Dr. Animo and the Mutant Ray

Dr. Animo and the Mutant Ray is the twenty-fifth (25) episode of Ben 10.

Plot
Grandpa Max and Gwen look out from the RV. They seem to be at a local swamp. Grandpa Max tells Gwen that Gator-fest is starting tomorrow, and it'll be crowded with people. Gwen is disgusted by the environment and its natural appearances. She walks around the RV to find Ben playing around with the Omnitrix with a screwdriver. Ben says that he needs to figure out how to unlock more secrets of the alien device, although Gwen is right about how dangerous it might be. Grandpa Max agrees with Gwen. Grandpa Max tells him to promise not to tweak around with it again. As usual, he won’t listen, and he finally gets what he wants. The face of the Omnitrix pops off, although its face starts to rotate in different directions and electrical sparks fly out. A blinding green light comes out of the device, indicating that a problem is made.

As Ben sits on the floor after the flash, he regrets what might happen next. He looks at the top of the Omnitrix, and the shape is appeared to have become twisted. Grandpa Max and Gwen head out the RV and see what just happened. Ben hides it by saying that the sound came from lightning. His alibi was weak, as Gwen clarifies that there's not a cloud in the sky, though he continues to hide it. Grandpa Max told them to forget about it and head to bed. However, the ground where the protective cap of the Omnitrix landed on started to react strangely, and tentacles spawn out of the swampy soil.

The next day, Ben heads out of the RV. He looks back inside through the window and around the RV. He stretches the gum he was chewing and rings it around the Omnitrix cap, then replaces it to where it belongs, hoping that the device would be fixed up. Gwen suspects Ben’s actions, although Ben was just in time to think of an insult that would counter back. Before they were ready to argue more, they see the festivities of Gatorfest set up. They enter the festival, while a pair of huge eyes look out from the swamp water.

It had a lot to offer: from toys to games, food and refreshments, novelties and collectables. Most of the material things are alligator themed. A man picks out strange worms from his bucket and shows it to a fellow friend. The worms had the appearance of Stinkfly, although they had no wings, and they were worms.

People are gathered to see the hatching of new alligators. The Tennysons decide to join in. The hatchlings come out of their shells and head into the water, and everyone cheers. Gwen seemed to have enjoyed the view. Suddenly, the three babies head out of the water and hide in nearby grass, which puzzles Ben. Gwen notices what they were running from. It was the giant toad of Dr. Animo. The frog attacks the crowd with its tongue, and they avoid it. However, it caused Ben’s Omnitrix to drop the face he tried to re-attach. He didn’t seem to notice that it dropped. Right there, Dr. Animo was in front of him, this time, wearing strange giant arms and red-goggles. He tells Ben how disgusted he feels how he helps people out. He orders his frog to attack Ben. Ben was able to avoid his attack, and he prepares his Omnitrix. Just as he pushes the face back down, he becomes Stinkarms, a hybrid alien consisting of Fourarms and Stinkfly. The malfunction must have been due to his recent tweaking with the device.

Stinkarms wasn't able to carry the weight of the giant frog. He couldn't fly either due to his massive size. The only choice was to avoid the frog. Alligators notice Stinkarms and try to snap at him, thinking that he's something to be eaten. Stinkarms grabs a nearby novelty alligator and hit the frog towards Animo, and Animo notices an interesting item in the ground. He finds that the Omnitrix’s face is able to mutate DNA, and the small crab shows him that when it transformed with some of Stinkfly’s physical appearances. Instead of continuing the fight, he leaves with the face, and Ben notices that its gone. Already the problem has gotten worse.

At an abandoned observatory, he inserts the face of the Omnitrix into a giant device. It appeared to be something he was working with for quite some time. He tests it on a bat, and in a giant flash, he knows that his ray is functioning the way he designed it to.

The Tennysons ride down the swamp river, and Ben regrets to what he did to the Omnitrix. He admits that he shouldn’t have done it, and he wants Gwen to gloat that she was right all along. She says that she has no clue about what he's clamoring about. A loud roar distracts them from behind. It appeared to be the bat Animo experimented with, and this time, it had the appearance of Heatblast. Ben readies to transform into an alien, although Grandpa Max seems that it isn’t such a good idea at the moment. With no choice, Ben transforms into Diamond Matter, a hybrid of Diamondhead and Grey Matter. The Heatbat grabs a hold of Diamond Matter and drops him into the water. An alligator grabs him, although he was able to get out, thanks to DiamondHead’s power to sharpen any part of his body. The bat heads back to their boat, though Grandpa Max was able to splash water into it. It flies away, and Ben infers that it may head back to Dr. Animo.

They find themselves at the old observatory, and inside, they find the giant ray that Animo had built. Out of no where, the giant frog jumps onto their boat, smashing it into pieces. The Tennysons were OK, although finding Animo on top of the ray just made their situation worse. He tells them that he'll put the Omnitrix’s face into good use. He explains that he plans to create a new world filled with life mutated from the DNA of the Omnitrix, by pointing the ray’s signal into a nearby satellite, thus delivering it all over the world. To experiment his hypothesis, he points the Transmodulator towards the Tennysons. He inserts his giant hands into the device, and activates it. The flash of light heads towards Ben, but Grandpa Max pushes him out, though he ends up to be the one to be mutated into a greenish larvae with Stinkfly’s eye stalks. It drools green slime and this tells Max’s grandkids that they must be alert.

Ben continues to regret what he’s done, and he blames himself for starting it in the first place. Animo on the other hand, seems to be satisfied of the result, though he follows the standards of scientific experimentation. He points at Ben again, and Ben was able to dodge the blast, though the giant frog and the Heatbat surrounds him. Again, Ben activates the Omnitrix, though he ends up as Heatjaws, a hybrid of Heatblast and Ripjaws. The combination was the worst to end up, as water extinguishes fire. He attempts to shoot fire at Animo, although it burns out. Animo shoots the ray gun at Heatjaws, though his altered state doesn’t affect him. Instead of modifying his DNA, Animo decides to end his life instead. He orders his pets to rid of him. Heatjaws was able to bring the bat down into the water and the frog to let go of him, though his energy his severely drained due to his state.

Gwen runs up the stairs and Animo aims the ray at her. She was fast enough to get away from his attack, though the bat was able to survive, even when it was in the water for a time. It attacks her, though she finds a way to get into the ray machine. Luckily enough, the doorway was too small for the Pyro-bat to enter. Heatjaws continues to suffer, as the giant toad comes out of the water to fight. The toad was able to dodge Heatjaws’s fire blast, but he was taken down the second attempt. Heatjaws seem to have recovered much of his strength when he was immersed into water, and he took down both Animo’s animal minions down without much difficulty.

Gwen tries to find the Omnitrix part, just as Animo was ready to activate the ray. Heatjaws delays the activation for a moment, then Animo attempts to do it again. This time, the ray doesn't turn on, and Gwen comes out to show him that she took back the part she was looking for. Animo heads up to try and get it back, but Heatjaws was able to take him down.

Heatjaws heads to Grandpa Max, and he's extremely disappointed how everything has turned out. Gwen finds that Ben has become smart for claiming his mistake since the beginning. She heads back into the ray and tells Heatjaws to fire it up. Eventually, it reversed the effect, and Max was back to normal. Gwen explained that she put the Omnitrix face in backwards, hoping that it would reverse the mutation. Just as the Omnitrix was ready to deactivate, Heatjaws tells Gwen to hand him the face. He places it on the emblem on his chest, and it bonded the Omnitrix back together. Gwen and Ben head down the ray and Gwen gives her favorite saying. “I TOLD YOU SO!” she exclaimed, and Ben admitted that she was right all along.

In the RV, Gwen watches Dr. Animo being taken into custody yet again by the officers. Gwen thinks that Ben has learned his lesson, though he’s in the back attempting to pop out the face again. He laughs and jokes around, as they leave the swamp.

Characters

 * Ben
 * Gwen
 * Grandpa Max

Villains

 * Dr. Animo
 * Heatbat
 * Dr. Animo's frog mutant

Fusion Aliens used

 * Stink Arms (body of Fourarms, features of Stinkfly)
 * Diamond Matter (body of Greymatter, features of Diamondhead)
 * Heat Jaws (body of Ripjaws, features of Heatblast)

Trivia

 * At the end of the episode, Ben said he wanted to change into XLRfreak (half XLR8 and half Ghostfreak) meaning that Ghostfreak is still on the Omnitrix, but Ghostfreak was already destroyed in Ghostfreaked Out.
 * Animo's frog reappears in this episode, but isn't seen again after it.
 * From this point on, Animo tried to get the Omnitrix to extract the DNA inside to create a mutant army of animals in the original series (in the sequel series Alien Force and Ultimate Alien he just tries to defeat Ben).
 * This is the only episode in which Ben uses fusion aliens.
 * Dr Animo's nickname is Dr Freakimo, made by Ben.
 * Ben's transformation into Diamond Matter (Diamondhead / Grey Matter hybrid) was the 100th transformation in the series.
 * At the Gator festival, one of the boys' watch strongly resembles Alan Albright.