The campaign ofBayonetta’soriginal voice actor, Hellena Taylor, to lead a boycott ofBayonetta 3, for which she feels she was offered unfair compensation to return to her old role, continues to roll on. Taylor on Friday doubled down on her call to boycott the recently released title by providing a list of charities that she would like people to donate to in lieu of purchasing the game, one of which drew the ire of some fans for its known status as an anti-abortion advocate.This list of charities is generally innocuous, including the student pizza fund for the drama department at her alma mater, the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, in addition to Pets for Vets, disaster relief fund Team Rubicon, and environmental group The Halo Trust. One entry on the list, however, BillBoards 4Life, is a Kentucky-based organization that uses billboards to promote its members' anti-abortion stances. According to the group’s ownTwitter page, “Our mission is to post prolife billboards focused on spreading the word about the sanctity of ALL human LIFE.“One of the people calling attention to Taylor’s list of acceptable charities was Bloomberg reporterJason Schrier, who commented, “Even putting aside personal beliefs, it’s pretty wild that this choice of ‘charity’ isn’t to help out women in tough spots or try to offer guidance — it’s to yell at people on the highway.”
Taylor, who provided Bayonetta’s voice in her first two main-series games, burst into the spotlight on October 15, after she took to Twitter in a series of four short videos criticizing executives behind Bayonetta 3, specifically PlatinumGames' Vice President Hideki Kamiya, foronly offering her $4,000to return to the role for the newest installment. The allegations set social media afire, with the vast majority of the fan base initially standing strongly in Taylor’s corner. The following day, Kamiya, after making a post calling Taylor’s claims “sad and deplorable” (in Japanese),temporarily deleted his own Twitter accountto the delight of many who were seeking retribution on Taylor’s behalf.
A few days later, on October 18, new Bayonetta voice actor Jennifer Hale, whom Taylor had previous said had “no right” to call herself the voice of Bayonetta,issued her own statement, advocating for the rights of voice actors to be fairly compensated for their work but urging fans to remember that Bayonetta 3 was created by “an entire team of hard-working, dedicated people” and calling for the situation to be resolved “in an amicable and respectful way.”
The tides seemed to have shifted rapidly against Taylor, however, after an October 18 report indicated that the offer made to Taylor was actuallycloser to $4,000 per recording session, a claim that caused Taylor toclarify her prior statementthat the $4,000 offer was a final offer made to her for recording some lines for the game, although she had at one point been offered $15,000 for the project as a whole.
Abortion is a hot-button issue in the United States, particularly since the Supreme Court overturned the benchmark case Roe v. Wade this past summer, eliminating a nationwide right to abortion and placing the matter in the states' hands. However, public opinion nationwide seems to indicate the majority is in favor of legalizing abortion in most circumstances. The most recent poll byPew Researchhas found that 61 percent of respondents support the right to an abortion in most cases, including 60 percent of people in the moderate/lean Republican category. Taylor is based in the United Kingdom.
Likewise, the vast majority of responses to Schrier’s commentary were critical of Taylor’s choice to include BillBoards 4Life, including some self-reported Kentucky residents bemoaning the political climate of their home state. Said Twitter user Derek Van Dyke (@DerbyCityDerek), “If folks find this distasteful, I’d argue the best way to counter it is by making a donation to Kentucky-based abortion funds (like the Kentucky Health Justice Network).”
