User blog comment:Theworldismine/How awesome is omniverse now?/@comment-71.55.210.41-20130525154359

I'm sorry, I'm baffled. Just what in the world was good about Alien Force and Ultimate Alien that makes them so much better than Omniverse?

I have my problems with all three of the series that have come out since the original show ended. But while I've been able to blow through the entire Omniverse series so far and enjoy it, when I attempted to watching Alien Force, my willpower died by episode six.

Things That Were Wrong With Alien Force:

1) The characterizations. Ben hadn't "matured", he was like a completely different person! He'd lost much of his confidence, and was suddenly supposed to be "sensitive" and "well-mannered". Gwen had lost much of her snarkiness, and I thought the show suffered for the sudden lack of arguing between them; I enjoyed their fights before, and sure, they should get along better now, but they like never snarked at each other at all. Kevin had done a total heel-face-turn compared to his original characterization; don't get me wrong, I love the idea of Kevin turning into a good guy, I felt so bad for him in the original series. But there was no frikken development, he just met a random plumber dude, then plumber dude died, and suddenly he wants to help out the good guys! This being the kid who was totally willing to murder a train full of people so he could make a payday in the original show! The five-year-time-skip could explain many differences in their behavior, but with no context as to why they're so different, it's too jarring, and it's like watching a totally different show.

2) EVERYTHING IS ALIENS! I didn't like the retcons that made Gwen and Kevin part-aliens. First off, in a show with so much about aliens with super-powers, and wherein Ben could turn into aliens at will, it was nice having Gwen as a totally human heroine who could still kick butt in spite of it all. But now she's this awesomely powerful Anodite thing, and I feel like that takes away from what made her so cool in the original. Similarly, Kevin's new backstory is lackluster compared to what could've been done with his original one. Okay, so your dad was a Plumber, and what you want more than anything else in the entire world is to be a Plumber like him? Woooooow, kid, you're off to a GREAT start with that, what with the whole murderous, sociopathic rampages you went on as an eleven-year-old, and the fact that you're an illegal arms broker today! I'm sure your dad would be SO PROUD! His original story, which had him as a mutant human, made his behavior more understandable. He was living in an abandoned subway station because his parents either kicked him out, or made things unbearable enough for him to run away, because he was a "freak". People mocked him and he was getting bullied all the time. My favourite quote from him remains "Nobody's innocent! They just haven't had a chance to make fun of me yet!", because it shows just how bitter this kid was about everything he'd been through. If they'd kept that basis, they could've used some REAL development, to slowly show his progression from sociopathic child monster, into what he ultimately became. But there was no real development. Just a retconned backstory to explain his SUDDEN BURNING DESIRE TO BE A GOOD GUY. It was a cheap, easy way to get an end-result that could've been awesome, but suffers for the lack of proper execution.

3) The forced relationship between Kevin and Gwen. Hey, I'll ship anything, so it's not like I have a problem with the premise, but watching the way it happened in the show was like watching someone mash two Barbie toys together while making kissy noises.

4) And then a whole bunch of smaller details, like Max being shoved in a proverbial closet for much of the series, Kevin's car's colour scheme (seriously, he HATED Ben for the longest time, why is it that when they first met him his car perfectly matches Ben's jacket?), the fact that it took them frikken FOREVER to bring back any of Ben's old aliens, the fact that the Plumbers are suddenly an intergalactic police force with no explanation of how they got to be like that when the original Plumbers were all humans protecting Earth from hostile aliens (and some were even prejudiced against aliens as a whole, as demonstrated during the episode Big Fat Alien Wedding), etc, etc

Oh, and on the subject of Ultimate Alien? The Ultimatrix made me want to cringe. Seriously, we're watching a show about aliens, not Digimon.

Overall, Alien Force and Ultimate Alien? They weren't really watchable for me. I can't go through the entire series from beginning to end, the way I did for the original show, or the way I did for Omniverse; it's too painful and annoying. So I just read summaries of all the episodes, and if something seems interesting/funny, I go and youtube that one. But that's all.

Things I did like about Alien Force/Ultimate Alien, though:

- Rath.

- Albedo, even if how he came to be kinda didn't really make a whole lot of sense to me.

- Rath.

- Charmcaster's origin story and all.

- Did I mention Rath? Seriously, that guy is awesome.

Now, to be fair, I don't think Omniverse is like the holy grail of Ben 10 either. It's still not as good as the original series, even if I think it's better than AF/UA.

Problems With Omniverse

1) The new animation style. I hated Kevin's new look when I first saw it, and Grandpa Max's permanent squinty eyes still bother me. But I got used to it. I don't think it's really all that bad, by which I mean, it's tolerable, and I've seen worse out there. I do, however, enjoy some of Ben's expressions in this new style.

2) Some of the new aliens are dumb. I like Ball Weevil, and Crashopper is entertaining, but Bloxx is basically an alien made of Legos, and while I can understand how Kickin' Hawk is effective in practice, the dude is basically a giant alien chicken man. I can't believe Ben hasn't shown the slightest bit of embarrassment over using him. That said, I've been playing Pokemon games long enough to become kinda indifferent to this effect; any time you have a sort of "Gotta Catch Em All" situation (like here where Ben is essentially 'collecting' new alien forms), sooner or later they're gonna start using ideas that are, well... not so great.

3) Some of the alien re-designs. I liked the original version of Big Chill, and Echo Echo too. Both looked cuter before than they do now.

But those... are pretty much all the problems I have with it. To talk about some of the problems I've seen other people mention...

- Ben acting more childish? Honestly, to me he just seems more like BEN. As in, the original Ben we knew back with the original series. He's certainly matured more, which you can see when you hold him side-by-side with his past self from the flashbacks, or more easily, side-by-side with Ben 23 from the episode Store 23. But he's still Ben, which means he's still childish, impulsive, probably ADHD, and just, in my opinion, hilarious.

- The sudden lack of Julie, followed by her suddenly not being dating Ben anymore? Uh... She wasn't exactly in every episode of Alien Force or Ultimate Alien, either. I am slightly bothered it took them so long to get around to her, but I was never a huge fan of hers anyway, so I'm kinda... indifferent to this. As for how they broke up, honestly, it seems a little far-fetched to me, and some of Ben's dialogue seemed a little forced while playing that video game, but only some; I have played plenty of video games that frustrated the hell out of me, it was just that specific phrase choices didn't seem to fit. ("You're strangling me!" is the main one.)

And then there are the things I love about Omniverse, which include:

- Rook.

- Ben and Gwen snarking again. (I will state however, that some of their interactions as eleven-year-olds in the flashbacks seemed OOC to me. My main example would be in the episode Trouble Helix; Gwen was just too childish, she was always the mature one, or well, as mature as an eleven-year-old could get, heh.)

- Blukic and Driba.

- Ben just generally acting more like the Ben I remembered in the original series.

- Rook.

- A lot of the snark in general in the show; I have yet to watch a single episode without laughing and backtracking to watch a particular scene again. It feels more like the original show, without the feeling that they're trying (and not really succeeding) at making everything SERIOUS NOW OMG.

- Roooooooooooooooook omg.

So it's just. I really don't see what's so terrible about Omniverse. Everything I've seen complained about, seems to me like people overreacting about things that aren't that bad, and some of which are even to be expected (like some of the new aliens sucking, I mean really, how much longer did you think they could keep coming up with good ones? Again, look at Pokemon for historical data on the subject.)

In conclusion, I think Omniverse is frikken awesome, and way more watchable than the travesties of Alien Force and Ultimate Alien.