Accidental Innuendo: In "Clown College," Max and his old badminton teammates form a giant racket to fight Zombozo, which the latter dubs the "BBW." That acronym is more commonly known as "Big Beautiful Woman" and is typically mostly seen in more lewd contexts, such as porn sites.
Alternative Character Interpretation: Hex in "Creature Feature": Did he really spare Ben's life due to the rules of his magic, or he simply didn't want to fell in debt with his enemy? Or is Ben right and he does have a conscience and simply won't admit it?
Bizarro Episode: "Ben Again and Again". It takes place during the Origin Story of how Ben got the Omnitrix, and while this isn't the first time the franchise did a Time Travel episode returning to that point, this episode assumed you knew how Ben got the Omnitrix already. If you didn't and were confused at the meteor and the robots, too bad - the plot's going to focus on Future!Ben and Future!Billy squabbling and trying to get the Omnitrix, which causes massive changes in the timeline and somehow resulting in Ben getting cyborg parts and steampunk outfits. While it doesn't make the episode bad, it's certainly an episode that will make people go "Huh?"
Whether or not a reboot needed to be made in the first place. Detractors point out that it means that the universal road trip promised at the ending of Omniversewill never be followed up on and a lack of Ensemble Dark Horse Rook, while supporters believe that the series had fallen into a Continuity Snarl and resetting the continuity is a better path forward.
Man of Action Studios' involvement. After Ultimate Spider-Man (2012) and Avengers Assemble on Disney XD were met with a divisive response, detractors cited concern the reboot will be a rethread of the original series' worst mistakes. Ironically, after the show premiered, many have traced its problems not back to Man of Action but to Cartoon Network itself and its style and policies that prefer episodic comedies rather than serialized action shows. Man of Action themselves have even said that they have no choice but to follow the network's trends and hope to do the best they can with the show regardless.
The decision to limit Ben to only having 10 alien forms at a time to avoid the previous continuity's Artifact Title problem. While seen as an Author's Saving Throw, there are also fans who find it disappointing due to nerfing Ben and having the side effect of fan favorite alien forms being phased out needlessly, how it ultimately led to Ben having a third of his lineup being super strong aliens (Four Arms, Rath, Humongousaur) in the later seasons, and how the later specials seems to be going against the idea in general with means of circumventing the limit and thus making critical fans quesiton why they thought the limit would be a good idea in the first place.
Gwen being now portrayed as nicer to Ben compared to the Original Series. People who disliked her snotty Jerkass attitude toward Ben in the original series consider it an improvement which making Gwen more likable, Others claim that this makes her no longer a proper Foil/Straight Man to Ben, and breaks the dynamics between the two.
Charmcaster's new origin as a normal human girl who got her powers by finding Hex's spellbook, was a drastic change from her pre-Reboot origin. There she was Hex's niece and disciple as well as a native from a Mage Species variety of humans from Another Dimension. Some fans like this new origin for playing up Charmcaster's sympathetic side from the start. In contrast with the pre-reboot era, where the writers seemed unable to decide where the character stood on the sliding scale of Anti-Villainy (She was prone to being a Heel–Face Revolving Door). The reboot version is still close to the original series' design and personality. Others dislike the new origin for removing many interesting angles to the character, such as her relationship with Hex and the world-building regarding magic with Ledgerdomain. These were replaced with a cliche supervillain origin that has been seen a thousand times before. With that said, some of this was alleviated later on with the revelation that Hex still is her uncle in this continuity. This meant that Charmcaster had a connection to magic even before she developed magical abilities of her own.
The Season 3 Xingo-based Take That! at the Alien Force/Ultimate Alien era. The reception towards it largely comes down to which side of the Broken Base surrounding that era you are on. Either it is a well-deserved jab or a rather mean-spirited joke. About the only part of it that most people agree worked was the blond hair on the Shallow Parody of Kevin, which seems like an appropriate dig at Cooper's highly unimaginitive Reused Character Design.
Tetrax being the same species as Diamondhead is no surprise to anyone who has watched the original series.
Character Rerailment: Despite the reboot's Denser and Wackier tone compared to the Original Series and its sequels, it has returned some of the characters (particularly the franchises' main protagonist and antagonist) back into how they were originally portrayed in the original series.
After the sequels gradually turned him into more of a joke and lessened his fighting prowess, Vilgax is once again portrayed as a straight Knight of Cerebus and One-Man Army who can take on Ben and several bounty hunters of his own.
Ben is also closer to his Jerk with a Heart of Gold personality from the original series. He can be lazy and egotistical, but will always be there to save the day and get serious when he needs to be. He does show real care toward his family. Plus, his egotistical side is toned down to a more reasonable degree than it was in the sequel series.
Azmuth's character is rolled back to something more similar to the original series' Secret of the Omnitrix. Rather than the Big Good of the franchise, he is a jaded Jerkass whose faith in the universe has been shaken.
Complete Monster: The High Override, from season 2, is a warlord and the leader of the Fulmini empire, who has harvested countless planets for their energy. He sets his sights on Earth after discovering its existence through Ben using Shock Rock, the Omnitrix's DNA sample of a Fulmini. At first, manipulating Ben as Shock Rock as a voice in his head before taking over his body during Ben's sleep, the High Override makes Ben construct a beacon to allow a portal to opened for the Fulmini to invade. When resisted by Ben and Vilgax, the High Override takes over Shock Rock's mind and forces him to attack his friends, while banishing Vilgax into the Null Void. One of the most dangerous threats in the show, the High Override set a serious tone scarcely seen from other villains.
Oddly enough, Frightwig. Her reinvention as being a solo antagonist and Evil Counterpart to Ben is seen as more interesting than the generic henchman the original version was. When the other two Circus Freaks came along, they too got a better reception than their older counterparts. Along with Frightwig, they also broke the generic henchman mold by actually quitting working for Zombozo and going off to make their own way in the world. Even in "Speechless on the Seinne", when they went back to him, it is made clear they are now his partners, not his henchmen. They won't allow him to boss them around. "Party Poopers" further proves that Frightwig is the real brains of the operation. She even manages to get Zombozo to back out of a potential Heel–Face Turn so that she can continue to use him to her own benefit.
Ben's Gax form, due to finally giving him a canon Vilgax transformation. It helps that his introduction injects more drama into the series.
A good number of fans have actually warmed up to Xingo, particularly after his second appearance.
Bash Mouth, Kevin's 11th alien form, has quickly become popular due to his design, interesting power, and the fact he is not a modified version of one of Ben's aliens. It also true In-Universe, since Ben couldn't stop saying how cool Bash Mouth was in his first appearance, even while he was beating him up.
Shock Rock, Ben's Fulmini alien. He debuted in a two-part episode (the only multi-part episode outside season finales, no less) which is considered one of the best of the series and he quickly proved extremely powerful (he defeated Vilgax, of all people), has a good design and a vastarrayof powers. The role his species play in "The Innervasion" also helped. Ben himself sees him as his secret weapon to use when his other aliens aren't enough.
Vilgax here is less loathsome and more cunning and charming.
Lord Decibel, one of the more memorable villains of the reboot.
Germans Love David Hasselhoff: As stated on the main page, the show is very popular in Europe, as was the original series. For the most part, it gets early showings in Europe, before coming to the United States. There it usually gets middling ratings, mostly due to being under the boot of a certain other superhero show. It could be argued that this series was made more for Europe really. The fact that the series was announced to have a third season so early was likely because of the overseas fanbase.
Fan-Disliked Explanation: Billy Billions and Charmcaster are nowhere to be found in Season 4 onwards. Apparently, this was to focus on the more galactic/inhuman villains in the series. However, many fans pointed out how many human villains (especially ones who weren’t all that popular in the fandom) like Tim Buktu and Lagrange still have recurring roles in Season 4. Some believe the real reason why was to give more focus on Kevin, who already fulfills the role of both previous villains. Nonetheless, their total absence can come across as jarring.
Growing the Beard: Some believe that this has been achieved by the Season 1 finale, the four-part "Omni-Tricked", which actually has a serious plot with more serious action sequences, reintroduces Vilgax as fearsome as he was in the original series, foreshadows the Plumbers with the introduction of Phil, and does something many fans have wanted to see for a long time in letting Ben achieve the form of Vilgax's species with his Omnitrix.
Season 2 continues to feature Vilgax in a recurring villain role and is developing more continuity with elements such as the progressing unlocking of Enhanced Forms for Ben's aliens, which also ensures more legitimate action sequences. There's even some legitimate Character Development, with Ben becoming increasingly worried about the downside of having the Omnitrix and how it could lead him to becoming weaponized for destruction. It helps that the majority of this season's episodes have been written by the members of Man of Action themselvesnote hence the new credit of "Story Editor" for them plus the writer of the aforementioned Season 1 finale, whereas much of Season 1 was freelance work and felt much more episodic as a result.
Harsher in Hindsight: Michael Morningstar being a centuries old Manipulative Bastard who uses his fame to feed off energy from teenagers is significantly more unsettling to watch after Morningstar's original voice actor Drake Bell was revealed to have had an online relationship with a 15 year-old girl that included sending sexually explicit messages to each other.
Hilarious in Hindsight: Cannonbolt was originally planned to be one of Ben's original 10 aliens in the original series, but was replaced with Ghostfreak. In this series, Ghostfreak has been replaced with Cannonbolt.
Ben's redesign in the reboot looks a lot like his appearance in the original intro where the art style shifts to a simplified art style while listing the aliens.
Gwen and Charmcaster. In just the first appearance of the latter, Gwen actively protects Charmcaster from her abusive boyfriend, and helps her see him for what he really is. While Charmcaster vows to be Gwen's enemy in order to prove herself stronger than her, she still leaves her and Ben alone for the time being. This is out of gratitude, even though she could easily have wiped them out. The episode ends with Gwen saying "I have an arch-enemy!" in cheerful excitement, calling to mind the way "nemesis" was used in Phineas and Ferb.
Similarly, Ben and Kevin. This is especially transparent in "Four By Four", where Ben and Kevin are teamed up for laser tag. They reach the point where Kevin even ends up Taking the Bullet for Ben. Ben holds him in his arms dramatically. And the "arch-enemy" subtext continues when at the end, Kevin says that Gwen might make a better nemesis because she won the game. This prompts an outraged Ben to exclaim "You're dumping me as your arch-enemy because of Gwen!?" Later, in "The Bentathlon", Ben responds to a punch from Kevin with "You call that a punch? Felt more like a kiss!" By Season 4, it reaches the point where Kevin comes off as a Stalker with a Crush to Ben, who is in serious denial about it.
In a No Yay variant, Ben and Tim Buktuu. Seeing a grown man obsess over a 10-year-old boy and use voodoo to humiliate him in a borderline sexual assault kind of way is not pleasant, to say the least.
The show has also been criticized for trying so hard to return to the franchise's roots, that it ended up recycling plots from the original series in lesser quality. Most notably, Zombozo's plan in this show is almost exactly the same to the one he had in his first appearance, but without any of the scary aspects that made him popular to begin with. This generally gives the feeling that it was bringing nothing new to the table.
Needless to say, fans of Alien Force and Ultimate Alien are not happy about this show pandering to original series fans who wanted a lighter and more comedic take on the franchise. This is the third time they have done this after Omniverse and Season 3 of Alien Force. Both of these were considered Audience-Alienating Eras by fans of the darker tone Alien Force had taken on.
Jerkass Woobie: Dr. Animo, of all people. In this version, he Used to Be a Sweet Kid who was driven by the desire to live up to the legacy of his beloved veterinarian father. He ended up Jumping Off the Slippery Slope into villainy and madness. His mind is permanently damaged by the animal DNA experiments he performed on himself.
This show's version of Charmcaster might be the most sympathetic one to date. She was just a normal, innocent nerdy girl before getting Drunk on the Dark Side when acquiring magic powers. She using her powers as a front for new strength, when she was actually as lacking in self-confidence as ever. This led to her entering a blatantly abusive relationship with Michael Morningstar. She only becomes Gwen's Arch-Enemy due to the shame she feels at being so weak that she needed saving by Gwen, and can only feel strong again by defeating Gwen. Even Word of God describes her as someone who hurts others (the Jerkass part) because of how badly she herself is hurting (the Woobie part).
You can't help but feel some pity for Zombozo. His failures actually start to add up to the point where he loses his henchmen and most of his resources. By the time of "Super-Villain Team Up", he is a hobo reduced to hypnotizing random people into giving him their money to get by. By Season 3, he is considered such a buffoon that the Forever Knight is left unimpressed by him and won't even bother recruiting him. Unlike so many other of Ben's villains, which the Knight recruits. And in Season 4, he actually tries to reform and become a party clown, only for Frightwig to push him back into a life of crime against his better judgement.
Acid Breath, who is just a teenager on this show and had to suffer gradual physical deterioration because Zombozo was too lazy and selfish to ever take him to a hospital when he pleaded for it.
Kevin in "Introducing Kevin 11" has a definite moment as this, when he tells Ben to just run home to his grandpa, to which Ben replies "At least I have someone to run home to!" Kevin is so gobsmacked by this accurate retort that it looks like he is holding back tears. Even Ben recognizes that he may have crossed a line here for. As viewers learn in a different episode, Kevin suffers from serious Parental Neglect. It gets even worse for the poor kid in The Movie. After showing how lost and lonely Kevin really is, he and comes the closest yet to a Heel–Face Turn. Only to get put through the wringer again and again, being physically and emotionally beat down and only having his feelings of inadequacy (when compared to Ben) reinforced.
Billy Billions, who sadly admits in "Billy Bajillions" that his wealthy upbringing has only made him lonely. He really wants to have friends who don't just like him for his money. And just when Ben and Gwen seem ready to become those friends, the Forgeti makes them all forget this whole conversation.
All that Steam Smythe really wants is to have people appreciate the power of steam the way he does. As seen by "Steam Fight at the OK Corral" he is moved to tears when this actually happens.
Magnificent Bastard: Vilgax was once the assistant of Azmuth, but stole the Omnitrix to become a warlord, leading Azmuth to drain half of Vilgax's DNA into the Omnitrix, who manifests to Ben as "Gax". Posing as "Vil" and becoming Ben's Evil Mentor, Vilgax manages to reabsorb his power, and later fixes Ben's malfunctioning Omnitrix to remove his advantage, before attempting to extract it. Surviving his ship sinking into lava, Vilgax returns many times to menace Team Tennyson, manipulating several villains including: Dr. Animo, the Weatherheads, and Zombozo into alliances with him intending to betray them. Vilgax nearly tricks Ben into believing the Omnitrix is dangerous and surrendering it to Vilgax. Though Vilgax is right about the danger Shock Rock poses to the Earth, causing the Fulmini Invasion where Vilgax teams up with Ben to protect the Earth. Vilgax also manipulated Kevin into creating the Antitrix by transmitting blueprints in his dream, before Vilgax takes the Antitrix for himself and becomes AntiVilgax, then steals the Omnitrix Key to unlock Celestialsapien DNA and becomes Alien V. Far more manipulative than Classic Vilgax, while being far less nastier, this Vilgax becomes far more likable and compelling to watch.
Tim Buktu repeatedly puts innocent people in harm's way to make himself look like a hero in "Villain Time".
In "High Stress Express", LaGrange tries to destroy the bullet train, just to keep his world record. He does not care that tons of people would have died if he succeeded.
Michael Morningstar is bad enough to begin with, but his abuse of Charmcaster in "The Charm Offensive" takes him to another level of irredeemably vile.
Never Live It Down: Ben snapping at Kevin in "Introducing Kevin 11" by saying "At least I have someone to run home to!" is quickly becoming this among the fanbase, with some bringing it to Ron the Death Eater status. Of course they ignore that not only did Ben immediately feel awful and try to apologize, but he has every reason to be mad at Kevin… not only did he bully Ben repeatedly at school, but since the start of Season 3 Kevin has been stalking him and trying to kill him for petty reasons. No wonder he snapped.
Older Than They Think: The style of humor, and Ben's attitude (minus the Took a Level in Dumbass developments of later series), are actually much closer with the original series. The main difference is the episodes last for eleven minutes, rather than half an hour.
Much like the original series, the Incest Subtext between Ben and Gwen has returned with strength once again in this new iteration.
Kevin's rather one-sided crush on Gwen may be cute, but there is clearly far more effort put into depicting Kevin's relationship with Ben. A relationship in which the other party is just as passionate in their feelings. Needless to say, it is the Fan-Preferred Couple of yaoi fans everywhere.
Pre-reboot, a lot of the previous series' antagonists were criticized as being rather generic and lacking in personality. The reboot certainly doesn't entirely escape the criticism, particularly with a good many of its new villains. But a number of previous series' villains, such as Zombozo, the Circus Freaks, Billy Billions, and even Dr. Animo were reworked to better flesh out their personalities and backstories.
Ben's watch only keeps ten aliens at a time in this incarnation. This seems to be in response to complaints about Ben's almost excessive number of forms in previous continuities, many of whom had powers that often left certain aliens Out of Focus. It also avoids the Artifact Title issue that permeated all four prior series. However this is also very controversial, see below.
One criticism of previous entries was their frequent reliance on supplementary material (particularly the Omnifacts, which only aired a few times on television) or Word of God materials for worldbuilding. This series does more worldbuilding within the show, and also has more easily accessible supplementary materials with the "Alien Worlds" shorts.
Arburian Pelarotas are alive and well in this continuity, which seems to be to avoid the Fridge Logic of how the species was rendered extinct by a creature that was destroyed by Ben using the form of said species.
After changing Charmcaster's origin to be a normal girl who became a witch by learning magic, "What Rhymes With Omnitrix?" hints that Hex is indeed her uncle after all. A storyboard of the scene◊ outright confirms it. Changing her backstory to begin with was probably meant to be an Author's Saving Throw to previous continuities' retconning the existence of magic.
“Buktu The Future” will be the last regular 11-minute episode, as the crew claims that it will be incorporating more elements from the original series, starting with the Season 4 finale movie which is composed of six episodes that interconnect with one another. Season 5 would be composed entirely of such movies.
Fans were not pleased with the exclusion of original 10 aliens Ripjaws, Wildmutt and Ghostfreak from the main roster. However, they do make appearances in Ben 10 vs. The Universe as prisoners of the Null Void, along with Eye Guy and Blitzwolfer.
Following Omniverse, which played Rath far more for comedic moments than awesome ones, the reboot's Rath returned Rath to his roots as being both awesome and funny.
Fans who disliked Spidermonkey’s Omniverse design will be happy to learn that his reboot design is based more on his look in Alien Force and Ultimate Alien.
For those who were annoyed of Kevin’s increasingly oversaturated appearances, the issue isn’t quite as extreme in season 4, where he doesn’t show up nearly as often in the previous season, Ben gets more legitimate victories over him, and the more diverse set of villains get their time to shine.
Shallow Parody: A season 3 episode featuring Xingo encountering recolored version of the Alien Force-Ultimate Alien era protagonists and mocking them for being 'too serious' runs into this problem quite heads on. It basically assumes that all those shows did was pepper their phrases with 'serious'. It also seems to think that Gwen and Kevin spent half their time avoiding romance, because 'Kevin was seriously bad news'. Many comparisons to Teen Titans Go! and its handling of fans of the original show were quickly made. That said, Xingo is explicitly based on classic The Prankster-type cartoon characters, so it's no surprise he thinks Denser and Wackier is better.
The HSQ for "Omni-Tricked", the four-part Season 1 finale, can be described in one word: Vilgax.
The five-part Season 2 finale, "Innervasion". Shock Rock and the Omni-Enhanced Alien forms powered by his energy that Ben has been using all season were revealed to be remotely used by the Fulmini to use the Omnitrix as a means to invade the Earth. And Ben has to team up with Vilgax to stop the invasion.
The two-part Season 3 finale, "Roundabout", has Ben actually joining the Forever Knight and having to work together with Kevin, Billy Billions, and Charmcaster as a team.
So Okay, It's Average: The general consensus about the show. It's considered better than other comedy-based reboots of superhero shows by Cartoon Network, but still not on par with previous incarnations of the franchise and not living up to its full potential. With that said, some fans argue that it seems to be getting better as of the season 1 finale.
Tainted by the Preview: 20 out of the 40 episodes of Season 1 premiered in the UK in late 2016 before the show premiered in the US. Most of these episodes are considered weaker than a good many of the other 20 episodes, so this did not help the US fandom's reaction to the show, which was already negative due to the new designs and changes in tone and episode length.
Take That, Scrappy!: In "Alien X-tinction", Omniverse-Era Ben is last seen being kicked in the rear back to his timeline by Gwen 10, which can be satisfying for those who hated this iteration of Ben.
The fact that a majority of the voice actors from the previous series were replaced has been disliked, such as Paul Eiding with David Kaye.
The show ditching its former Animesque art style in favor of a more Westernized cartoony one.
The redesigns of the classic aliens, some being minor such as Wildvine having only two humanoid legs as opposed to multiple rootlike ones, or Upgrade being colored purple instead of green. Most radically changed, however, is Stinkfly, who has a humanoid body plan and two compound eyes as opposed to four tentacle-like ones, and ended up being heavily criticized for being scarcely recognizable as Stinkfly at all.
The changes to many of the characters as well, particularly Gwen and Grandpa Max.
While they acknowledged it made sense for the show (given how Petropia apparently wasn't destroyed by Vilgax in this continuity), many fans were displeased with the portrayal of Tetrax. He was one of the most interesting and compelling supporting characters in the original continuity. He was changed from The Atoner to a remorseless unscrupulous bounty hunter, who intentionally almost kills Gwen. With that said, "Mutiny for the Bounty" in Season 3 has begun developing him to growing closer to his original self.
Similarly, some reacted this way to Charmcaster's new origin. It was at least later established that Hex is still her uncle in this continuity.
Ben 10,000 ditching his beard for a really unappealing clean-shaven look.
Some fans have now protested the ending of the Season 3 finale, where Kevin gets lost in a time vortex after sacrificing himself to trap the Forever Knight...only for Kevin to almost immediately be written back into the show in the following season and show very little signs of a different behavior. One might have to wonder what the entire point was if the plotline ended as soon as it started.
"Alien X-Tinction" is a Crisis Crossover with the Classic Continuity featuring a Ben from each of the previous series (and Gwen 10) fighting a rogue Alien X. However, the entire special is basically just one big fight against the titular villain, Original Series Ben and Omniverse Ben have few lines and practically no relevance, and no one even suggests turning into Alien X themselves. Instead, they all fight Alien X with regular aliens (every Ben except for the Reboot Ben and Alien Force Ben only use one alien each, and Ultimate Alien Ben never uses any Ultimate Aliens) and manage to win. Word of God explains this one to be a case of Real Life Writes the Plot as time constraints and budget only allowed the alternate Bens to use a minimal amount of aliens, so they stuck with a few of the iconic ones.
Tough Act to Follow: Season 4 on the whole is less well-received than Season 3, as while Season 3 was the most Story Arc-driven season to date, Season 4 regresses back to Season 1's format of being composed entirely of stand-alone episodes until the finale. To be fair, the executives partially influenced this path, as they pushed the crew for more random, non-serialized episodes for easier syndication. With all that said, however, it is still considered better than Season 1.
Billy Billions, a character who didn't show up in the original series (being from the previous series, Omniverse), is a villain in this series.
Another example is Michael Morningstar, a villain from Alien Force and onward, showing up.
Minor example with Frightwig who was only ever prominent in the original series as one of Zombozo's henchmen. Here she debuts as a solo villain, and even when she joins Zombozo, there is great emphasis on her and the changes made to her in this series.
Arguably the biggest jaw-drop is Overflow, a Water Hazard-esque alien who also replaces Ripjaws as one of the founding 10 in this continuity.
The alien Doctor Animo turns into in "Animorphosis" to go up against Vilgax? None other than Rath, who Ben himself gains access to in Season 3.
Ben gains access to Humungousaur in season 3 and Jetray in season 4, both having been fairly unpopular aliens in the previous continuity (to the point Jetray didn't ever make an appearance in Omniverse). In The Movie, he also gains access to Goop, although he isn't a permanent addition and won't reappear afterwards.
The Movie that serves as Season 4's finale introduces the Incurseans, who are the equivalent to the Plumbers in this series, the polar opposite of what they were like before.
All three of the season 5 specials make use of this: "Ben 10010" reintroduces the future versions of Ben and Gwen, "Alien X-tinction" brings back everypreviousversionof Ben, Gwen 10, and Alien X, and "Ben Gen 10" brings back Generator Rex — eight years after his series wrapped up and ten years after the last time he crossed over.
The prisoners of the Null Void that appear in the finale movie are none other than Ripjaws, Ghostfreak and Wildmutt: the three main aliens that were dropped from the roster in the reboot to the disappointment of many fans. Along with them are also Eye Guy and Blitzwolfer, two aliens that were scarcely used in the original series.
Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: Ben of all people warrants as this. A further look at his life ever since he got the Omnitrix and even before shows that his family has general expectations of him messing up... even in episodes where he does show wisdom or doesn't even do anything wrong at all. Add on to the growing stress and pressure he gets as the show goes on, mostly over whether or not he should have the Omnitrix and if he's fit to be a hero at all, it's little surprise that once Forever Knight gives him the right incentive for it, he ends up joining his team of Squires purely out of spite against his family showing their lack of faith in him. And that's only the tip of the iceberg: his evil alternate adult self as Alien X goes on a multiversal rampage after losing Gwen and Max, causing him to become jaded and heinous against any version of himself who still has - or had - a family. For someone who's normally seen as immature, reckless but virtually harmless thanks to his good intentions, it's quite jarring to see Ben undergo this kind of treatment.
◊ outright confirms it. Changing her backstory to begin with was probably meant to be an Author's Saving Throw to previous continuities' retconning the existence of magic.
