Griffin Burns

Griffin Burns and the Making of Childe in Genshin Impact

Genshin Impact arrived in 2020 as one of the most globally consumed games of its era, and the English voice of Tartaglia – known in-game as Childe – became one of its most talked-about performances. Griffin Burns brought the Eleventh Harbinger to life with a combination of playful menace and genuine warmth, capturing the character’s contradictory nature in a way that resonated across millions of players worldwide. The role stands as the defining credit of his career to date, and the fan community around it remains one of the most active in English-language anime game dubbing.

From Pennsylvania to Los Angeles

Raised in Hanover, Pennsylvania, Burns attended Mercersburg Academy before competing in cross country and track at Bucknell University. A semester abroad in London redirected his focus toward theater and creative writing. After graduating, he relocated to Los Angeles in 2010 and broke into voice work through online casting, landing his first game credit in Vindictus. The path from small-town Pennsylvania to a fixture in major anime and game productions took the better part of a decade of consistent work at studios including Bang Zoom! Entertainment, FUNimation, and Studiopolis.

Demon Slayer, JoJo, and the Anime That Shaped His Range

The 2018 run of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind gave Burns Vinegar Doppio – a character demanding two distinct psychological registers in the same body. That same duality proved useful when he was cast as Muichiro Tokito in Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, a Hashira defined by emotional detachment and sudden, devastating power. His earlier turn as Akira Fudo in Devilman Crybaby on Netflix drew considerable attention for its raw emotional intensity, and Colt Grice in Attack on Titan: The Final Season added a tragic weight to the franchise’s closing arc. The BTVA community recognized his momentum early, awarding him Breakthrough Voice Actor of the Year in 2017.

Music, Content Creation, and New New Girlfriend

Music has run parallel to voice work throughout Burns’s career. He co-founded the pop rock band New New Girlfriend alongside fellow voice actor Kylen Deporter, naming it after a line from Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. The project has released original material and covers, with Burns uploading vocal performances to YouTube and building an audience that now exceeds 1.4 million followers across social platforms. His TikTok presence in particular helped close the distance between voice actors and their audiences in a way the industry had rarely seen before.