Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle has now reached U.S. cinemas, and ahead of its debut, voice actor Erika Harlacher discussed the process of bringing Shinobu Kocho to life in the English dub.
Harlacher, who has voiced the Insect Hashira for six years, reflected on the emotional demands of the role and her methods for capturing the character’s hidden intensity.
“When we first meet her, she’s kind of sassy and cheerful,” Harlacher told CBR in an interview. “I was very surprised at how much anger she had deep down.”
Shinobu Kocho’s character carries deep personal trauma, following the death of her sister Kanae at the hands of the Upper Moon Two demon, Doma.
Despite her outwardly calm and polite demeanour, Shinobu’s grief and anger fuelled her rise to the rank of Hashira, compensating for her lack of physical strength with speed, poisons, and strategy.
In the Infinity Castle storyline, Shinobu faces her greatest challenge yet, confronting Doma directly. To portray this emotional conflict, Harlacher revealed she relied on a technique rooted in recording her own physical responses to real-life emotions.
“Whenever I was feeling a really strong emotion in real life, I would pause and write down what my body felt like during those moments,” she explained.
“That way, when I’m in the recording booth, I don’t need to re-traumatise myself, but I can use those notes to remember what it felt like.”
Harlacher described how this method allowed her to revisit sensations such as a tight throat or heated skin when recording dramatic scenes.
This approach, she said, helped her convey Shinobu’s inner turmoil authentically while protecting her own well-being.
Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle is currently showing in U.S. theatres, with Harlacher’s performance as Shinobu central to the ongoing adaptation of the series’ climactic arc.
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