HT Exclusive| Solo Leveling’s Barca, Thanos & Bhallaladeva: How Rana Daggubati would host 3 villains on his talk show

In late November, Crunchyroll rolled out an impressive casting for the upcoming season of Solo Leveling. Powerhouse Indian superstar Rana Daggubati boarded the anime train in an ambitious feat as the Hindi, Telugu and Tamil voice for the Ice Elf King Barca’s role. Delighting Indian anime fans, his unmissable, powerful and distinct voice also welcomed Otakus to an unforgettable big-screen experience as the Hindi-dubbed version of the omnibus film Solo Leveling – ReAwakening secured an early theatrical opening on December 4.

Hot on the heels of the announcement that put big smiles on the faces of Indian fans, Crunchyroll also revealed that the Baahubali star would be leading an ultimate anime surprise at the Delhi Comic Con 2024 on December 6. Taking the stage and the Crunchyroll booth, the South Indian actor made a head-turning appearance at the fan convention event, followed by his attendance at an exclusive fan screening of the new Solo Leveling movie. Everything successfully set the tone for Season 2’s arrival in the new year.

Also read | HT Exclusive: After Solo Leveling, Rana Daggubati wants to join this Seinen manga-anime universe

HindustanTimes.com scored an exclusive interview with the beloved and enigmatic Indian performer at the capital’s Comic Con this year. Daggubati didn’t hold back while detailing his brand-new experience voicing an anime character. Comparing his new gig with older ones, he also came clean about which three villains he’d love to host from his filmography on his talk show.

What drew Rana Daggubati to Solo Leveling’s Barca

Rana Daggubati himself established in the promo video for his introduction as Ice Elf King Barca that villain roles have been flocking to him for a while. Despite that, he ultimately greenlit the responsibility of lending his voice to the enigmatic antagonist who will be walking out in Solo Leveling Season 2.

Breaking down what finally sealed the deal for him, the Indian superstar proclaimed, “Well, I think all of my life… I try to do things that excite me and, that can teach me a new culture. I’ve lived in movies all my life, and I think any culture that I know is through whatever I watched or whatever I have done.”

He continued, “I think that’s the fun about just living as an artist. You don’t know what you’re called for, and you’ll get to see some other part of the world that you never thought existed in the most beautiful form and so up close.”

Barca’s intimidating character won’t be lost in translation

Diving deeper into how a lot of emotion and cadence often get lost in translation, leading viewers to feel a sense of loss, Daggubati basically reassured the audiences that wouldn’t be the case for all three Indian dubs of his character in Solo Leveling. “The guidelines of the character are so clear, it’ll pretty much hit the same beat across languages,” he proclaimed. I also asked him if any of the three versions ended up sounding more menacing than the other.

However, he maintained that all three were equally threatening as the first one. Furthermore, he foregrounded that he faced no hardships in voicing Barca in Hindi, Tamil or Telugu.

Relating the experience with how translation pours through in Indian films, he said, “I think that wasn’t too hard because we do that with film. And more likely in the last 4-5 years, we’ve been making Telugu films, making sure that Hindi audiences see it, Tamil audiences see it, and the world across gets to witness it.” Coming down to anime, he noted how it “especially is a such an easy offering to people for whom language is not really the top most priority… it’s storytelling, actually.”

Also read | Solo Leveling – ReAwakening review: Big screen visual spectacle sets the mood for anticipated sequel but at a cost

Remembering his old Thanos days

With the villainous responsibility put on his shoulder to voice Solo Leveling’s Barca, the Baahubali star confirmed that it inevitably took him back to the days when he lent his voice to the MCU big bad Thanos for Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame.

Describing his previous “beautiful experience” and correlating it with the new one, he said he was travelling when the first film came out. As a result, “I got to watch the film where I knew all the scenes of Thanos, but I didn’t know the rest of the movie. But it was really exciting because I felt like, okay. Now I’m Thanos, and this is the world. So it was a very different experience.”

He continued, “I don’t think anybody would have had that experience of seeing some pieces before. And I think that’s the same that happened for Barca.”

What Rana Daggubati would like fans to take away from the new Solo Levelling season and his character

We eventually delved deeper into how his character, Barca, and the Solo Leveling protagonist, Sung Jinwoo, are quintessentially grey characters who don’t fit into the stereotypical definitions of the villain/hero binary. It led Rana to admit that he would want fans to simply take away the latest offering as “a really fun experience,” fleshing out an “underdog” narrative.

Simultaneously, he also urged viewers to be open to exploring “deep themes of rejection in society” and how there are also people “safeguarding,” i.e. those “who stand by you.”

“These are very honourable lessons that it’ll teach you, but in a very entertaining and violent way.”

Rana’s mean invitees on his talk show

Finally, I presented him with a hypothetical situation, demanding to know who he would host out of his own villain roles on the unfiltered Prime Video talk show, The Rana Daggubati Show. He chose three characters from his complete filmography: Solo Leveling’s Barca, Marvel’s Thanos and his unforgettable Baahubali supervillain, Bhallaladeva.

Denying the responsibility to mediate the interaction in this make-believe setup, Rana blatantly said, “I’ll just say, ‘Okay, now let’s have drinks,’ and see what happens. I won’t steer the conversation here. I’ll just be steered in whichever direction those guys take me.”