Badass Baritone

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He is a manly man, and he has a manly voice to prove it.

A character of this sort must fulfill two criteria:

1. The character must be a badass.
2. The character must have a deep voice of baritone register. Bass register is also possible but is rarer and almost always overlaps with being evil.

Such a character may range from Cool Old Guy to Testosterone Poisoning. Such characters are frequently supporting roles, such as The Lancer.

See also Evil Sounds Deep, Guttural Growler, Power Makes Your Voice Deep. Contrast Tenor Boy.

Examples of Badass Baritone include:

Anime and Manga

• Scar from Fullmetal Alchemist.
  • Also Alex Armstrong.
  • Zolf. J. Kimbley.
  • Roy Mustang, as well.
• One Piece: Roronoa Zoro has the deepest voice in the crew, and is undeniably Badass.
• Dutch from Black Lagoon.
  • Boris also.
• Alucard from Hellsing.
• Any character portrayed by Norio Wakamoto.
• Several characters from Bleach: Kenpachi, Byakuya, Ukitake, Shunsui, Aizen, Ulquiorra, Grimmjow, Starrk... and there are most likely more of them.
• Gaara as dubbed by Liam O'Brien. Also his japanese seiyuu.
  • Shino, Zabuza, Kakuzu, Neji, Kyuubi, A and Guy and a few others.
  • Kakashi, Itachi, Pain, Madara.
• Souther from Fist of the North Star has a voice that might well be deeper than is actually naturally possible. Oddly enough, Toki the Kung Fu Jesus has his own Badass Baritone going on. The main character, Kenshiro, prefers high-pitched "A-TA-TA" sounds.
• Whenever Goku goes Super Saiyan 3, he invokes this trope to show he means business. And let's not get started on the badassery that is Super Saiyan 4...
• Hidekatsu Shibata: Voiced The Third Hokage, King Bradley and Igneel.
• Jamieson Price: Voiced Lord Genome, First Hokage, The Count in The Count of Monte Cristo, and a few others.
  • Digimon Data Squad's Commander Sampson qualifies, as does his original Japanese counterpart.
• Joji Nakata: Soichiro Takagi, Alucard, Chaser John Doe and a few others.
• Shizuo Heiwajima from Durarara, particularly in the dub where he's voiced by Crispin Freeman.
• Joe the Condor from Science Ninja Team Gatchaman, considering his VA is real life Badass Baritone singer Isao Sasaki
• Katekyo Hitman Reborn: Reborn in adult form, Xanxus, Squalo, Mukuro (especially in his 25 year old form),25 year old Lambo and Alaude.

Film

• Miles Gloriosus from A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, especially in the movie.
• Many incarnations of Batman have him lowering his voice while in costume to sound more menacing.
• Christopher Lee sometimes plays this when he isn't playing villains.
  • His voice is perfect when he plays the Discworld role of Death, since Terry Pratchett has always described Death's voice being deep and foreboding like the slamming of a coffin lid.
• Mace Windu in the Star Wars prequel trilogy. Darth Vader is the more villainous example, but he's still one of the most badass villains on the screen.
  • As a rule, though, anytime Samuel L. Jackson is in the film's cast, expect his character to be one of these.
• Optimus Prime.
• Riddick from the The Chronicles of Riddick series.
• Any character played by Ron Perlman.
• Kevin Grevioux has an unnaturally deep voice, which led many people watching his character Raze in Underworld to assume it has been altered in some way. He's also a Genius Bruiser, having degrees in microbiology and genetic engineering and having come up with the idea for the movie in the first place.
• Mufasa.
• Severus Snape.

Literature

• Aral Vorkosigan of the Vorkosigan Saga has a "scratchy" baritone, as does his Retired Badass father.
• Earl Thorfinn, aka Macbeth from Dorothy Dunett's King Hereafter has a voice constantly described as "subterranean."
• Harry Dresden of The Dresden Files.
  • Also, Sanya. Knight of the Cross, and the only person manly enough to make Dresden feel inadequate, being roughly of a height with Dresden and muscle-bound enough to make Michael, who is notably strong, look puny, whereas Harry is all wiry muscle.
• Bahzell Bahnakson in David Weber's War God series.
• Every Chaos Marine in Throne of Lies speaks in an unusually low voice, but Xarl, The Squad's resident Blood Knight, is noticeably deeper.
• Derek Sagan of the Star of the Guardians by Margaret Weis has a deep baritone.
• DEATH from the Discworld is described as having a voice like a lead coffin lid slamming,even if his voice is more felt than heard.

Live Action TV

• Castiel. Also, Jensen Ackles noticeably starts using a deeper voice in any extended conversation with him. It's like they're trying to out-badass each other. Misha Collins has said that he regrets it- he thought he would only be a guest star and was just trying to sound Badass, but when he was brought back to be a major supporting character he was forced to keep it, and finds using the voice so much to be annoying, difficult and mildly painful.

Misha Collins: So in the first episode that Castiel shows up in, um — he's trying to communicate with Dean, and in so doing, his voice, his angelic voice, is exploding television sets and breaking windows — and so I, consummate guest star that I am, thought - oh, you know, I'm gonna do this [deepens voice], really deep, gravelly, commanding, kickass, kind of window-breaking voice... And I may be running into medical problems now.

• City Confidential narrator Paul Winfield, and his successor, Keith David.
• Shepherd Book from Firefly.
• Mason Makoola from Pair of Kings, although he is a bass.
• Sherlock Holmes himself. You could mistake Benedict Cumberbatch for Alan Rickman if you had your eyes closed.
• Skins: Gen 1's Sid, to some extent. His baritone next to Tony's tenor certainly evens the playing field.
• The Fourth Doctor from Doctor Who.

Theatre

• Charlie Anderson from The Musical adaptation of Shenandoah.
• Count Carl-Magus in A Little Night Music is certainly a manly man, if conceited and stupid, with a distinct baritone voice.
• Wotan in Richard Wagner's Der Ring Des Nibelungen. He's a bass-baritone, the ruler of the Gods, and he even has an eyepatch.
• Pick a Verdi baritone role. Any of them. Good guy or villain, all badass.
  • Meta-example: any baritone who can sing Verdi automatically qualifies. Rare though they may be, "Verdi Baritones" make ordinary baritones cower in fear.
  • If basses count, Sparafucile from Rigoletto. Assassin AND a man of honour. He never double-crosses anyone.
• Don Giovanni. He's THE MAN.
• Vanderdecken in Der fliegende Holländer -- manly, dark, mysterious, bass-baritone.
• Escamillo from Carmen. You know, the guy who sings that impossibly hammy song about how cool toreros are.
• Les Misérables: Inspector Javert. Baritone or bass-baritone required, and he's badass enough to have his own trope. (Ask Patron-Minette how he arrested seven armed bandits plus a Mama Bear (who counts herself as two) alone.)
  • Enjolras is also played by a baritone and, as charismatic leader of the Friends of the ABC, qualifies.
• Sweeney Todd. Also The Judge.
• Macheath in The Threepenny Opera
• Depending on the actor, The Phantom of the Opera (the role has been played by both tenors and baritones).
• The indisputably badass Beast from Beauty and the Beast is a solid baritone role, as is the equally badass (though much more arrogant about it) villain Gaston.

Video Games

• Garrus Vakarian, David Anderson, Zaeed Massani, and Thane Krios from Mass Effect all have deep, distinctive voices.
• Angeal from Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII fits the trope nicely.
• Kratos Aurion from Tales of Symphonia, who has the same seiyu as Kenpachi.
• Alucard from Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. A bit of a contrast with his appearance.
• The Grand Oak of Dragon Age: Origins definitely fits this trope. Bonus points since he Rhymes on a Dime.
• The Arishok of Dragon Age II.
  • Malcom Hawke, father of the player character, as well.
• Auron from Final Fantasy X has a voice bordering on Guttural Growler.
• Golbez, in both the DS remake of FFIV and Dissidia Final Fantasy.
  • Kain as well, but only in English. Koichi Yamadera's vocal stylings are still somewhat deep, but not Christian Bale-Batman so.
• In The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time, Link's voice deepens as an adult. Puberty, granted, but still...
• The Heavy from Team Fortress 2 stands out as having perhaps the deepest voice of the cast.
• Any character voiced by Keith David is almost guaranteed to be this. Vhailor from Planescape: Torment, The Arbiter from Halo (notable for being the least hammy Elite), and Captain Anderson from Mass Effect come to mind.
• Jorge-052 from Halo: Reach, all the way.
• Meta Knight in Super Smash Bros Brawl speaks in a deep, gravelly voice. He's also the only character in the game who administrators are considering banning from tournament play because he's too powerful.
• Tychus Findlay of Starcraft II has a voice that makes Barry White sound like a falsetto.
• Ezio Auditore da Firenze from Assassin's Creed II and Assassin's Creed Brotherhood. His voice gradually deepens as he gets older, in addition to growing a Badass Beard.
• Shinjiro Aragaki from Persona 3 in the original Japanese version.
  • Although Grant George's English voice is hardly high pitched itself.
• Harman Smith, voiced by Dwight Schultz, in Killer 7
• Quan Chi.
• In Fallout: New Vegas, Legate Lanius from the base game and Joshua Graham from the Honest Hearts DLC are both badass and have very deep voices. Doubly notable for both being extremely cool, competent, and collected and neither of them using profanity in a game where it is plentiful.
• Lee Everett of The Walking Dead.
• Jazz from Eternal Sonata. Here, have an example.
• A few Asura's Wrath characters have this, like Deus, Asura and the Rasho Mooks.

Western Animation

• No one has a baritone like Gaston! Except Beast.
• Goliath from Gargoyles. His voice is practically deeper that those of the other characters. Only natural, since he's voiced by Keith David.
• The main character of Korgoth of Barbaria (as well as a number of characters voiced by Diedrich Bader).
• Lex Luthor as voiced by Clancy Brown in The DCAU.
  • Batman as voiced by Kevin Conroy as well, especially when Batman is older, demonstrated in this video.
  • Darkseid as voiced in both the English and the Latin American dub.
• Transformers' Optimus Prime is universally this, with a voice so deep and weighty it would crush the vocalizers of lesser 'bots.
• Smaug in the Animated Adaptation of The Hobbit, as befits a titanic dragon. It really adds to the effect of his Badass Boast.

Real Life

• Christopher Lee. Played many of the most iconic villains in film history, aided much due to his magnificent baritone voice. He's also a trained operatic singer, a metalhead, speaks at least five languages fluently, is a Master Swordsman, and was a member of the Special Operations Executive during World War II (whose exploits inspired the character of James Bond).
• Tim Curry.
• Vladimir Kulich.
• Musician First Class Courtney R. Williams, Concert Moderator for the United States Navy Concert Band.
• Till Lindeman of Rammstein.
• Despite common depictions, this trope is subverted in the two most legitimately Badass American presidents: both Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt are said to have had shrill, nasally voices.
  • So did General Patton, George C. Scott portrayal notwithstanding.
• Steve Blum.
• Johnny Cash, ladies.
• Michael McConnohie, one of the closest we have to an English-speaking Norio Wakamoto.
• The late Peter Steele of Type O Negative.
• Harry "The Tyrant" Conklin of Jag Panzer. He can (and does) go higher, but his natural register is baritone and he's the living embodiment of badass in metal. I'M A MAN WHO SHOWS NO MERCY FOR THE WEAK!
• Metallica's James Hetfield. Accidentally stepped into a pyrotechnic, and lived.
• The Undertaker. Walking, talking embodiment of Badass. Once got set on fire by his pyro and never broke character.
• Japanese singers Takayuki Miyauchi (known for singing the awesome Opening song to Kamen Rider Black RX) and Isao Sasaki aka "The Japanese Elvis Presley".
  • Gackt's voice is surprisingly deep for such a feminine-looking guy, and his songs are pretty awesome as well.
• Among Mexican dubbers, the big prize for the deep and badass voice-overs goes to Gerardo Reyero (who's actually a bass). Though it's not to say that guys like Mario Castañeda, Gabriel Basurto and Marcos Patiño are slouches either.
• Norio Wakamoto.
• James Earl Jones is made of this.
• Brian Blessed, complete with giant pieces of ham.
• The late Tony Jay, so much he was typecast as villains.
• And lest we forget, the late Don LaFontaine.
• Richard Armitage.
• Travis Willingham.
• Ettore Bastianini, a famous Italian operatic baritone in the 1950-60s.
• Patrick Seitz.
• Jamieson Price.
• Liam O'Brien.
• Ryuzaburo Ohtomo.
• Fred Tatasciore tends to play these roles, with good reason whenever he's not playing monster roles and The Incredible Hulk.
• The late, great Daisuke Gouri.