Veteran actor James Earl Jones — who has died, aged 93 — boasted a career that spanned more than seven decades. He is also one of only a handful of figures who have nabbed themselves an EGOT (that's an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony).

Jones's impact was so wide-ranging and eclectic that each generation was blessed with a new touchstone of the actor's trademark low growl and stabilising on-screen presence.

Here are some of our favourite moments from Jones's illustrious career.

The Great White Hope (1967)

In the early 20th century, much to the horror of genteel (read: racist) society, Black heavyweight champion boxer Jack Johnson couldn't be beat. And many white boxers tried, with each promising hopeful labelled the "Great White Hope".

This term became the name of Howard Sackler's 1967 play about Johnson and a challenge from Jim Jeffries, the white boxer who came out of retirement to fight Johnson in 1910.

James Earl Jones delivered a Tony Award-winning performance as Johnson in the stage show, opposite Jane Alexander as his first wife, white Brooklyn socialite Etta Terry Duryea. Their interracial marriage was scandalous among white high society, and Johnson drank heavily and violently abused her.

But it was the film adaptation of the story in 1970 that helped catapult Jones further forward, earning him a Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer, and a nomination for the Best Actor Academy Award.

As Variety said of his performance: "Jones's re-creation of his stage role is an eye-riveting experience. The towering rages and unrestrained joys of which his character was capable are portrayed larger than life."

— Katherine Smyrk

Star Wars (original trilogy, 1977 — 1983)

Darth Vader is unimpeachably one of pop culture's most iconic villains.

A space-age samurai clad in black, his towering silhouette framed by the sinister hum of his crimson lightsaber. More machine than man, his mysterious yet menacing mask accompanied by the cyclical gasp of a respirator.

But that intimidating vision wouldn't have had the necessary impact without the correct voice.

Unhappy with the muffled, West Country accent of David Prowse – the almost two-metre actor inside the suit – director George Lucas initially sought Orson Welles to voice Vader.

Jones eventually landed the part, and his rich bottom-end proved the perfect fit. His gravitas helped immensely in selling the good versus evil stakes of the cinematic space opera, and in the process created an instantly renowned voice.

If 1977's Star Wars: A New Hope was a powerful introduction, then the Empire Strikes Back arguably perfected the formula. Nearly every one of the lines Jones delivered in the 1980 sequel is memorable – a string of the most quotable lines in movie history, all etched with Jones's particular phrasing.

"Impressive. Most Impressive."

"I am altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it any further."

And of course, the famous misquoted delivery to Mark Hamill's Luke Skywalker that is one of cinema's biggest plot twists. (Do we really need a Spoiler Alert at this point?)

"No… I am your father."

It speaks volumes that subsequent Star Wars villains never surpassed Vader's authoritative tone. Characters instead pivoted towards the mute or magisterial (the prequel trilogy's Darth Maul and Count Dooku respectively) while Adam Driver's Kylo Ren was (perhaps somewhat intentionally) a pale imitation.

It all underscores that Darth Vader, and Jones's booming baritone, is an immortal one-of-a-kind.

— Al Newstead

Conan The Barbarian (1982)

Darth Vader might be Jones's most iconic villain, but the evildoer he played between the second and third Star Wars films showed he could be just as frightening in person as in voiceover.

Thulsa Doom is the cruel antagonist of 1982's Conan The Barbarian, the film that catapulted Arnold Schwarzenegger – in the titular role – into Hollywood.

Doom is the leader of a savage snake cult and Jones plays him with a calculating sense of condescending menace. He doesn't say a word in his first appearance, in which he attacks Conan's tribe and beheads the young boy's mother, using only his steely glare and precise movements to instil fear.

We learn that Doom has supernatural powers, capable of hypnotising others to do his bidding and – in a sequence that gave countless kids of the 80s nightmares – transforms into a man-sized serpent.

Displaying his abilities to an imprisoned Conan in another scene, Doom wills a woman to fall to her death, declaring to his captive: "That is strength, boy. That is power! … What is steel compared to the hand that wields it?"

He takes credit for gifting Conan his bloodthirsty determination and self-made strength because, you know, he ruined his childhood and set him up for revenge.

Fleshing out what could have been a mere comic book villain, Jones's Thulsa Doom works so well because he is the deadly, controlled yin to Conan's brawny, bull-headed yang.

Conan The Barbarian has aged far better than other swords-and-sorcery flicks of the era, and the film's cult status is arguably due to Jones's performance as much as Schwarzenegger's.

— Al Newstead

Matewan (1988)

In 1920, in the small town of Matewan, West Virginia, coal miners went on strike. The violent response and suppression of their action is the inspiration behind this iconic film. It's a story about worker solidarity, and the fight against an exploitative employer whose power stretches beyond just the workplace.

Jones plays Few Clothes Johnson, the leader of Black workers brought in by the mining company. One of the first scenes in the film is of a group of Black men being attacked as they get off the train by a number of angry white men; setting the tone for the furious animosity that existed on many fronts.

Jones's rumbling power comes out when he joins a union meeting early in the film, and is met with anger and cries of "scab".

"Now you watch your mouth, peckerwood. I've been called n*****, and I can't help that's the way white folks is, but I ain't never been called no scab!"

That scene is a turning point in the film, and slowly sees the hostility between the Black and Italian workers hired by the mining company and the local white coal miners start to ebb away.

They find a sense of camaraderie as they try to fight the mining company for better conditions, and a liveable wage.

— Ahmed Yussuf

Coming to America (1988)

In the 1988 cult Eddie Murphy film Coming to America, Jones plays a character that is seldom written for Black men in Hollywood: the loving father who can admit when he is wrong, and change.

As ruler of the fictional wealthy African nation of Zamunda, Jones's king Jaffe Joffer commands the space of every room he enters — always behind servants tasked with throwing rose petals to the ground for him to walk on. He is also used to getting his way.

But when Jaffe's son, crown prince Akeem Joffer (Murphy), refuses the marriage he has arranged because he wants a wife who will "arouse his intellect as well as his loins", the king ultimately puts his son's happiness before the outdated traditions he long upheld.

On the surface, Jones's Jaffe was a humorously out-of-touch royal and comedicly stern parent. This exterior, characterised by Jones's trademark powerful voice and imposing stature, makes the reveal of the soft, loving and tender father that lurks beneath all the more moving.

There's a lot that's (iconically) ridiculous about Coming to America, from the all pervasive Jheri curls and the knock-off McDonald's called McDowell's, to the fact Murphy and his co-star Arsenio Hall play four characters apiece (one of whom is white). But Jones brought glorious depth to the film, and his multifaceted portrayal of Jaffe is a big part of why Black diaspora audiences still raise their children watching it.

"Son, please. I am more than the exalted ruler of this land and the master of all I survey," king Jaffe tells prince Akeem one morning from the opposite end of a long breakfast table.

"I am also a concerned dad."

— Yasmin Jeffery

The Simpsons (1990, 1994, 1998)

You might be thinking: "Oh yeah, I remember JEJ in The Simpsons from when Mufasa and Darth Vader come out of the clouds with Bleeding Gums Murphy."

But sadly you are mistaken — this was actually Harry Shearer doing his best impression.

Jones appeared in Springfield even earlier, with his voice featuring in all three segments of the very first Treehouse of Horror in 1990 — he remains the only guest voice to hold this distinction.

He has a single line as a snarky moving guy in Bad Dream House. He is moved to tears as Serak the Preparer, after Lisa accuses the octopus aliens of planning to eat the family ("You're not the only beings with emotions, you know!"). And his mammoth voice talents were finally allowed all the space to move in The Raven: The Simpsons take on Edgar Allen Poe's classic, which features Jones as the narrator.

Jones just couldn't stay away from the Halloween episodes, returning a couple years later to voice Maggie Simpson, of all people. Of course, this is an alternate-world Maggie who has just plunged an axe into Groundskeeper Willie's back ("This is indeed a disturbing universe.")

His voice popped up in just one non-Treehouse episode: in season nine's Das Bus, a parody of Lord Of The Flies. You can hear Jones in the very last seconds of the episode, yadda yading about how the kids got rescued, the hilarity of the one-liner only enriched by the actor's dulcet tones.

— Velvet Winter

The Lion King (1994)

As much as it might seem like the time for it, don't go back and watch 1994's The Lion King today in Jones's memory. It's hard enough on a regular day to watch Jones's voice embody World's Best (lion) Dad, Mufasa.

Don't be tempted by his iconic speech about the Pridelands being everything the light touches. I know it's difficult to resist how he condenses the circle of life so concisely and kindly that even a toddler could understand. You don't want to dwell on how he heroically saves baby Simba from the hyenas, quickly forgiving the rebellious cub before explaining to his child that he'll always be watching over him in the stars. Don't even think about how he appears to adult Simba in the clouds and in pools of water to give him worldly advice.

It's hard, I know you want to relive all of Jones's flawless voice work as the elder lion King, in a role that introduced his low growl to a new generation, in a film that remains the highest grossing traditionally animated film of all time.

You simply must resist because in order to revel in all of the gloriousness of Jones's work as Mufasa, you have to watch THE scene. You know the scene. You know the sound of the stampede coming down the gorge. You know the desperation in Mufasa's voice as he calls for Scar, his brother, to save him. You know the roar as he falls. You know tiny baby Simba pleading with his unmoving Dad to get up 'cause they have to go home. You might be tearing up just reading this.

So protect yourself, wait until the weekend to bust out The Lion King and have a good, ugly cry as you remember the impact Jones's voice has had.

— Velvet Winter

The Bible (2018)

In James Earl Jones Reads the Bible: King James Version, the actor lends his voice to the New Testament.

That's more than 17 hours of his sonorous tones delivering lines like: "Abraham begat Isaac; and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob begat Judas and his brethren…And Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ."

There are a lot of "begats" where the ellipsis lies.

According to Guinness World Records, the bible is the best-selling book of all time with well over 5 billion copies sold. The version narrated by Jones was also an international bestseller, selling more than 600,000 copies.

His soothing, melodious voice captures the poetic grandeur of the sacred text, with the Washington Post saying: "Somehow that voice of his, calm, deep, powerful…makes the words seem more thrilling than ever."

— Mawunyo Gbogbo