Who's the Voice Actor Behind 'Inside Job' Character Bryan Bot? He's a Familiar Face
Published Oct. 26 2021, 9:21 p.m. ET
Netflix's new satirical adult cartoon Inside Job follows socially awkward MIT grad and genius Reagan Ridley (Lizzy Caplan) as she works alongside her messy team of coworkers to hide the world's conspiracy theories. It's all for the greater good. From creator Shion Takeuchi and executive producer Alex Hirsch — both of whom were behind the magic of Disney Channel's Gravity Falls — Inside Job is already a hit subsequent to its Oct. 22, 2021, release.
While Lizzy Caplan, Christian Slater, and Clark Duke serve as some of the show's main characters, we see guest stars in the show's future, as Season 1, Episode 4, hilariously titled "Sex Machina," featured a familiar face, or rather voice. The episode's character Bryan Jacobsen, aka Bryan Bot, was voiced by someone both TV fans and moviegoers alike will recognize.
Who's the voice behind Bryan Jacobsen, aka Bryan Bot?
In Inside Job's fourth episode, Reagan Ridley — the daughter of Cognito Inc. co-founder Rand Ridley (Christian Slater) — explored the world of dating apps after Cognito Inc. bought one out. Known to be lacking in people skills, Reagan bet her colleagues she could land herself a boyfriend using the app. Her plan proved to be faulty, however, when she decided to build a robot version (Bryan Bot) of her so-called "perfect match," Bryan Jacobsen, to practice on.
"Bryan Jacobsen: 32. He lives in DC, teaches programming to underprivileged children, and never had a female roommate, so he'll have nothing to compare your house to," Reagan's ROBOTUS (Chris Diamantopoulos) creation — a robot version of the President of the United States — read. It makes sense that Inside Job has been compared to Emmy-winning cartoon Rick and Morty. William Jackson Harper voiced Bryan, who happens to look a lot like William. Coincidence? We think not.
Where else have we seen William Jackson Harper?
Fans of NBC's The Good Place know the Emmy-nominated actor and playwright as the indecisive, logic-obsessed Chidi Anagonye. Before Chidi's death, he was a professor of moral philosophy. Playing the nerdy (yet hot) scholar just works for William, as he took on a similar role in horror director Ari Aster's highly anticipated sophomore film, Midsommar.
He portrayed graduate student Josh, who was in the process of writing his thesis on Swedish midsummer festivities before submitting to a gruesome death at the hands of the Hårga cult members. If you haven't seen the 2019 movie, it's a beautiful, hallucinogen-laced nightmare if we've ever seen one.
William Jackson Harper also played the leading man in Jeff Rosenberg's 2021 rom-com We Broke Up, which received middle-of-the-road reviews.
If you can't get enough of him, William will be the romantic lead in Season 2 of HBO Max's rom-com anthology series Love Life. The show's first season saw actress Anna Kendrick as the main protagonist, while Season 2 will see William Jackson Harper step into that role. "I just wanted to explore how messy everything is and how Marcus is a guy at a certain stage in his life where he feels like he should have it all together and have it all figured out," he told Glamour in regards to his character, Marcus Watkins.
"He's judging that. He's sort of got the stability that I think that so many of us are craving in certain respects. And I think that when that all gets thrown up into the air and your life gets upended like that, you have to piece your entire persona back together," William continued. Whether he's Chidi Anagonye, Bryan Jacobsen, or Marcus Watkins, actor William Jackson Harper shines every time.
Season 1 episodes of Inside Job are streaming on Netflix.