Anyone else have this problem with Marvel's What If...?

Y'all been watching What If? There's a few episodes out so far, all taking place in different parallel versions of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, telling new alternate stories, and for the most part I've enjoyed them. However, there's one element of the show that I find oddly distracting. I'm not sure if anyone else has felt this way, but when I've been watching the show, I can't stop thinking about the casting.

For example, in episode 1, What if Agent Carter became Captain America, I've counted no less than 4 different types of casting.

1. Actors reprising their role.

Hayley Atwell returns as Peggy Carter, same with Sebastian Stan, Stanley Tucci, Toby Jones, even Damian Dark. All actors who were originally in The First Avenger lend their voices to the characters again here, some for only a few lines. This is one of the big draws of the show, seeing all these big name actors play these characters again but in new and exciting situations. But what about actors who aren't available to return?

2. Voice actors doing an impression.

Steve Rogers is here, and he looks like Chris Evans. Now if you don't know, Chris Evans and Robert Downey Jr. are pretty much done with the MCU, Endgame being their last appearance, so I wasn't really expecting either of them to show up here and it makes sense to get someone else to do an impression. You can't write Steve out of a Captain America story completely, and he has a pretty minor role here, so nothing too distracting. Interestingly, in this episode Steve is played by my boy, Josh Keaton, of Spectacular Spider-Man.

3. Not the original actor, but a replacement actor reprising a role.

Naturally, Red Skull is the main villain here. He's not played by Hugo Weaving but instead by the guy who did an impression of Hugo Weaving's performance in Infinity War and Endgame: Ross Marquand. So he still looks like Hugo Weaving, but is not played by him.

4. A character not originally in the movie, but resembles the actor voicing them.

Bradley Whitford is in this episode playing a character not originally in The First Avenger, but looks like the actor Bradley Whitford. Apparently he's actually reprising a role from the Agent Carter One Shot I forgot existed. So there is a canonical explanation, but still kinda weird to see an actor not originally in The First Avenger alongside characters to were.

So in this singular episode, you have characters from First Avenger played by the original actor, characters not played by the original actor, a character played by someone who replaced the original actor later on, and a character not originally in The First Avenger, but played by the actor they resemble. I spent the majority of the first episode just thinking about this instead of just enjoying the episode.

But, I didn't have the same experience with episode 2, What if Black Panther became Star Lord.

This one I enjoyed a lot more because A; pretty much everyone reprised their roles down to the one slave girl at the Collector's place, Ophelia Lovibond, who had like two lines in the original Guardians. And B, this episode was actually a new story as opposed to a rehash of The First Avenger but with Peggy instead of Steve. So I was a lot more engaged overall.

Then we get to Episode 3. This one was also a new story so I liked that, but somehow, it had the strangest casting choices of any episode so far in my opinion.

This one is a murder mystery which does some cool stuff with the Marvel timeline. If you don't already know, Iron Man 2, The Incredible Hulk, and Thor: The First Thor, all take place around the same time within about a week or so.

Samuel L. Jackson takes the lead in this one, returning as Nick Fury who he will likely continue to play until the day he dies. Same with Tom Hiddleston as Loki, who is also in this one, as well as some other returning cast members which I appreciate.

In this episode we also have Black Widow, but for some reason she is not played by Scarlett Johansson. This series was recorded before her beef with Disney over the Black Widow movie release too, so I can't think of any real reason why she wouldn't want to do the voice. She's like a main character in this one too so it's a little distracting, but actress Lake Bell does a pretty good impression.

They meet up with Tony Stark as usual like in Iron Man 2. Again, not Downey Jr., though strangely they're repeating lines directly from Iron Man 2, but instead of just reusing that audio, they rerecorded the lines with this impressionist, Mick Wingert. Weird choice, but then Tony dies, so moving on.

Then we meet Betty Ross, a character who we haven't seen since Incredible Hulk, and they don't get Liv Tyler. Which is fine, I wasn't really expecting her since she hasn't been involved in the MCU since 2008. But, actress Stephanie Panisello doesn't even try to sound remotely similar to Tyler's performance.

And since we're in Hulk territory now Bruce Banner shows up, played by Mark Ruffalo. Which again, makes sense. Edward Norton who played Banner in Incredible Hulk, infamously didn't like how the movie turned out and refused to reprise the character going forward. So there's no way they were gonna get him back, and Mark Ruffalo has played the character ever since so he is the logical choice. But in the episode, Banner looks like Mark Ruffalo, but he's in Edward Norton Hulk situations. So again, it's just kinda weird.

General Ross shows up as well, and he's also not played by the original actor William Hurt, even though Hurt has reprised the character multiple times since Incredible Hulk as recently as this year in Black Widow, so I feel like it wouldn't be that hard to get him. But whatever, he has like two lines, so it's not really a big deal.

So none of the casting in this one is bad per se, it's just kind of strange and very inconsistent. Academy Award winner Michael Douglas shows up at the end of this one to play a crazy Hank Pym. Jaimie Alexander returns as Sif for like 2 lines, despite not appearing in the MCU since 2013,(yes, she also had a cameo in Loki, but other than that we haven't seen her in almost 8 years) but for some reason they couldn't get ScarJo? They got Chadwick Boseman back as T'Challa, and he's not even alive!

So, is any of this a major problem? Not really. In most cases they've made the most logical casting choice for each situation, and it is impressive how many actors have come back, even in just the first few episodes. But when you have an art style that intentionally resembles the actors portraying these characters, it's just kinda weird when they don't always sound like the actor that they look like. It takes me out of it a little bit.

One of the most exciting things about comic books that take place in a shared universe is that any character can show up anywhere and anytime. All you have to do is draw that character. The MCU has managed to capture that narrative potential with one major caveat; any character can show up anywhere and anytime, as long as the actor is available and willing to play the role.

With animation, you can kind of stretch the limitations of getting actors to reprise their roles a little bit more than live action. For example, there is a lot of DC animated projects, and Kevin Conroy voices Batman in most of them. But it's not crazy distracting when he doesn't voice the character because A; it's likely not in the same continuity as his other portrayals, and B; the character still always looks like Batman, so it doesn't matter as much if he doesn't always sound the same. You can even get away with other actors replacing the role easier. In Justice League Unlimited, George Newbern replaced Tim Daily as Superman, who had played the character in Superman: The Animated Series, which are in the same continuity, and I didn't even notice, because the character always looked like Superman. Voice acting also doesn't take as much time to record as live action so it is often easier to get actors to reprise the same role again and again. That's part of why Conroy has played Batman so many times.

I feel like with What If, Marvel thought it would be super easy to get everyone back as their characters, since they just need them to do the voice, but then just kinda did their best when they couldn't get everyone, and hoped that no one would notice because it's animation. But because the art style depicts the characters as looking like their live action counterparts, there's just a bit of a weird disconnect. To me, it's frustrating because I think this could've easily been avoided one of two ways.

One, simply focus on stories revolving around characters who you do have, which is still quite a lot. This requires slightly more planning, but it's not more planning than what it takes to make any of the live action movies.

Or Two, and this is my preferred solution, change up the animation style so that the characters don't necessarily look like their live action actor. You could even give each episode its own unique animation style ala Love Death & Robots, or the upcoming Star Wars Visions. You are Disney after all, an animation company. Surely you could get a little more creative with the animation than just looking kinda like the movies.

Does any of this actually matter that much? Not really. I just find it strange when you have such a wide range of casting choices in a single project. Even when I am engaged in the story I still spend about half the time trying to figure out which actors are returning and which are not. Is anyone else bothered by this? Is it just me? Let me know on Twitter @duff_danny. And Marvel may be asking "What if," but I will do you one better:

Why If...?