Part 1: Mike Wellins
Part 2: Robin Ator
Part 3: Albert Hensley [You Are Here]
Quick Context
Several commercials were produced for LoD, but only one aired in North America. It’s a 30 second spot focusing on some fast cuts from the game’s Full-Motion Videos, or FMVs. However, it suddenly shifts to the arena fight between Dart and Lloyd. At the end, Dart manages to accidentally cut off Lloyd’s head. The scene goes from serious to silly, revealing stage elements like a boom mic and the Director telling everyone to take a break. But this didn’t really tell you what the game was about, or why you should buy it. Was it a game that was more like a movie? A funny game where peoples’ heads get chopped off? We had no idea for decades.
DrewUniverse was able to learn about this commercial from the first-hand account of multiple people who worked on it. This is part 3, as recounted by Albert Hensley. Unlike most interviews, this series merely conveys the story as told by the people who worked on the commercial. A compiled account will be summarized and published on this website in 2026.
The ad agency Chiat Day (in Los Angeles, CA), were hired by Sony to find a production studio to create the TV spot. They would decide to go with Will Vinton Studios: known for claymation, TV spots, et cetera.
** Please note that the below transcript is provided as-is from the original email exchange. Issues with grammar, missing words, and stuff like that will not be revised on this page.
Part 3: The Story from Albert Hensley
I loved working on this spot with Mike Wellins (he was the director!) What I remember from it was that I was initially just the video editor, and Mike asked me to step into a booth and record a scratch track of the line, “what a wuss!”. They were going to replace it with someone else at some point, but on this one, the client loved how I read the line, so they wanted to keep it. They also kept Mike Wellins’ voice in it. He was the one who said, “Nigel, he cut my head off!!!! He cut my head off!!!” The only line I had was “what a wuss!”. But they kept both of our reads for the spot.
So after they decided to keep Mike and I, because they were going to then pay me an industry wage for this spot, they asked if I’d be willing to go to a recording booth and record a nice clean take of the “what a wuss” line. So I went downtown to an official studio. Initially, we had just grabbed a mic, and I recorded the scratch track in the editing studio, so the audio quality wasn’t PERFECT, so since they were going to spend so much money on the spot, and also give me a nice chunk of money, they figured they’d better get a cleaner version.
I do remember being in the recording studio, and I thought it’d be super quick, but since they had me for a full hour, they then would offer up alternate lines, so they’d have a lot to play with when it was all done.
So I recorded about 15 different takes of “What a wuss!”
Then I did about 10 takes of alternates like:
“What a baby!”
“What a weenie!”
“What a wimp!”
“What a woosie!”
etc, etc etc…
What should have been a 2 minute session, turned into about a 30 min session, with every alternate synonym of “wuss/baby/puss/etc” you can think of! They ended up sticking with “What a wuss!” But it was a fun session.
This happened to me more than a few times at Will Vinton Studios. I ended up being a scratch track for several national ABC TV promos that Mike Wellins directed, and the client liked me so much, they kept my scratch tracks, and paid me.
Same with a pilot we put together at Will Vinton Studios called “Klay’s TV”, also directed by Mike Wellins. (He and I were good friends, and loved working together as director/editor. He also used my voices on a short film he created that I did the sound design for, called “Chuck Webber’s Land of Abusement”. Mike and I were a good team!
It was because of all this success I had at voice stuff at Vinton, that made me really think about doing it full-time. I never thought it’d be something I would do full-time, but I kept the idea on the backburner for several years. And then in 2013, when I got laid off from my full time job producing the pre/half/post game shows for the Trail Blazers here in Portland, that I decided, “Hmm, maybe I should try that fulltime voice thing?”
And now it’s been 10 years, and I’ve had a ton of success at it. So without LofD, I may not have become the fulltime successful voice actor I am today! (and if you wanna see other stuff I’ve done, my website is www.AlbertHensleyVoice.com)
As told by Albert Hensley