Transformers And Winnie The Pooh Share A Certain Legendary Voice
To talk about Peter Cullen's voice acting career is to take a trip through the last five decades of mainstream U.S. animation. The man has lent his voice to so many noteworthy cartoon series that it boggles the mind, including "Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo," "The Smurfs," "Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends," "Voltron: Defender of the Universe," "Alvin and the Chipmunks," "Muppet Babies," "Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers," and "Invincible." But one cannot even begin to do justice to his body of work without touching on the iconic character that he's voiced across multiple animated shows and feature films for nearly 40 years now. Truly, at this point, Cullen is all but synonymous with his onscreen counterpart: Eeyore. (Oh, and Optimus Prime, I guess.)
After debuting as the Autobots' intrepid leader in "The Transformers" in 1984, Cullen took over voicing the most relatable resident of the Hundred Acre Wood from the late Ralph Wright (who voiced Eeyore for Disney prior to his death in 1983) starting in 1989 with "The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh." Cullen has brought the melancholic donkey to life in the vast majority of Disney's "Winnie the Pooh" projects since then, as well as the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh dark ride featured at Disney's theme parks. Those few exceptions include the 2018 films "Christopher Robin" and "Ralph Breaks the Internet," wherein Brad Garrett voiced the character instead.
Speaking to Collider in 2023, Cullen confirmed that Optimus remains his number-one boy, but indicated that Eeyore is a close second:
"I loved the characters that were easiest to do, that didn't require a lot of screaming and yelling, and stuff like that, because screaming and yelling, it's hard work. But my favorite, outside of Prime, was Eeyore. [Mimics Eeyore] 'Thanks for noticing me. Not that anybody cares.'"
The wild world of Transformers voice actors
Six Degrees of Winnie the Pooh is even easier to play when it comes to "The Transformers" than you might realize. Legendary Disney voice actor Jim Cummings, who took over voicing the Silly 'Ol Bear for the House of Mouse on "The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh" and frequently voiced Tigger before assuming the role full-time in 2000's "The Tigger Movie," also voiced a few characters on "The Transformers." He would then return to the franchise some 30 years later for "Transformers: Rescue Bots," an animated show targeted at the next generation of potential robots-in-disguise enthusiasts.
While not strictly a member of the Winnie the Pooh gang, Frank Welker (who voiced the villainous Decepticons' malevolent boss, Megatron) joined the Disney Animation family around the same time that Cullen and Cummings did, having gotten his own start in voice acting on "Scooby Doo, Where Are You!" in the late '60s. Then there are the other prolific voice actors who worked on "The Transformers," including Casey Kasem — the first actor to ever voice Shaggy in the "Scooby-Doo" cartoons — and Corey Burton, another incredibly versatile performer who started doing voice acting for Disney in the 1980s. Really, the further down the list you go, the harder it becomes not to find a cast member who eventually crossed over into another famous animated property with one or more of their costars.
Forget that old proverb that "Inside you, there are two wolves." Clearly, what everyone really has inside them are an Optimus Prime and an Eeyore — and if you're as wise as Peter Cullen, you'll treasure them both equally.