#ben 10k
3. Ultimate Ben
I like to imagine the writers room when they were coming up with ultimate Ben
Writer 1: “okay so we have a hero who’s main power is transforming into other alien species and using their unique physiology and anatomy to have- by earth standards- super powers and showing off creative and fun alien designs. Plus now with the introduction of the ultimatrix we can show off battle hardened ultimate aliens, perverting and weaponizing the fan favourites into tools of destruction. How do we capture the magic of the original Ben 10,000 while also incorporating all the interesting ideas we’ve come up with?”
Writer 2: “Uh, an unremarkable dad bod with a shitty beard doing backflips with a touch of inflation kink?”
Writer 1: “…”
Writer 2: “also his shirt is maybe the old watch symbol?”
Writer 1: “PERFECT”
In short I think the design was lazy as fuck and agree with Kuro that he should’ve had a Kevin 11 thing where he could galador his body parts into other aliens. Also him knowing one shield spell was dumb considering Gwen can barely use hers at the best of times.
2. Ben 10k (omniverse)
Not too much to say about this Ben, I liked the biomnitrix, I liked his softer voice and how he activates the watches by wonder womaning them. Most of his fusion aliens were cool and him being an insanely overpowered demi-god while still having a stereotypical TV marriage to Kai was cute. This iteration I feel was kinda trying too hard with the fans I think though, having a belt buckle that literally says “10K” is a little on the nose and the biomnitrix is admittedly fan service-y but I feel like this design was done in earnest so I feel kind to it. Still this Ben leaves out a lot of the cool aspects of Ben 10,000 which is why our number 1 is…
1. Ben 10,000 (og)
This Ben wins HANDS DOWN for a LOT of reasons, I’m gonna divide them up into some sections because I love wasting my time.
1. Action
This Ben uses the master control function on the omnitrix to create his own fighting style that I’m just gonna call master-control-fu. Basically rather than just staying in one alien form/power for a prolonged period of time like Ben UAF and omniverse, Ben 10,000 swaps between aliens and uses their powers together to get the advantage in battle (i.e, pinned down in battle? Use spitter to push the baddie off, then buzz shock to zap the goo created by spitter). This fighting style means visually interesting battles, creative solutions to problems AND echos both back with vengeance when ben was running from Kevin and Vilgax by rapidly swapping between aliens (best part was when he escapes a null guardian’s mouth using heat blast, swaps to stink fly to fly above Vilgax, fourarms to smash onto vilgax grey matter to hop to kevin and away from him, Wildmutt to get a 360 degree view of the area and then using that knowledge, Wildvine to smash two null guardians that were of his line of sight together.) and also Grudge match when Ben taught Kevin to use alien powers together (stink fly goo+ heatblast flame = explosion). In short this Ben’s action scenes were a joy to watch and made my head spin.
2. Character design
Near PERFECTION, I love how the omnitrix is huge now and takes up Ben’s forearm in a sort of earth 2 power ring scenario, I love his aged and swoll aliens ESPECIALLY WILDMUTT which references season 2′s vulpenmancers and low key human ben is p hot. YOU DON’T NEED TO GO ULTIMATE TO HAVE COOL LOOKING ALIENS.
3. Characterization
I also loved this Ben’s characterization from his two episodes, in the first he’s a work obsessed ego-maniac and after his run in with his past self he learns that he has personal responsibilities as well as hero responsibilities and I think that was a good message and an interesting commentary on our current Ben, sure now he’s a kid and loves being a hero and sometimes puts his desire to be the hero above others but when the stakes get raised that sometimes might become all times. Anyway, point is first episode he’s all about being a saviour, he meets his past self and learns that he’s gotta do other stuff, in most shows that’d be the end of it and Ben’s future would be saved forever BUT we get another look into this Ben’s future and learn that there’s still echos of him putting his hero life above his personal one: he’s missed Kenny’s birthday multiple times and takes Kenny’s chances to be a hero away from him (in battle and by limiting his omnitrix to having less offensive heroes) and I love this take that people don’t just change in 2 seconds, you might make them aware of their flaws so they can recognize them but they’re still there and still crop up.
Overall this version of Ben’s future was made with love and while the other two have some love in there I think that the best route would’ve just to have used the OG Ben’s future as a template and put the series modifiers on top.
