kenobi show worse, knowing that Jones probably can't voice Vader anymore, much like he couldn't with Mufasa.
Obi-Wan Kenobi can currently be streamed on Disney Plus.
Source: Vanity Fair