Gender and Race

‘HEROES WHO LOOK LIKE ME’ Voice Actress Zehra Fazal Voices Characters for Her Younger Self

BY HANNAH CHALKER

Growing up as a young Muslim girl, Zehra Fazal said she yearned to see TV, movie and video game characters that looked like her. Now, the 35-year-old voice actress has become those characters she wishes she had in her childhood. Fazal has voiced a diverse range of characters, from Muslim to gender non-binary, on a variety of series for Disney Television Animation, Nickelodeon, Warner Brothers, DreamWorks, Cartoon Network and Bento Box. She is best known for voicing the Muslim character, Halo, in the Cartoon Network series, “Young Justice,” and has also lent her voice to several different video games as both main and supporting characters.

Born in Libertyville, Illinois, Fazal has always had love in her heart for cartoons — a love that followed her from childhood to adulthood. Initially, Fazal wanted to be an animator, so she focused on studying art. Bewitched by the theater department at her school, Fazal fell in love with performing and acting. She found herself enthralled in Japanese theater, leading her to live in Japan for a year to further her studies. This is when Fazal realized that she wanted to use performing as a method of storytelling. Greg Weisman, creator of “Young Justice,” encouraged Fazal to go into acting for animation when he met her at a convention when she was 16 years old. This suggestion stuck with Fazal for years until Weisman invited her to voice the young Muslim character, Halo, that he had created for the cartoon “Young Justice,” which she recently earned two Voice Arts Awards (Best Voice Actor and Outstanding Animation Character) for.

As a Muslim woman, Fazal has noticed the lack of Islamic representation in video games and television shows. Growing up, she found herself identifying with Luke Skywalker from Star Wars, not because of his looks, but because of his journey.

“As I get older, I see now more and more characters who look like me, who look like people that haven't been represented as much before,” the Wellesley College graduate said. “Whether it's representing people of different faiths, races, sexual or gender orientation, it's so powerful. It moves me in such a way that I'm like, wow, if I had had this sense of belonging, and know that you are part of a group, that you can be the hero of this story — if I had had that feeling growing up, I think things would have been a lot different.” Fazal’s character in “Young Justice,” Halo, is a gender nonbinary Muslim character with mysterious powers. Halo is described as an old soul in a young body. Halo’s powers come from the fusion of a young girl and something called a MotherBox, a living computer with female programming. + HER FEATURES

With this fusion, Halo’s former personality was wiped, but she still remembers the decisions she made in her former life, decisions that led to the assassination of a king and queen that took her in when her town was destroyed. So, Halo carries this guilt that isn’t entirely hers because she is no longer that person. With the United States’ controversial attitude towards refugees, Fazal’s character is one that people need to see. Prior to her career as a voice actress, Fazal was known for her comedy that pokes fun at the Muslim identity. Her comedy show, “Headscarf and the Angry Bitch,” explores how the definition of what it means to be Muslim is expanding and that it’s okay to be vocal about it. Her show is both fictional and autobiographical. Fazal wanted to hit the notes on living what she calls a “hyphenated identity” in America from the point of view as a Muslim-American. Whether you are Muslim or not, many Americans of different backgrounds can relate to the concept of a “hyphenated identity,” meaning you are not just one thing.

Halo from Young Justice

Fazal’s character, Halo, is also an allegory for puberty and adolescence as the character goes on a journey of selfdiscovery. Her character displays the importance of realizing that you can change as a person. Adolescence is a time in which our bodies go through changes that can be quite confusing and scary. While we may not die and come back to life with alien technology in our bodies, it certainly feels that way to some of us. Halo is just a teen who is realizing she isn’t the person she used to be before her transformation, and that’s okay.

“I think the closest analogy is what we all go through as teenagers when we find ourselves in bodies that all of a sudden are kind of foreign to us after puberty,” Fazal explained. “It's like what am I? How, how do I fit into the world? Who am I in relation to other people? How are other people going to treat me? Who's the adult I want to grow into the person I want to become? No, I think that these challenges were all inherent in the character of Halo. So, that was a really exciting thing for me as an actor to tap into that kind of journey of adolescence.”

Fazal is not only expanding representation in cartoons but in video games as well. Up until recently, she has voiced minor characters in video games such as “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare,” “Titanfall 2,” and “Destiny 2: Shadowkeep.” In the game “Borderlands 3,” Fazal voices a playable character, Amara, a woman of color with spirit-like energy, despite the difficulty of gaining representation for cosplay through media. “There was a woman of color who was dressed up like my character, Amara,” she said. “She came up to me and she was like, ‘I just want to let you know how amazing it feels to be able to dress up as somebody who looks like me’. I started crying, it was just this moment. You realize, you know, I didn't realize I was thirsty for something until I got offered a drink of water. You know what I mean?” Ilana Benson from BoJack Horseman

Now, Fazal’s main focus is making sure that people, young and old, feel equally represented in media. She loves her fans and is incredibly moved when they tell her that they relate to the characters she portrays. Fazal is continuing to work on projects to further her dream of having everyone feel rightfully represented, whether it be in television, video games or on stage.