Board Thread:Questions and Answers/@comment-27810039-20160217103443/@comment-27810039-20160221125727

Stryzzar wrote: It's not a retcon, it's an alternate explanation for something already there. Basically a clarification of something not clearly explained before. They never said Gwen wasn't alien before, and they never fully established what magic was. In AF, they basically explained that magic in Ben 10 is defined as the ability to manipulate mana. Before it was just read some spells, weird stuff happens, no one knows how or why.

EDIT: Now I know, AF has inconsistencies and was not done perfectly. But they did not intend this as a retcon. A retcon is saying Kevin is a mutant, then saying he's an alien, only to say he's a mutant again. Directly contrasting an established fact is a retcon. Why did the magic actually need to be intricately explained then shoddily de-emphasized with a subsequent contradiction that did nothing but convolute that facet of Gwen's character? There's no logical justification behind your contention that it wasn't a retcon, when all evidence points to the contrary(as in, Kevin repeatedly debunking Gwen's assertion that her powers are 'magic' and not 'alien' related, and Gwen later conceding that the origin of her powers are of alien provenance and aren't actually magical--that episode is a direct refutation of the magical talents that Gwen had exhibited in the original series, not an explanation because at this point there's no utilization of magic and she no longer actualizes her abilities in the same way--there's no correlation between the change, only an explanation for this perceptibly and methodically new power she's diplaying, and not the old one).

It could have been that Gwen was the direct descendant of a magically predisposed ancestor and her original power manifestation was an implication of that potential being realised. They could have left it at that and progressed to her casting spells of different denominations/classes of magic--that way there'd be coherency without controversial talk of a retcon, because the contradictory statements and happenings fly in its face. Isn't magic fundamentally and conventionally portrayed as the casting of spells for a myriad of different effects? Why overcomplicate things for the sake of an explanation?

As you know, she could conjure extremely localized tornadoes and create jet-streams for propulsion and flight on the occasion that the required materials are at her disposal--yet she's bereft of these talents and spells in inauspicious situations during AF, despite the magic still being there as explained by her being an anodite? That makes no sense whatsoever. If anything she should have experienced greater power ascendancy and a fluid expansion of what she could do.

If she's better at doing the walk as you say, then there'd be lots more versatiltiy in terms of how she would manoeuvre herself.