I don't think it's a straight up what if, in the vein of Marvel's What Ifs or Gwen 10, and more, a possible way the story could continue, that they labelled non canon so they had more of an open ending for a then hypothetical sequel series.
It’s a what if of Ben’s identity being exposed at 10 years old. Most fans consider it to be set in the Ben 10,000 timeline.
When Vilgax and other alien bad guys are trying to remove the Omnitrix they always have to take precautions to keep the defense mechanism from kicking in. So why don't they just cut his arm off? They are ruthless, aren't they?
Actually he tried that once, but it failed because The Heroes Arrived before he got around to it. Someone on Alien Force also tried, but again didn't really work out.
The Omnitrix is highly advanced and can’t be removed by normal means. Carl Tennyson (Ben’s dad) used his most proficient tools and none of them even made a scratch. Vilgax had to use a highly advanced weapon to pull the Omnitrix from Ben’s arm.
During the episode "Hunted", Kraab refers to Sixsix as a "gear-head" and "metal-mouth", and Ben calls Sixsix a "walking soda machine". Sixsix is an organic being wearing a suit (we even see tiny organic arms on his shoulders during this episode), while Kraab appears to be fully mechanical. Even if Kraab is also just an organic in a suit, his comments about Sixsix seem weirdly hypocritical, and it only gets more confusing when Ben joins in.
Ben was 10 at the time. You really expect a kid to speak sophisticatedly?
Supposedly, it's Ben's reluctance to grow up, for that'll mean he has to bear the burden of being the world's superhero.
See two below.
If a close relative were to disappear from you and you were force to reuse something that caused you trauma, wouldn’t you act more mature? And if you suddenly got recognition and awards from hundreds of planets, wouldn’t your self confidence sky rocket to new levels? It’s not that he’s getting less mature. He’s simply evolving as a person.
Just how long are we gonna keep this "summer vacation" thing going?
What are you referring to? How long Ben’s summer is or if it’s yearly?
Even as Limited Wardrobe goes, will Grampa Max ever change that Hawaiian shirt? I mean... 20 years.
Well, in one episode we see Ben pull loads of shirts of the same design out of a drawer, so it's probably not the exact same Hawaiin shirt.
When you find a look that works...
In regards to the Omnitrix, how was Doctor Animo able to make a Transformation Ray that use its alien technology, given that he's a human? And how does he later extract DNA of Ben's other forms from one of the copies made by Ben's Ditto form?
He is simply a biological and genectic genius.
Dr. Animo is a man of high intellect. Possibly higher than Einstein himself.
After all the things Ben went through how is he not suffering PTSD? He's witnessed his cousin's soul taken by the one thing he fears most, he was almost amputated by Vilgax, he saw the possible destruction of Earth, one of the aliens he could become escaped the Omnitrix and is actively trying to merge with him...
You get used to it and become The Unfazed, I guess. In the first episode he wasn't worried at all about reaching out and touching a glowing ball that fell from space so he seems pretty open minded.
Also, different people can and do react differently to the same stimulus. For an intentionally extreme example, some Holocaust survivors were left with bad dreams for a few months, and others never (mentally) left the camps.
It's possible the above mentioned inability to properly mature may be the form in which Ben's PTSD manifested, a form of regression.
Everyone reacts to things differently. Ben just handles his situations in a less emotion way.
Given that Upgrade is in fact a giant fluid mass of nanotechnology, nanotechnology by definition being non-organic and thus without DNA, how can its DNA be in the Omnitrix at all?
Maybe the nanobots in question aren't completely tech, but really tiny cyborgs?
Who's to say a purely biological creature couldn't evolve that can interface with machines?
The definition of nanotechnology is actually 'things built on an atomic scale', so something being both organic and nanotechnology is not mutually exclusive. In fact much research is being done into using things like, well, DNA for things like information storage. So who knows, the terms might genuinely be interchangeable to an advanced alien species.
All There in the Manual: Upgrade is not pure nanotech, but created when the tech for mining the Galvin home world’s moon (Galvin B) malfunctioned and merged with the organic rich soil of the moon resulting in organic life formes with all the technological knowledge and prowess of the most intelligent species in the universe.
How do Minerals carry DNA? How do bandages carry DNA? Whose to say DNA is limited towards organic matter?
Forget Neglectful Precursors... aren't the current authority figures just as ridiculous? At any given moment, Ben is the target of no fewer than five villains who are interested in claiming the Omnitrix from him and harnessing its power. A power, we know, that is extremely useful and could decide the fate of the universe. And yet, no matter how many Omnitrix experts he meets (an alien agent posing as a bounty hunter, his grandfather's reptilian ex-girlfriend, the device's inventors, and even his future self), not one of them thinks that maybe it might be a good idea to fix the device's noticeable and proven-to-be-completely-bypassable design flaw, so that he doesn't accidentally turn into a fish in the middle of the desert or find himself turning human again while in the middle of space? Even if you want him to learn to use it responsibly, certainly there's some interest in making sure the thing doesn't kill him!
Also, when the Omnitrix and its location seems to be known to every old yahoo in the galaxy, why don't any planets send some military personnel to help out Ben and arrest the psycho aliens that are always attack him? You'd think some good aliens might have come after the Omnitrix by now (to protect it from villains who want to use it to conquer and enslave them).
That did happen once or twice. It's just that Ben is usually able to handle any threats on his own, so sending reinforcements would be largely unhelpful.
In the same vein, I wonder why nobody besides the Forever Knights has ever attempted to steal the near-allmighty alien device from the 10-year old kid and make an army or sell it or whatever. Most other shows had some corrupt humans capturing / blackmailing/ etc. the hero, but apparently taking over the world is Vilgax' thing.
A lot of those experts knew of the Omnitrix, but not a detailed working knowledge of it. In the case of the creator, calling him a neglectful would be putting it lightly. It might be argued that his Future self has an Omniscient Morality License and possibly also a sense of nostalgia for how things went down the first time.
Exactly, future Ben knows (or at least, thinks he does, not being aware that his future isn't set in stone) that Ben won't die from an Omnitrix malfunction, because he is Ben. Ben himself was capable of unlocking the Omnitrix' master control on his own, in one episode. Granted, it was most probably by chance and he reset it near the end of episode, but that demonstrates even humans of normal intelligence are capable of doing it. And thus, said "Omnitrix experts" would see no need to help him, because they think it's nothing he can't fix himself.
How did Vilgax die from a gas station explosion in his ultra-enhanced form, but survive being tied onto an exploding nuclear missile in his un-enhanced form?
Bad allergies?
Word of God clarifies: the Future Episodes are not canon. Though it's fishy if it's just Ken 10 or Ben 10.000, too.
Different universes don’t have the same perks as the main one.
Whatever happened to the Omnitrix being able to replicate DNA? Ben's assimilated the forms of Ghostfreak's squad (though it looks like he forgot about them) so why not any of the other aliens he's met? For some of the friendlier ones all he has to do is ask. Their powers would come in handy, and that's not even counting Ben's enemies, imagine if he could replicate Vilgax for example (although would he really replicate Vilgax with all the modifications, or just a typical member of his species?)
According to the pop-up commentary during a marathon, the werewolf's scratch set the Omnitrix into "collect mode", which is why it kept absorbing DNA for the next few episodes. Most likely, something happened to set it back to normal mode after the Ghostfreak adventure, and Ben simply doesn't know how to turn collect mode back on. It's also possible that most of the aliens Ben met afterward were already in the watch, but were inaccessible the same way Upchuck had been until Xylene unlocked him.
Probably just a typical member of Vilgax's species. The Mods are unlikely to be in his DNA, after all.
Every time we see Vilgax meddle with the Omnitrix, he uses a glowing red finger. Since we know that such a device is not necessary to activate any of the watches functions, a distinct possibility is that he does so to ensure that he never touches the Omnitrix itself, and it never picks up his DNA.
To put it simply, it doesn't exactly "replicate" the DNA; it already contains samples of every non-Earth species across the Milky Way. The yellow setting ("capture") is actually more of a search engine; it finds the dormant sample and activates it, putting it into the rotation of choices.
Why does every single alien species have special powers except for humans? All the aliens stored in the omnitrix seem to be fighting machines, with the exception of Grey Matter and Ripjaw. In Secret of the Omnitrix it's stated that the Omnitrix was built for study. Yet it seems almost every alien in there is super powered and indeed it seems the whole galaxy is like this. Why are humans so crap at fighting?
We're crap at direct combat, but that's never been our strong suit - it lies in endurance, adaptation, and creativity. We can't run as fast as a panther, but we can keep up with it in a 'tortoise and hare' type situation until either the panther collapses from exhaustion or we lead it into a devious trap. Word of God even stated why the alien forms are such a power in Ben's hands is his human imagination: 90% of the time Ben's victory comes not from having those powers but the way he thinks of using them that actual members of the species would not.
This question got answered in Ben 10: Omniverse when we actually do see some useless aliens.
A WMG: humans' special "power" is that they can make little half-breeds with anything humanoid.
Our superpower is adaptation. We used the world around us to terraform the planet.
Where precisely is Bellwood, anyway? There seems to be a bunch of towns with that name across the Eastern seaboard. personal bet is on Tennessee, just to keep with their whole "ten" theme...
It's right next to Springfield.
Virginia seems a likely canditate. It's a mere 116 miles from Washington DC, and the gang visit there in the second episode.
Bellwood is likely in California or Nevada, because of the time it took the Tennysons to get to their first stop Yosemite National Park being night time, it hardly snows in the winter, it has a coast side climate, and it is near a desert.
A map in the Alien Swarm movie seems to place it in the central Midwest, somewhere up near the Minnesota/Wisconson area in the upper Midwest.
The best bet for Bellwood’s Location would be New York, because Heroes United (the crossover with Gen Rex) takes place New York and Ben believes he is in Bellwood. It is revealed that Kevin is from Bellwood, and the Tennysons first meet him in New York City; unless Kevin decided to travel cross-country for no particular reason it's likely he's remained in the same state.
Most likely New York. Various scenes from Omniverse show Bellwood to be as large as a New York Borough. Kevin ran away from home and inhabited a NYC subway tunnel. I don’t think an eleven year old is willing to travel half the country to go to NYC.
There’s a real city called Bellwood somewhere near Chicago, so it’s my guess the one for Ben 10 is somewhere in Illinois.
Is the live action special meant to be taken as part of the cartoon continuity, or is it an alternate possibility like that "Gwen 10" episode?
It's kind of both. The series makes a distinction between What If? (a possibility that never actually happened) and crosstime (a possibility that takes place in an Alternate Universe); the live action special falls under the latter.
Originally, all live action specials were canon until Ultimate Alien retconned Race Against Time into a parallel universe. Currently, only Alien Swarm is canon.
Did any of the possible finales show the Omnitrix being removed? Or is there no explanation for how it ended up hidden in Ben's closet at the start of Alien Force?
Nope, looks like it happened during the Time Skip.
Why does nobody ever give Ben credit or thanks for the heroic things he does? Like mentioned above and elsewhere, in the episode of Ghostfreak's return when he saves Max and Gwen with Cannobolt when they fall back to Earth from outer space, instead of thanking him for saving their lives, Gwen just complains about the rough ride, and Ben says he's learned his lesson about teamwork! In the episode with the space tick with a Galactus-like appetite for planets, after Ben destroys it and saves the planet, Max makes him scrub the RV like punishment for getting it covered in the tick's slime. And he gets plenty of lectures in the first animated movie about only wanting to be a hero for the fun of it, despite how his first thought about the Omnitrix in the first episode was "Maybe I can help people, you know, really help them, not just make things worse." And did Gwen or Max ever thank him for singlehandedly saving them from villains like Sublimino or Zombozo? Give the kid a break and a pat on the back now and then!
If the episode where Gwen and Charmcaster switch bodies shows anything, seemingly both Gwen and Grandpa have gotten so used to Ben doing his thing that they kind of see it as an obligation, like how you might just walk past a doorman holding open a door for you because you think "Oh well, that's his job, no need to thank him."
Related: Ishiyama. Ben not only beat his Big Bad , but also bring him back to life, and stil that Ungrateful Bastard dont want to give him a credit. What the heck?!
If one Cannonbolt was strong enough to take down "The Big Tick," how did it destroy an entire planet full of them?
Aburia was a peaceful planet. The vacation spot of the galaxy were Aburian plerotas would roll around in giant hamster tubes through the busy streets. They probably tried to but a lei over the Tick peaceful as they were.
Maybe all the 10-year olds were on holiday that week?
Considering Ben effectively allowed himself to be "eaten", and the trend of his mentality in the original series, to pull off that trick, maybe the Cannonbolt species believed in "mercy" for the "slow"?
Word of God is that Cannonbolt's attack is actually a defensive technique to run away. They are built more for defense than offense. Ben just has little concept of how to utilize Cannonbolt like he was intended.
On top of everything else, aliens in the Omnitrix are said to be genetically-enhanced specimens, possibly through some tinkering with the samples. It's possible the planet of Arburian Pelarotae simply didn't have Cannonbolt's abilities.
In "Ben 4 Good Buddy" the Rustbucket gets stolen, but in an earlier episode Grandpa is shown to have a remote door lock-type thing on his keys that calls the RV to him on its own. Why didn't he use it? Even if the guy driving the RV could figure out how to override the thing, it would have at least distracted him for a bit.
Honestly, in stressful situations like your van being stolen, especially if it has extremely high tech James Bond installments and weaponry that could easily be abused, you tend to panic, which clouds your judgement. Perhaps said judgement clouding made Max forget he could do that.
A few WMGS:
1. He decided against it because the driving AI is not very good and fails in busy areas.
2. It has a maximum range.
3. He lost it / it's in the Rustbucket.
4. It only works if no one's at the wheel.
In the first season finale, Ben has just been captured by Vilgax and Max drives to Mt. Rushmore as fast as possible. Gwen asks him why they're going away from the battle, and Max responds: "Now is not the time to explain." Um... you're heading to your secret organization's base with intent to pick up heavy weaponry. There's no way you're going to Mt. Rushmore and back without Gwen learning about things. Telling her what's going on seems far more sensible.
Max wasn’t concerned that she would learn about things. He was saying now isn’t the time to explain things because at that point he knows they’re on a time crunch to save Ben from Vilgax, and they can’t afford to risk doing anything that could even remotely slow them down and lose them precious time they might not have.
How did the Plumbers become Vilgax's greatest opposition? Before the Retcon, the plumbers were a small, humans-only federal agency that got shut down. In a universe with such a large supply of superpowered races, it's odd that he would have the most trouble with a group of relatively powerless beings whose main advantage is their available technology, despite a) still being less technologically advanced than many of the others, especially the Galvans, and b) having a Masquerade on such technology, which only limits their ability to develop it.
Did they say they were Vilgax's greatest opposition? They were able to drive him off world, and Max was a resourcful enough foe to be memorable, but I don't think they were his greatest opponents before Ben.
Vilgax was the Plumber’s greatest enemy. And considering that Vilgax is known throughout the galaxy, who knows how many forces were after him. Also, there were two plumber groups. The earth only plumbers operated on earth. The alien plumbers were a separate organization. They merged together between the timeskip.
Why is Diamondhead frequently cited as being indestructible, when he keeps getting broken? Whenever he makes a wall of diamond or something, whoever he happens to be fighting smashes it down without much trouble.
Because Diamondhead is already one of Ben's most useful forms. If he was as invulnerable as he is stated to be, there'd really be no point in bothering with most of Ben's other forms. Besides, he can regenerate anyway.
He's invulnerable, but not indestructible. It just means he can regenerate / heal from any injury.
The Omnitrix aliens are ten, just like Ben. So when Tini had a crush on Fourarms, does that make her a pedophile?
Who's to say that all aliens age at the same rate? Just because they're 10 doesn't mean they can't be an adult or even a senior citizen for their species. In the episode "Don't Drink the Water," a four year old Ben transforms into Fourarms, becoming a being that looks to be around 12-15 years old biologically. A 10 year old Fourarms is likely in his mid twenties by human standards.
Besides, Ben's aliens are always the best genetic individuals of their race. A genetically perfect ten years old human could be easily mistaken for at least a teenager.
There's every indication that when Ben turns into an alien, he's turning into a mature example of their species, not one that's at the equivalent age of ten. His fire-alien form is noticeably taller and more-developed than the young teenage version we see of that species later, for just one example. Now, he is turning into a unique example of that species, probably based on his own genetic traits, but age doesn't seem to be a carryover in the transformation... which is probably deliberate, specifically to avoid the problem of "aliens aging at different rates". Imagine if a twenty-year-old used the Omnitrix to turn into an alien species that normally only lived for fifteen years...
This is Confirmed, actually, as we see Big Chill give birth to babies in Alien Force.
Some alien stuff: How can Cannonbolt see where he rolling? How can Stinkfly shoot goo from his EYES? Why did evolution give Ripjaws legs, if his whole planet is covered in water?
Cannonbolt's sense of direction may be something inherent to the species. As for the other two, pretty sure Word of God is that the samples in the Omnitrix have been artificially modified.
It's possible that Stinkfly is shooting from a duct on the side of his eyes. Pretty sure there's a lizard that does this as a defense mechanism.
Lots of things that live in the ocean have legs. Admittedly they don't have humanoid legs, but Ripjaws having legs just because he's aquatic isn't really a big deal. Maybe on their planet, the air is so humid or saturated by whatever it is in water that they breathe that they can survive out of water for much longer than the species can otherwise, at least long enough to do whatever it is they need to that made their species suited to being upright and having legs (breeding, hunting, moving between bodies of water, gathering materials, etc.). Being able to go up on land for fifteen or twenty minutes might be enough time for evolution to select for members that can do that, if what they had to do on land was important enough.
OK Ben got a werewolf, a mummy and Frankenstein's monster and a ghost. Were is Ben-Vampire?
Took a few years, but we finally got our answer (and get to see one).
On Xylene's planet "once you hatch, you're on your own". That makes sense, but are they're born with ability to talk? Who teaches them law and stuff like that?
The only explanation that comes to mind is that it's like the Jotok, where there's a mass-bred (litters of thousands) nonsapient phase left in the wild followed by metamorphosis of some sort into a sapient phase (with genetic mixing between phases to remove any incentive for parents to stick around and wait), with conventional child-rearing done by those with a ticking biological going to places where the metamorphosis happens and picking up the first newly-metamorphosed individual they see.
Presumably they learn it the same way abandoned children do in the real world? They pick it up as they go along, sometimes by violating the rules and having someone explain why they don't do that?
Perhaps "on your own" isn't meant quite so literally, but rather that, like reaching 18 years in our society, you're expected to take care of yourself in terms of food and shelter instead of relying on other people.
Max seemed to have no problem telling people the aliens are Gwen in "Gwen 10".
Chalk this up to small differences in the scenes between "And Then There Were 10" and "Gwen 10". Max didn't see transformed Gwen until the robot was already attacking, and she hadn't had a chance to discuss the situation with him yet. She wasn't exactly pretending to not be his granddaughter during the battle. And Ben had been talking about the Omnitrix and Vilgax since the beginning of the episode. All things considered, plausible deniability was less plausible in this timeline.
If we go by the fan theory that as opposed to a legitimate alternate universe (when Gwen 10 appeared in Omniverse she had a different designed Omnitrix) it was actually a dream then Max's lapses make more sense, because Ben wouldn't have thought about it.
So in the episode "Ghostfreaked out" Ben realizes that he always felt weird as Ghostfreak because his DNA sample, Zs'skayr was trying to escape the Omnitrix. So every time Ben transformed into Ghostfreak he was Zs'Skayr. Right? But how is that possible? Every time Ben went Ghostfreak he acted just like himself. It didn't really seem like he was possessed by Zs'Skayr while he was ghostfreak until he found out in that episode. It would have been more realistic if Ben had acted totally OOC while he was ghostfreak in past episodes.
It's not that he was Zs'Skayr when he turned into Ghostfreak. It's that Zs'Skayr was trying to escape. He was still Ben at the time, but Zs'Skayr was slowly taking over, and Ben was losing himself to Zs'skayr.
In the Ben 10,000 future, Ken Tennyson uses Grey Matter to hack the Omnitrix and unlock the master control allowing him to switch between aliens at will with no time limit. Why didn't Ben think of that? Is Kenny smarter than Ben or is Ben just below average intelligence?
Ken has probably been observing Ben since he could remember. Ben (at this point) has had the Omnitrix for all what three months or however long summer vacation lasts. Ben was constantly in action and probably never gave it much thought. Ken however has been waiting for this his entire life. Those features have already been unlocked for Ben, which means that Ken knows it's possible. By the time Ben had any clue he's met Azmuth, learned that the Omnitrix could destroy the universe and more importantly Azmuth might just let it, and it still only took him turning into a teenager to try and hack it.
Going on a cross country trip with your Grandpa and cousin for the entirety of summer vacation? Sure. Not a common thing, but I guess it's possible. Getting in every significant location between San Francisco and Salem? Tricky, but sure. But the Rustbucket's path seems fairly... erratic. It makes sense that we don't see every stop they make, but they seem to zigzag between both coasts within a couple episodes.
They seem to be puttering around the East Coast in Season 1, finally make it to Yellowstone and San Francisco starting season 2. Few locations get name dropped, so no real problems.
Near the end of season 2, they meet Dr. Animo again in what's apparently Cajun country. Season three rolls around and an early episode has them in Salem, implying they've made a full loop around the country. Then a couple episodes later, it's off to New Mexico to visit the Rez!
Then they're in Hollywood for Super Alien Hero Buddies. Then Chicago for Monster Weather. Then freaking Cape Canaveral! The hell? It's just about the least efficient route you could possibly make on a road trip.
Charmcaster's use of a body-swap spell to get the Omnitrix in "A Change of Face" makes no sense. She states she wants to filter her spells through Ben's alien forms, but by her own statement in that episode, only people with magical auras can cast spells, and she just lucked out when the Body Surf spell landed her in Gwen's body, which she didn't know had an Aura. She has no way of knowing if Ben had an aura as well, or (if he does) the aura would transfer to his alien forms. If Ben didn't have an aura, she would be stuck in the body of a 10-year old forever, with no means of escape. It seems like a lot to gamble on two off-chances.
Unless she could sense that Ben had an Aura beforehand.
Even if she couldn't cast while in Ben's body, she'd still have the most powerful device in the universe. Maybe her thought was that even if Ben didn't have one, she could simply transform into a species that did.
So in "Back for Vengeance" Ben's fiddling allows him to unlock the Master Control, allowing him to transform instantly and stay in that form as long as he desires. We're first shown this ability when Ben mentions Upgrade, and then he tests it out on other alien forms. All well and good...but how does the Omnitrix know which one one wants? Names like Upgrade, Heatblast, and Four Arms are just nicknames he came up with, and I don't think he knew what any of the species in it were actually called at the time.
In the same episode it was shown that the Master Control also worked off thought, since Ben didn't always call out names to transform. He probably associates the names with the aliens, so when he hears or says the words, he thinks of the alien on some level, which the Master Control picked up on.
