Will Ryan Has Passed Away

[Patterson]

Thanks, Bananareader. While faith doesn't necessarily mean Alan Young was a christian, it is comforting to have a hint that he might have been. Time makes it easier when it was someone you weren't personally close to, but when an actor passes away, it's hard not to worry about the real people behind the characters we love.

[Polehaus53]

The tribute podcast has been released. Quite a few of the Odyssey cast and crew members share their memories of Will Ryan. There's also a bunch of never before released clips of Will Ryan during recording sessions. There's a lot of great stuff in it and is a good way to remember Will Ryan and all the work that he did, I'd recommend giving it a listen.

[The Old Judge]

A friend and I were sitting out on a boat talking about our respective childhoods a month back, and he mentioned how his parents weaned him on Adventures in Odyssey. I had heard the announcement of Will Ryan's death; he, however, was not the "superfan" that I was once, so I conveyed the message in a way that he would understand: "Eugene's voice actor is dead."

It overwhelms me how we humans can get so wrapped up in fiction. Adventures in Odyssey was different, though, because of the actors. They brought their characters off of the pages and breathed a vitality into the monologues and dialogues that appeared in each script that many people now cannot muster out of their own lives. Will Ryan was Eugene Meltsner to me. He was also a good friend for three decades of my life, and the Lord used him and his spiritual journey to encourage me when I felt doubt, or discouragement, or skepticism. If someone as intelligent as Eugene Meltsner can accept the sacrificial death of Christ on the cross as the only hope of salvation, I thought, then surely I have no true reason to doubt my Saviour.

Will Ryan helped a small, odd boy become a strong Christian man. His discipleship ministry, although he never knew it in this life, is something that I will always fondly remember no matter how long I live.