Ben 10 (New Series)

... Ok, I admit, that's an interesting theory.

Nope, it wasn't. Again, the old aliens don't get a free pass on that one. Though admittedly I am slightly more tolerant toward Megawatt because it don't think it's QUITE as blatant, and I could more or less buy an alien species who feed on electricity learning to disguise themselves as batteries. That and batteries are at least something you'd find in multiple civilizations, unlike LEGO....

edited 25th Feb '17 3:24:55 AM by Theokal3

From what I've seen and heard, the show has been slowly improving over the last 10 or so episodes. We got an episode with Michael Morningstar, a very different and interesting re-imagining of Frightwig, and an episode where Hex was more of a threat than he previously was (he turns into a giant snake!)

Also, Vilgax will be showing up in the season finale.

And probably most of all, the plots don't feel as rehashed anymore. That was the biggest flaw the show had in the first half of Season 1, but it seems to be going away (example: Morningstar's debut is nothing like his AF debut other than the given "Gwen has crush on him until he reveals himself to be evil", and that was going to happen in any reboot no matter what.)

I may be treading on dangerous waters but... I like it. Does a better job at this sort of thing than TTG does. If the rest of the franchise reminds me of a comic universe, this show reminds me of Marvel Adventures.

Ditto. And people need to remember that it is a reboot, everything about every past show has been wiped out, so it's going to need time to really find its footing and potentially get its own sequel shows. As I said above, it seems to be somewhat improving, and hopefully Vilgax will bring some more seriousness to the show (after all, the original series was light-hearted overall, but did not shy away from going Darker and Edgier when it needed to, something that this reboot is still struggling with.)

edited 25th Feb '17 10:15:35 AM by Isaac_Heller

Ah, so THAT's what Vilgax will look like. I see they still haven't figured out everyone prefers him with the gaz mask and still insist on giving him a visible mouth because the evil warlord needs to show more emotions for some reason. Shame; aside from this, the design actually seems pretty good.

Morningstar's debut is nothing like his AF debut other than the given "Gwen has crush on him until he reveals himself to be evil", and that was going to happen in any reboot no matter what.

That's not necessarly a good thing. If they aren't keeping what made Micheal Morningstar good (AKA his creepyness and sociopathy), then I don't really care for innovation.

Regardless, glad for you if you like it, but I am sceptical about it improving. It's still way more light-hearted than the Original Show, and Omniverse seemed like it was improving multiple times as well only to regress very fast.

The sword bothers me a bit.

Although I've never liked the sword in AF, and admittedly don't have interest in Vilgax anymore anyway. Most Ben 10 villains have a hard time holding my interest either way, though, except for maybe Malware and Albedo.

edited 25th Feb '17 1:48:50 PM by Etheru

The sword didn't bother me personally, but yeah, I see your point.

The franchise as a whole is too lighthearted at times when it doesn't need to be. It doesn't help that AF and UA to a lesser extent went to implications the original series and Omniverse doesn't, which makes the third season of AF and moments there after all the more frustrating when executives and fans are demanding Ben goes back to his more obnoxious personality.

I actually prefer AF-era Ben the most. He still has a lot of personality, he's just more reserved about it.

I remember when they had enemies like Trumbipulor (perhaps an inappropriate name now that Trump is in office?) and Charmcaster was a villain for a few episodes.

That said, I hope Energy Beings like Verdona don't return (wasn't really a fan of her or Sunny in the originals), but other ones like Eon, maybe??

I don't really understand why an alien lifeform being or having mechanical features breaks your suspension of disbelief.

By common definition an alien species is typically something from another world or beyond human understanding, something strange and otherworldly. There shouldn't be an Alien X by any stretch of the imagination, and yet, there it is.

Don't get me wrong I liked Alien Force making the stories a bit more nuanced and adult. But this is a cartoon series for kids you're saying was too lighthearted. Alien Force works is because it progresses from where Ben 10 left off. Most probably watched Ben 10 when they were very young, so when Alien Force came around it felt like the characters had aged with you. Samurai Jack and ReBoot have pulled this off rather well.

This franchise could've worked if it had started with Alien Force's tone, sure, but I probably wouldn't have gotten into it. It feels a bit disingenuous to suggest a kid's show shouldn't be lighthearted.

edited 25th Feb '17 8:25:44 PM by Soble

Actuallly, Transformers is the very reason I am slightly more tolerant toward aliens like Upgrades and Clockwork than I am toward Bloxx. But even then, in both Upgrade's and the Transformers' case, there usually is a justification for them being mechanical. Galvanic Mechamorphs were explicitly created by Galvans through artifiicial means, and Cybertronians, depending on the continuity you take, were either built by the Quintessons or had some form of mystic origin through Primus and Unicron.

And yeah, I acknowledge it's entirely possible to imagine mechanical life forms based on the idea they are something otherworldly and beyond human understanding. But in the case of Bloxx's, it's just completely stupid; at this point it's just a ridiculous coincidence that an alien form would develop to look like a famous Earth toy. Plus it's Silver Age level of cheesy.

As for the tone thing, well, you are technically right, but the reboot clearly put the emphasis on comedy here. Even in the Original Show, the emphasis was put on action and the show was mean to be more a fun superhero show. This here is more like a superhero parody from the little I saw.

Basically they wanted another comedy, but were too lazy and uninspired to sit down and think of and create the characters and original assets.

I do agree with most of what was said. All the mechanical aliens are fine because you can justify it. Bloxx was just a crappy toy idea that was as unsubtle as one could get.

So, episodes 21-27 of the Ben 10 reboot have been uploaded online.

Alien Force worked quite well with Darker and Edgier. Ultimate Alien, on the other hand...

If they aren't keeping what made Micheal Morningstar good (AKA his creepyness and sociopathy), then I don't really care for innovation.

They kept his sociopathy. Not so much his creepiness, but he lost that in UA and OV already.

Also, I found out that Morningstar and Frightwig are voiced by Drake Bell and Jessica DiCicco now as opposed to Wil Wheaton and Cree Summer. I have to say, while it's weird that reboot Frightwig is a 10-year old, she's got a lot more personality than the old Frightwig ever had. She's a female Evil Counterpart to Ben (made obvious with the -probably- alien device stuck to her body and her trying to take Ben's place in his and Gwen's friendship), plus she has Kevin 11-esque Troubling Unchildhood Behavior (she tries to throw a freaking computer into a swimming pool full of people! That is f***ed up!)

Also, the recent Animo episode was really good. Reboot Dr. Animo actually qualifies for Jerkass Woobie, with a much better motive to go bad than he had in the original series.

Most Ben 10 villains have a hard time holding my interest either way, though, except for maybe Malware and Albedo.

Are we not counting Kevin 11 and Charmcaster here?^note They WERE always intended to go Anti-Hero, after all.

edited 28th Feb '17 5:17:30 PM by Isaac_Heller

They kept his sociopathy. Not so much his creepiness, but he lost that in UA and OV already.

So? As you said, this is a reboot; they could have easily restored it with this new version.

I will admit though, what you say of Frightwig does sound more interesting than her mainstream self.

True, not excusing the reboot, I was just saying that it's nothing new that he's without his old creepy factor he had in AF. I can't for the life of me figure out why they dropped that and decided to completely focus on the snobby pretty-boy factor of his character instead. It's rendered Dwayne McDuffie's earlier statement about Darkstar being the most dangerous of Ben's villains laughable.

edited 1st Mar '17 10:48:41 AM by Isaac_Heller

I know, right? I remember how his first episode almost gave me nightmare at the time. What a waste of a good villain.

I like Kevin and Charmcaster, but as you mentioned, they became anti-heroes, so...

There's also considering Michael Morningstar's powers in the reboot as well. In the previous shows, he can just simply use his powers to absorb energy. In the reboot, he has to get people to admire him in order to absorb their energy and as the episode showed, it was a blatant and easily exploitable weakness to him. All Ben has to do is keep people's attention off of him and/or just find an isolated location where no one is around to fight Morningstar in. Because of the way in which they implemented his powers in the reboot alongside taking away his personality from the previous shows, they made Michael Morningstar much less of a dangerous and challenging threat to the main characters. They greatly undermined him as a villain in the reboot.

Morningstar also seems to be explicitly otherworldly here rather than a kid with superpowers a la heroes. Or at least, he's stated to be hundreds of years old and his hideous gnarled appearance seems to be more like a "true form" than the result of his powers backlashing.

Frightwig as a kid and faux friend does look lot like them trying to introduce a new Kevin-style villain who isn't tied down by years of Anti-Villain development. It's a little surprising, but given that Frightwig and her gang were so non-distinctive before that I routinely forgot that they even had names, I'm all for shaking her character up.

edited 2nd Mar '17 10:31:02 PM by KnownUnknown

Okay, people, guess who just powered trough 10 of Ben 10 episodes. I think I may be sucked dry out of vital forces by them and I'm only powered by spite now, but that barely a change for me. Let's get this over with.

Villain Time - It's a knockoff of "Hero Time" Don't ask me where I got my first clue. Harmless if you have zero expectations and high immunity to to tired cliches.

Bright Lights, Black Hearts - I'm...not actually hating on this episode like most. Don't get me wrong, this Morningsar isn't in any way an improvement of original and need to feed on admiration is limiting as it is contrived. But he still had aura of menace that other villains in show lacked, He's sociopathic, confident, good at fighting and all that stuff that made Darkstar Darkstar. There are even cool touches like that Morningstar never eats or that he apparently lived for decades by now.

Recipe for Disaster - Three alien cooks want to eat Ben, that's it. I think they're alien at least, episode never explain who they are, why they were disguised as humans or even gives them names aside group name (Tri-chefta). The trio also has some of them ugliest designs in the whole show.

All Wet - First actually somewhat interesting idea in whole show. Weak execution. Say what you want about episodes above, at least villains have clear motives.Here Frightwig pretends to be normal girl and befriends Gwen only to cause random acts of vandalism rather then try to kill Gwen or anything. We don't really learn anything about her - there are bits where her hair talks in robotic voice but its never addressed. And of course whole plot hinges on fact that Ben won't just pull off her cap. I would still say that Frightwig like other original villains is one of best baddies in show.

Story, Bored - Hex steals magic book which turns him into humanoid snake and now he's invincible! Well, not really. I would say that he feels weaker as snakeman then as regular wizard. At the end he uses book to grow to giant size but then Gwen tells Ben to just shoot the book and he loses before gets to do anything. Shame because Snake!Hex was one of better designs in show.

Xingo - It's like Game Over but instead of Ben going into game, cartoon character gets out. Imagine most annoying result possible and you saved yourself 11 minutes.

Drive You Crazy - Seems like generic episode where Ben races La Grange again, but get this: Before plot starts Ben wants to go go-karting but car breaks down. Ben agrees to help kind mechanic who needs race-money to get her workshop running again after Grange blasts her car. During race he makes bet with Grange that if he loses he will never race again. Then after Ben wins race we IMMEDIATELY cut to Ben go-karting with neither mechanic nor bet being acknowledged at all.

Hole in 10 - See, this is why I sometimes say nice/passive things about other episodes. Because terrible episodes like these exist. Like with gremlin episode, 10 minutes of Ben running around fighting baddies who are beneath him: this time bikers rodents made by Animo (who again doesn't even show up). The dumbest part is forces moral: Ben does well as strong aliens against them only to time-out but eventually he uses Grey Matter cause message of a day is "Good things come in small packages" or whatever. And after long boring chasing around he does manage to beat ONE GUY. It just that it was leader so other bikers listen to Ben now. Lame.

The Beast Inside - Animo actually appears, WTF? And also...that episode generally felt somewhat different. Aside from overused running gag (thought other then that Ben-Gwen interacions are almost charming), it was much more down to earth, almost like it tried to be episode from original series. There is even this weird sorta attempt at the end to give Animo some sort of depth or something.

Tomorrow Today - Remember last episode with Smythe? This is basically the same thing. Yes, now they they recycle they own plots! Snake ate its own tail, now it's going for mouth. Actually it's more competent in practically every aspect so, it's kinda more like do-over or apology? Now just do-over the whole show...

Caught the tail end of an episode of the reboot.

Honestly just seems kind of "meh" overall. Nothing really offensive or bad and it seems to know what it wants to be, but it's also not really amazing, either.

My only gripes are really minor, such as the art style not being my cup of tea (though it fits the show's direction).

Stop watching the show?

Stop watching the show? :p There must be something you like about it.

edited 21st Apr '17 12:54:59 PM by Soble

Eh, at least no one can accuse me of that, since I stopped watching right after the first episode.

You are accused now of giving up easily an not giving show a chance.

Why give effort to a show that clearly gives no effort itself?

... Okay I plead guilty^^' though in my defense, Omniverse kinda left me cynical on the whole thing.