Patricia Summersett has confirmed that she is reprising her role as Princess Zelda in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.
As reported by GameRant, she shared a brief message on Twitter, revealing that Nintendo just gave her the OK to confirm this herself, as well as thanking Nintendo for the opportunity.
Summersett originally played Zelda in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Unfortunately, her acting in that role faced a lot of criticism for what was perceived to be a weak performance.
For what it’s worth, in most of the scenes that Summersett plays Zelda, she plays a vulnerable character, who isn’t sure that she can live up to her father King Rhoam’s expectations. While she is unable to summon the Hylian power that was inside her, she was more interested in scientific inquiry. In specific, she wanted to learn more about the Guardians.
So the way Summersett voiced Zelda fit the role that she was playing, but this did not insulate her from said criticism. Zelda had received a lot of revisions in her portrayal, from a basic damsel in distress, to a powerful being on the same scale as Ganon. That this specific Zelda spent most of the game’s cutscenes being portrayed as vulnerable was a bold move on the side of Aonuma’s team. However, it did Summersett no favors.
In an interview with Zelda Dungeon, Summersett talked about how she handled the criticism of her portrayal:
That was tougher to deal with at first, because I was very sensitive to it, and just wanted everybody to be as happy as possible for such a big game [Breath of the Wild]. You really have to keep that kind of stuff in perspective, or one does.
You really got to be positive about that stuff. I’d say the negative people tend to be more vocal online, just by default – that’s the nature of the algorithms of the net, and it does take some getting used to. One has to build a thick skin, I think, with something like this. I’d definitely say my skin has gotten a lot thicker over the last years, since taking on this particular role, just because it’s required more thick skin than some of the other kinds of failures or critiques I’ve had in the past.
There’s something in that to channel as well, because that’s how Zelda feels, and she’s doing great, but she feels that way eternally, and that’s her plate. It’s very relatable in that way, I think. Anybody who’s taking risks and trying to work very hard at anything, you come across that. I do love that about her character in general, the fact that they dig into that part of the storyline for her: what it means for her to feel like a failure, but keep pushing forward and striving for something bigger, and for the benefit of all. One can use that as inspiration as one uses heroes as inspiration.”
Ultimately, even if there are fans who still have misgivings over Summersett’s casting, Nintendo still has a good reason to cast her again. After all, it makes sense to use the same actor for a consistent portrayal of Zelda’s character. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild are already intimately used to Summersett’s voice, especially every time she warns Link of the arrival of a Blood Moon. A change could be even worse for that portrayal, making everything feel off.
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom will be releasing on May 12, 2023, exclusively on the Nintendo Switch.
