Hellena Taylor, the original voice actor for Bayonetta who is not returning to voice the character in Bayonetta 3, has spoken out about why she’s not reprising the role. In a series of videos shared on socials, Taylor said she was offered $4,000 to return to the role of Bayonetta, an offer she described as “an insult.” Taylor has since called for people to boycott the game ahead of its October 28th release. Hideki Kamiya, the executive director working on Bayonetta 3 and a well-known figure within developer PlatinumGames, has since responded to these claims.
Videos by ComicBook.com
Taylor’s thread of videos on Twitter began with the one below where she introduced herself as “the voice of Bayonetta.” Throughout her videos, she said that she was asked to reaudition for the role given that voiced change over time, and when she did, she said she passed with “flying colors.” That netted her what she called an “insulting offer,” however, so she wrote to the Kamiya to ask for what she felt her talents were worth. Taylor said she received a response which initially made her feel positive about obtaining a better offer, but it was then that the offer was raised to the $4,000 payout.
“This is an insult to me. The amount of time I took to work on my talent, and everything that I have given to this game and to the fans,” Taylor said at the end of her first video. “I am asking the fans to boycott this game and instead spend the money that you would have spent on this game donating it to charity. I didn’t want the world. I didn’t ask for too much. I was just asking for a decent, dignified, living wage. What they did was legal, but it was immoral.”
Since Taylor’s account of the Bayonetta 3 situation started circulating on socials this weekend, Kamiya responded on Twitter with language that suggested he felt the whole truth was not public.
“Sad and deplorable about the attitude of untruth,” Kamiya said. “That’s what all I can tell now. By the way, BEWARE OF MY RULES.”
