Douglas Rain, The Iconic Voice of HAL 9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey, Has Passed Away

Few sci-fi movies are as influential as Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, which didn't get much love back when it was first released but has now been considered an excellent film. To this day, the movie is often satirized and referenced, with hits like Interstellar and Wall-E all clearly influenced by the cult classic. So, it's unfortunate to announce that one of the most iconic parts of the movie is no longer with us.

Douglas Rain, who voiced the creepy artificial intelligence known as the HAL 9000, has passed away. HAL was surprisingly eery for a villain that was just a red circle and it was all due to the stellar performance Rain gave for the character. Every time the A.I. popped up, fans would often feel uncomfortable and maybe even scared, which is exactly what the film wanted.

I mean, who can ever forget Rain's iconic line, "I'm sorry Dave -- I'm afraid I can't do that." Often imitated for the sake of parody, it shows just how the villain became such a big part of pop culture. The fact that it also killed most of the human crew, save the aforementioned Dave, helped with that as well.

Rain is mostly known for his work in a number of Shakespearean plays, though he did also do a number of television roles and voice acting throughout his career. The voice of HAL 9000 was also the understudy for Alec Guinness in Star Wars, who many know now as Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Via Deadline

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