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Power Makes Your Voice Deep

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When a person taps into some mystical wellspring of power note , a common side effect is that their voice immediately plummets several octaves. Naturally, this is a tell-tale sign that copious amounts of ass are about to be kicked.

When pulled off correctly, the results can be spectacular.

May be justified if the power upgrade comes with Hulking Out or transforming into a One-Winged Angel: being larger probably corresponds with longer vocal chords, which produce deeper sounds.

Characters who are not, strictly speaking, examples of this trope may consciously alter their voices to sound deeper (or sexier) while in their heroic/villainous personas, in order to sound more impressive (or distracting) and to protect their identities.

Sister Trope to Power Echoes and Baritone of Strength, and the neutral cousin of Evil Sounds Deep and Voice of the Legion. A Secret Identity Vocal Shift may appear to be this if the voice for the superhero identity is deeper than their civilian version (which is usually the case). See also Heavy Voice.

Examples:

    open/close all folders 

    Anime and Manga 

    Comic Books 
  • In Cloak and Dagger (Marvel Comics), Tyrone Johnson's voice became much lower when he changed to his Cloak superhero identity.
  • The comic versions of Ghost Rider all get deep, scary voices once they change from their human identities to the Rider. Typically, it's represented by a change in their speech bubbles (speaking in italics, with the bubbles now outlined in black fire, or speaking in white text in black bubbles, and so on).
  • Some incarnations of Superman actually do this as a deliberate affectation to make himself sound less like Clark Kent.
  • The Incredible Hulk and his cousin She-Hulk both are noted for having deep voices when they transform.

    Fan Works 
  • Averted in Nexus. When Jack's in his demon form, his voice has a metallic edge; much like the Autobots.
  • Children of an Elder God: When Gendo and Yui seize the power stolen from the Outer Gods by the main characters, their voices plummet and boom when they speak.
  • In Thousand Shinji, when the main characters ascend to godhood, their voices similarly plummet and boom when they talk to their followers.
  • Advice and Trust: When Rei uses her hidden power, her voice becomes throatier and deeper, and she actually growls.
  • In the Undertale fanfic Visiontale, posted on Archive of Our Own, the deeper a monster's voice, the stronger they are magically. Sans also indulges in this when he is about to give someone a bad time by casting particularly powerful magic.

    Films — Animated 
  • In The Little Mermaid (1989), Ursula, the movie's Big Bad, already had a pretty deep voice. After she uses the trident's magic to empower herself and grow to a humongous size, her voice becomes downright demonic. This is more noticeable in the Latin American Spanish dub of the film.
  • My Little Pony: Equestria Girls – Friendship Games: Zig-zagged. Human!Twilight's voice gets deeper when she initially transforms, and returns to her usual voice when Spike reminds her of herself. Sunset's voice is unaffected when she transforms. Only evil power makes your voice deep. The first Equestria Girls played this trope straight when the then-evil Sunset transformed into a she-demon under the power of Princess Twilight's crown.
  • Turning Red: Ming's voice noticeably drops several octaves when in her Kaiju-sized red panda form.

    Films — Live-Action 
  • Blackheart from Ghost Rider (2007) gets this magical power once he summons 1000 souls into his body. That may have been the only benefit from the whole deal; unless standing around getting blown up so you can slowly reform again is highly sought after in demon society.
  • Done for humorous effect in Batman Forever:
    The Riddler: "For if knowledge is power, then A GOD AM I!" (Beat) "Was that over the top? I can never tell!"
  • Galadriel's voice gets pretty deep (and reverbed) in The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring when she is imagining what she would do with the kind of power provided by the One Ring. However, Galadriel is already plenty powerful, so all the deep voice and special effects that went with it were her own doing.
    • In The Hobbit, it seems to be her standard way of casting spells, including unnatural lighting and Drone of Dread.
    • In the book, her normal speaking voice is described as "clear and musical, but deeper than woman's wont".
    • Her granddaughter Arwen is similar. Liv Tyler plays her as generally having a deeper voice than Tyler's natural one, probably because of this trope. Her voice becomes deeper yet (and also reverbed) when she casts a spell at the Ford of Bruinen to summon a flood, and much deeper when Frodo, half in the spirit world after being wounded with a Morgul blade, is able to perceive her spiritual power as an elven princess.
  • When Tia Dalma once again becomes the sea goddess Calypso in Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, her voice grows extremely deep and reverbed. It could be because she was also extremely pissed off. Growing to a size so massive that she dwarfed the Black Pearl and all of its crew might've also had something to do with it.

    Literature 
  • The High Seekers in the Novels of the Change, controlled by some unearthly force, sometimes go so deep that it's represented by boldface. This usually heralds the good guys getting a royal spanking.
  • Subverted in Artemis Fowl, when the characters expect this, but get a falsetto instead.
    Number 1: "I know. Less airy, more fairy, right?"
  • In the Star Wars Expanded Universe there are a few times when the Sentient Cosmic Force decides to convey something to a young Force-Sensitive in a less ambiguous fashion than usual, and actually takes on a voice that seems to come from deep inside of the person. This either sounds like someone the person knows who has died and joined with The Lifestream, or it sounds a lot like them.
    • Rebel Force has Luke Skywalker think that the voice sounds like his, but deeper, older, more certain. He assumes it's his father's voice encouraging him from beyond the grave. We know it's not.
    • Galaxy of Fear has Tash Arranda similarly encouraged and hearing an older-Tash voice. Before that, the Force swells in her when she's commanding someone to stop and not kill her uncle and she doesn't recognize it as hers — it's lower, commanding, and forceful.

    Live-Action TV 
  • Willow in Buffy the Vampire Slayer gets amped up on mystical magic powers and Alyson Hannigan speaks the character with a slightly lower and slower tone and speed.
  • Doctor Who:
    • In "The Evil of the Daleks", the Emperor Dalek has a noticeably deeper voice, modulated at a lower frequency, than the other Daleks. (Avoided with the normal Supreme Daleks, who tend to have higher-pitched voices than the other Daleks, making them sound like they're on the verge of snapping from stress.)
    • There are some clever justified examples in "The Robots of Death", when the Doctor gets Leela to release helium into a room in order to rob Taren of his Compelling Voice. He takes full command of the situation, the villain and Leela get really squeaky and the Doctor mocks them for it, but his own voice remains as deep and velvety as ever (Power Keeps Your Voice Deep). Apparently, being a Time Lord gives him 'a larynx that can put up with anything', though Rule of Cool is the obvious Doylist factor. We also get Lack of Power Makes Your Voice High, as the amount of gas and thus the effect of the helium on Taren's voice increases as Taren loses control of his robots and thus his power, until he literally squeaks himself to death.
  • Chase Davenport in Lab Rats, whenever his "Commando App" is activated and he becomes Spike. In the "Spike vs. Spikette" episode of Bionic Island, Kate and Bree have their own Commando Apps installed and activated, with their counterparts (Spikette and Spikerella) also in possession of boomingly deep voices.
  • Merlin gets into this when Merlin begins speaking Dragon-language. His regular magic doesn't usually deepen his voice, but the dragon calls do.
  • Red Dwarf: When Rimmer becomes the Mighty Light (a diamond light form which gives him superpowers) in "The Promised Land", his voice becomes notably deeper as a result.
  • Doctor Fate in Smallville sounds deeper than Kent Nelson.
  • Margaret Thatcher was depicted this way in satirical puppet show Spitting Image. In contrast, the male members of her cabinet ('the vegetables'') were given thin, weedy, ineffectual voices.
  • Anyone in Stargate SG-1, when possessed by a Goa'uld symbiote, although it's actually the Goa'ulds invoking the trope. They can use normal voices if they want to, but they want people to think that they're all-powerful gods, so they change their voice to match people's expectations. And among the rebel Tok'ra faction, who share control rather than dominating their human hosts, the different voices are used simply to show whether it's the host or the symbiote who's speaking at the moment.
  • Bailey from The Suite Life on Deck when she's possessed by Princess Xaria. This also happens to London in the same episode, but as a closing gag.
  • Supernatural's Misha Collins made a deliberate decision to have his voice as Castiel, the extremely powerful angel, be deeper than his normal voice—it was a one-shot character, right? Nearly a decade later, he kind of regrets it, as he and his co-stars hilariously explain here He got to use his normal voice in one episode, in which the man Castiel has been using as a vessel appears.

    Radio 
  • This trope's roots may have sprouted from the radio drama The Adventures of Superman, in which the same voice actor used his tenor range for Clark Kent and his baritone range for the superhero. Most exemplified when, in order to show that Clark Kent was changing outfits, the voice actor would start out in his Clark Kent tenor saying "This looks like a job", then his voice would drop nearly an octave and he'd finish with "for Superman!" This may have been the inspiration for the trope cropping up in other works as part of how Clark maintains his Secret Identity with no props except the glasses.

    Video Games 
  • (Kajin no) Soki in Tatsunoko vs. Capcom. For his Level 3 Hyper Combo, he assumes his Black Oni Onimusha form, donning a mask with red eyes and a mane of white hair. His voice goes from "Boisterous Bruiser" to "Holy hell! He sounds like Satan!" Said voice is also booming and incomprehensible, but his voice drops from bass to baritone in no time flat.
  • Devil May Cry
  • Invoked in Jak 3, where the Precursors, revealed to be fuzzy little Ottsels with not-so-impressive voices, use a voice-manipulating device to get that "uber powerful ancient" boom. They know they wouldn't be taken seriously without it.
  • In Guild Wars: Nightfall, Kormir's voice becomes layered over a less high voice when she replaces Abaddon as the God of Secrets.
  • When Link wears the Fierce Deity Mask in The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, he physically becomes older, and therefore his voice becomes deeper.
  • In Viewtiful Joe 2, when Blade Master Alastor is defeated, the Black Film controls/empowers him, warping him into the even more demonic Underworld Emperor Alastor. When the transformation is complete, his voice quickly deepens. Cue Round 2, where he has a slew of new tricks, more power and defense, and a much larger healthbar.
  • In Castlevania: Rondo of Blood, Dracula's voice deepens mid-word as he transforms into a massive bat-creature for the second part of the battle. Conversely, when that form is defeated, he roars in pain, and his voice spontaneously rises back to normal as his transformation is forced to revert.
  • Dota 2:
    • Undying, a zombie whose ultimate is an ability which transforms him into a much beefier version of his regular self. That includes his voice. (This soundset can be heard from 1:14.)
    • Earthshaker's voice is automatically ridiculously deep, and you better believe that he lives up to his name.
    • One of Terrorblade's abilities also transforms him into a demon, which obviously simultaneously makes him both more powerful and makes his voice even deeper, too.
  • Granblue Fantasy: Vajra's voice becomes low and monotonous when she's channeling a spirit. After completing her Fate Episode, you can toggle between her normal voice and her 'possessed' voice in the individual character settings.
  • World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King reveals that the Lich King's booming, deep voice is a case of this. During the final cinematic of the expansion's end raid, Icecrown Citadel, we learn that the echo is apparently coming from the Lich King's Helm of Domination as in the "Fall of the Lich King" cutscene that plays after his defeat, the helmet falls off of Arthas' head and his voice is back to his normal tone from before him putting the helmet on. Afterwards, when Tirion Fordring puts the helmet on Bolvar Fordragon, players actually get to hear Bolvar's voice go from his current voice, to a downright demonic-sounding growling rumble, with the echo kicking in towards the end of the sentence he says after having the helmet put on him.
  • Neptunia:
    • The CPUs and CPU Candidates' voices generally become deeper after transforming into their goddess forms. Some of them are more or less Older Alter Egos to their human forms, but rather than just gaining a more mature voice, the pitch of their voices get drastically lower. While in Yellow Heart's case, her voice really just only becomes more mature, for characters like Purple Heart and Iris Heart it is more than that. Particularly seen in Neptune/Purple Heart's case; the older version of Neptune doesn't reach Purple Heart's low voice even at the slightest.
    • This trope only appears subtly to Purple Sister and White Sister Rom. Their goddess forms have still very high voices and the change is not nearly noticeable like the other two CPU Candidates, but you can hear more confidence and a very slightly lower pitch in their voices. In White Sister Rom's case, her voice also becomes a bit frostier.
    • Inverted with Black Heart in the first two games, and averted in the third, then played straight since Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth1.
    • Inverted with Orange Heart, whose voice becomes much higher and girlier, as her voice is already deep and tomboyish in her human form. The Planeptune CPUs (not counting the CPU Candidate Purple Sister) generally have a huge character change after transforming. While Purple Heart becomes more serious, stoic and tough, and Iris Heart becomes more dangerous and (sexually) aggressive, Orange Heart becomes softer, more cheerful and girlier.
    • The original CPU quartet can transform into their Next Forms in Victory II, making their voices even deeper than they already are.
  • A lot of the more supernatural champions in League of Legends (such as Maokai and Nasus) have very deep voices, but the unquestioned winner is Nautilus, the Titan of the Depths. Once an ordinary deep sea diver, he met something down there that fused him into his diver suit, growing him to gigantic size, infusing him with incredible power, and making his voice sound like THIS.
  • In Triangle Strategy, Idore's voice is already fairly deep, but it deepens further after he taps into a store of Aelfric and turns into Demigod Idore in the Golden Route's final chapter.

    Webcomics 

    Web Original 
  • Inverted in the Eskimo Bob episode "The Swarm". When Yuck absorbs all his clones and takes on his One-Winged Angel form, his voice actually becomes more high-pitched.

    Western Animation 

    Real Life 
  • There is some Truth in Television to this, funnily enough. People (both men and women) will subconsciously deepen their voices if they feel confident or superior to the person they're talking to. (And the other way around — if you feel inferior, your voice gets higher.) Has to do with establishing dominance. Hence, not only will a person with a very deep, gravely voice subconsciously be seen as a powerful individual, BEING powerful will also cause you to lower your voice without realizing it. However, the real life effect is not nearly as strong as what you'll see in movies. Also, people drop their voices for other reasons too: such as when they are trying to hide anger or sadness, or sound sexy.
  • Logically, a larger person or animal will naturally have the deeper voice, simply by having larger proportionate vocal cords. You don't see many tall men or women with high-pitched voices, even when they're not trying to sound powerful or threatening.
  • Male frogs and toads developed their extensible chin pouches so that their mating calls would sound deeper and more resonant. This suggests larger body size to females, which seek out the biggest males to father their offspring (because only males with a good set of genes live long enough to grow big).

 
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Video Example(s):

Kale unlocks Super Saiyan

In Episode 93, the meekly Kale finally transforms into her own powerful Super Saiyan form. In the English Funimation dub, voice actress Dawn M. Bennett changes her performance accordingly, making Kale sound huskier and confident in this deadly form. This contrasts with her base form's girly higher-pitch vocals.

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Kale unlocks Super Saiyan

In Episode 93, the meekly Kale finally transforms into her own powerful Super Saiyan form. In the English Funimation dub, voice actress Dawn M. Bennett changes her performance accordingly, making Kale sound huskier and confident in this deadly form. This contrasts with her base form's girly higher-pitch vocals.

How well does it match the trope?

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Main / PowerMakesYourVoiceDeep

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