Ben deals with some old annoyances from his past.
Ben, Gwen and Kevin fight against a Techadon robot and destroy it. Kevin retrieves the only part of it that's still intact: a gauntlet.Cash and JT, who got humiliated by Ben due to them still acting like stereotypical kid bullies despite being teenagers, decide to crash Kevin's car, from which they steal the titular gauntlet. Cash puts it on and it begins to transform him into another Techadon. It's up to the team to save Cash from the trasnformation.
- Actually Pretty Funny: Gwen laughs at Kevin blowing through some straws with his nose, while Ben just sits there with a look of annoyance. (Though
Word of God was that he was enjoying it). - All There in the Manual: The Techadon robot isn’t named as such here, with the name being revealed by Word of God and canonised in the Tie In Game.
- Big Eater: In the second half of the episode, it's implied that Ben drank a lot of smoothies, given his tastes on different combinations.
- Blood Knight: When a vengeful Kevin sees Cash merged with the Techadon gauntlet, he gleefully absorbs the wall next to him, smirking that he doesn't have to hold back to get revenge for his car.
- Bullying a Dragon: Cash and JT may still bully Ben, but they fail to realize they're not 5th graders anymore and Ben isn't the same ten-year-old boy they were physically stronger than. What's more, nobody is laughing at their antics. Ben, who considered using the Omnitrix on them but changed his mind, has to spell it out for them how pathetic and sad they are that they resort to childish jokes in order to feel big, especially as teenagers.
- Character Development: In the original series, Ben was nothing short of gleeful to use the Omnitrix to get revenge on Cash and JT for their bullying antics towards him. Here, Ben is tempted at first to do something similar, but eventually decides to take the high road and call them out instead.
- Covered in Gunge: Kevin and Gwen end up covered in Goop after the alien destroys the robot. Thankfully its flying saucer is capable of removing the slime off.Gwen: Ben, get off of us.Goop: Sorryyy...
- Cybernetics Eat Your Soul: As Cash gradually starts to fuse with the Techadon Gauntlet, he becomes increasingly more powerful and deranged, even threatening the people at Mr. Smoothies in an attempt to draw Ben out.
- Early-Installment Weirdness:
- Aside from being unnamed, the Techadon is implied to be a singular entity which is capable of self-repair and corrupting minds. Later episodes establish Techadons to be mass produced robots that are simply hard to destroy.
- In this episode, Cash wrecking Kevin's car gets the latter mad enough to go on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge when he learns where Cash is. In later episodes, Kevin's car gets wrecked practically Once an Episode, with Kevin’s reaction never going beyond exasperated annoyance.
- Everyone Has Standards: As the Techadon gauntlet begins to take more control over Cash, JT becomes increasingly scared of him, and goes to Ben and Gwen for help.
- Finger Wag: After seemingly being trounced by the Techadon-infused Cash all across Mr. Smoothies', Chromastone simply gets up and does this. This only serves to enrage Cash further.
- Manchild: Cash and JT still maintain the mentality of school bullies out of middle school, despite being in high school at this point. Later, it's enforced when it's revealed that at least JT has the mentality to think eating paste is a regular outing he and Ben can do.
- No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Cash, armed with the Techadon Robot armor, tries to give one to Ben, transformed as Chromastone. Ben's not even winded when it's over.
- No-Sell: All of Cash's attempts to deliver a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown on Chromastone end with the alien simply getting up and silently warning him to stand down.
- Not Afraid of You Anymore: While calling out Cash, Ben says that Cash's bullying tactics only seemed scary when they were little. Now it's just inconvenient.
- Not Worth Retaliating: Ben comes to this conclusion when Cash and JT make him accidentally spill his smoothie. Normally, he would retaliate by going alien, and he was going to. But instead, he calls them out on how pathetic it is that they're still acting the way they did when all of them were ten.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Cash decides to mess with Ben by spilling his smoothie on his shirt, Ben is briefly tempted to go alien on him ... but then decides he isn't worth the effort and gives one of these to him, remarking that Cash has been using the same tired bully material since they were in second grade, that Ben can't believe he was ever scared of him, and that while everyone else around them has grown up, Cash is still nothing but a sad, immature, and pathetic loser who has to torment others just to feel good about himself.Ben: Y'know what? You two aren't even worth it. It's ridiculous! Can you at least try to be original for a change? You've been doing the same bully routine since the second grade, Cash. It's tired. Spilling my drink? Seriously, I can't believe I used to be afraid of you. Look around, Cash, we've all grown up. But you're still the same pathetic loser who has to torment others just to feel good about himself. You're just sad.
- Schoolyard Bully All Grown Up: Deconstructed with Cash and JT, but especially the former. Cash's bullying antics are shown to have become tired and childish now that they're in high school, with not even Ben him all that seriously anymore. This gets to Cash so much that he eventually puts on the Techadon gauntlet and begins becoming assimilated by it, becoming more and more desperate to hurt Ben and his friends. By contrast, JT begins to realize how Cash treats him more as a lackey than as a friend, and decides to finally stand up to him.
- Sheathe Your Sword: Ben attempts to invoke this early on, as he realizes that using one of his aliens on Cash in retaliation for something so childish isn't worth it in the slightest. That said, he is forced to turn into Chromastone when Cash is nearly fully fused with the Techadon armor, and even then he primarily plays on the defensive to try to help him gain control back.
- Shout-Out: Courtesy of Ben. "No juice for you!"
- So Proud of You: Gwen states she's proud of Ben taking the high road over his bullies. Then Kevin notes he would've beat the stuffing out of those two.
- Something We Forgot: Gwen feels like she’s forgetting something after Cash is neutralised. We then cut to the abandoned factory, where Kevin is still lying there injured.
- Toxic Friend Influence: It's strongly indicated that the reason JT stopped being Ben's friend is because Cash influenced him to become his bully instead.
- Whole-Plot Reference: A teenaged boy finds an alien weapon which he gets addicted to and slowly turns him into a copy of the last one who wielded it? The only difference is that in this case it's a bully rather than a victim of bullying.
- With Friends Like These...: When JT tries to stand up to an armored Cash, the latter screams at the former "You ratted me out!" and shoots a laser at him. Gwen's the first to remark to JT that (at least under the Techadon Robot armor's influence), Cash isn't exactly a good friend to jump at JT's throat like this. Even before that, Cash often treated JT like a sidekick to push around and rope into trouble.
- You Are Better Than You Think You Are: A symbolic variation. During JT's "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight speech to Cash, the latter points out he's helpless to control what the armor wants him to do. JT responds by telling him "It doesn't control you: you control it!" One gets the feeling that JT is projecting his own problem with Cash, how he controls him just as the armor controls him. With this advice, it gives Cash the strength to fight it from within and free himself.
