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The malleable nature of online games means nothing is sacred, no aspect is safe from influence or enhancement. Even the recorded performance of an actor such as Peter Dinklage is a piece to be plugged into a game like Destiny - or unplugged, if someone better or with a more compatible schedule comes along.
Nolan North is taking over duties as the Ghost, your chatty companion ball in Destiny, after just one year. His role could be timeless, sure ... but nobodys perfect. And as long as Destiny isnt perfect, Bungie might as well put a revolving door on the Ghosts recording booth.
Lets cast for a spell, shall we?
Anthony Daniels (Star Wars)
Xur, the odds of successfully surviving a moon wizard attack are approximately three thousand seven hundred and twenty to one!
As the body, voice and soul of C-3PO, Anthony Daniels has some verified experience in playing a verbose, eternally consternated robot. Theres no shortage of horrid things to fret over in Destiny - The Vex, The Hive, that grumpy Mr. Crota - and no way to avoid countless firefights and spooky Martian caverns. Hes going to hate it, and his only R2 companion is the one that fires a loud gun.
Tatiana Maslany (Orphan Black)
As her stellar work in Orphan Black has shown, Canadian star Tatiana Maslany can blend into any role - an inhuman ball of talkative space minerals wont even register as a challenge for her. Youll totally forget its Maslany playing the Ghost, right until people start complaining about the fact that she hasnt won an Emmy for it yet. Why hasnt she won an Emmy yet? Seriously.
Troy Baker (The Last of Us)
Troy Baker, or Nolan North 2, as hes known among casting directors, should have little trouble compressing his considerable talents to fit inside the Ghosts shell. Hed knock it out of the park, we know this, but theres one other reason Troy Bakers ubiquitous voice is an apt and inevitable part of Destiny: Its a video game, and its illegal to release one without him.
343 Guilty Spark (Halo)
Though 343 Guilty Spark has struggled to break out of menacing future-orb roles - does anyone remember his cameo as Fancy Security Camera on CSI: Cyber? - it might be time to fall back on what hes best at. 343 Guilty Spark also has an in with Bungie, having worked with the studio on multiple Halo games and lore-heavy motion comics. There were some regrettable things said between parties after writers killed him off in Halo 3, of course, but hes smoothed things over since then. Besides, if you really want to earn a grudge from Bungie, you have to compose the music.
Chris Pratt (Guardians of the Galaxy)
That pelvic sorcerer came from the moon!
Chris Pratt is almost too cool for a video game, but Activisions army of negotiators make a strong case when they all show up at once, in an actual case, in groupings of $10,000 or more. Itll be money well spent to get a Ghost with all the qualities of Hollywoods current go-to hero: inescapable charisma, a carefree embrace of adventure and some wild sex appeal.
Mmm, sexy, sexy Ghost man. Why dont you place a nav beacon to my spaceships private quarters?
Katherine Mathilda Tilda Swinton (That Wes Anderson Movie)
Forget the subservient AI routine - maybe we want the Ghost to be odd, unsettling, commanding, weird. Maybe we want Destinys main chatter to go through a Tilda Swinton filter, coming out in a skewed way, tingling in our ears like the demonic whispers of a dark universe throbbing just beneath our own. With every word, Tilda-bot shatters the bones of our conceptions, reducing our understanding of Destinys lore and our universe to a gently quivering blob. Now Destiny is an eldritch horror that we can never escape.
Shia LaBeouf (Transformers)
Shia LaBeouf does just fine as ol Ghosty, as well come to call him around Destiny Year 4, but the important part is that he, well, did it. Standing in the mirror for a solid week, never once sitting or showering or eating, LaBeouf willed his dream into reality by shouting motivation phrases at himself. Do it. Do it. DO IT! Become someone important! In Destiny, the video game!
Well look back fondly on this version of the Ghost, which proved that sometimes our aspirations can pay off, and that sometimes you just gotta kill Nolan North with your bare hands to get the gig. DO IT!
Angela Lansbury (Murder, She Wrote)
Think of how delightful Mrs. Potts was, and how adept Jessica Fletcher was at solving mysteries and corralling killers. That sounds like the kind of companion, eloquent yet inquisitive, youd want alongside you in the fight against The Darkness. Lansburys considerable experience on film and stage makes her all the more fit for a Destiny Ghost - and theres not a single grimoire card that says Jessica Fletcher wasnt reincarnated as a whipsmart robo-sphere after she wrote all that murder. Bet you missed that aspect of the plot, didnt you?
Peter Dinklage (Game of Thrones)
With the specter of George Lucas floating over every instance of a creator re-doing their work, fans will inevitably demand the return of the original Ghost from Destinys good ol days. Dinklebot was better, fans will say. Perhaps we were too harsh on him, critics will write. Can you please kill Tyrion already and free up Dinklages schedule, Bungie will whisper into George R.R. Martins ear. And maybe it wasnt entirely his fault.
