Gender non-conforming activist, author, and actor Jacob Tobia is joining the voice cast of Netflix’s ‘She-Ra and the Princesses of Power’ as the show’s first non-binary character, the shapeshifter Double Trouble. A short video interview was posted by the Netflix Prism Instagram account, in which Tobia discusses their new character:
According to Dreamworks Animation:
“Tobia voices Double Trouble, a non-binary shape-shifting mercenary from the Crimson Waste, who joins forces with Catra and the Horde. Able to magically transform themselves into any person they see, Double Trouble has the soul of a thespian, spending hours in ‘character study’ trying to perfectly mimic their target, and always looking for feedback on their ‘performance’ – just don’t ever give them a negative critique.”
‘She-Ra and the Princesses of Power’ just launched last year on Netflix, but it is already getting set to release its fourth season. (Of course, its seasons vary in length– Season 1 had 13 episodes, S2 had 7, and S3 had 6.) The series has been a champion of diversity, with characters of all skin tones and body types, and has depicted same-sex relationships– Princesses Spinerella and Netossa, Bow’s two fathers. Also, I would have sworn that Sea Hawk was transgender, but maybe I’m wrong.
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For old school fans, Double Trouble is a unique character, in that she appeared as a doll in the original Mattel toy line, but was never depicted on the cartoon. She did appear in the minicomics that came with the toys and some storybooks, but otherwise Double Trouble is a bit of a mystery. I’m not even sure if it was ever specified whether she was a hero or villain. The toy had a rotating face feature– similar to the Man-E-Faces toy from Masters of the Universe– with one “pretty” face and one “ugly” face, but honestly, they don’t actually look all that different.
Dreamworks Animation states that Season 4 depicts “the respective rises of Queen Glimmer as leader of the Rebellion and Catra as co-leader of the Horde. As the Horde makes advances on the Rebellion under the looming threat of Horde Prime’s arrival, the Princess Alliance makes heroic strides but begins to disagree on the best way to defend Etheria. Ultimately, a shocking discovery about Etheria itself causes Adora to reconsider everything she thought she knew.”
Tobia is an award-winning writer, whose works have been published by MSNBC, MTV, The Huffington Post, The Washington Post, The New York Times, and more. They created, co-produced and hosted the talk show ‘Queer 2.0’ on NBC News, and worked on Season 4 of Amazon Prime Video’s ‘Transparent’.
‘She-Ra and the Princesses of Power’ returns with new episodes on November 4th on Netflix.
Source: Entertainment Weekly
