Charmcaster (Classic)

Charmcaster is one of the Ben 10 villains and the niece and apprentice of Gwen's nemesis Hex. Like her paternal uncle, she relies on magic to fight. Though like most villains she despises Ben, but her hate is mostly turned toward Gwen for their shared affinity in magic, mirroring Ben's and Kevin's rivalry in the original series and Kevin's and Michael Morningstar's rivalry in Alien Force. Charmcaster played a key role in the series, as it was by stealing her spell book Gwen learned using her own dormant magical powers and abilities.

Dwayne McDuffie has revealed that Charmcaster and Hex are actually humans from an interdimensional world (specifically Yahwahtacsip referred to as Ledgerdomain as revealed in Where the Magic Happens), thus explaining their immense magical powers and abilities. Her father was Spellbinder, an incredibly strong and powerful magician who was ruthlessly murdered while opposing the tyrant Adwaita.

Ben 10
In her debut appearance, Tough Luck, she busts her uncle out of prison and assists him in trying to steal the Keystone of Bezel which will re-create the other five charms and greatly strengthen and increase their powers and abilities one thousand times. She manages to trick Gwen by putting on an act about her uncle forcing her to help him, only to swipe the Keystone while hugging Gwen. She then gives Hex the Keystone. In the end it is revealed that Hex needs the Keystone to recreate the five Charms of Bezel, and that she is controlling and manipulating her uncle into doing it so that she can take their power for herself. In the end, all of her magical and mystical powers and abilities, like Hex's, seemed to have been absorbed by the Keystone.

Charmcaster returns in A Change of Face, her magical powers and abilities having returned much, much stronger and much more powerful than ever since her recent encounter with the Tennysons. She attempts a body swap spell with Ben, hoping to take advantage of the Omnitrix to greatly strengthen and amplify her magical powers and abilities to even higher power levels. Her efforts fail; however, as her three attempts end in swapping with Gwen, being returned to her normal body while Ben and Gwen are swapped, and returning Ben and Gwen to their normal bodies respectively. She is arrested at the end of the episode, and her bag is tossed into the sea. She is last seen in a juvenile detention ward, where she is about to be beaten up by Pinky and Missy whom Gwen spurned while she was in Charmcaster's body. Gwen procures her spell book during this period, and keeps the item as a souvenir, eventually learning to use it in hopes of awakening her own dormant magical powers and abilities to their full potential.

Charmcaster makes a small cameo at the end of Don't Drink the Water, where she is seen taunting her uncle(who has been reduced to an infant by the Fountain of Youth) and saying that she's giving the orders now.

Her final apperance in the original series is in Ben 10 vs. the Negative 10 as part of the Negative 10. Unlike her partners; however, Charmcaster is mainly focused on defeating Gwen(as opposed to Ben). She also is shown to have a slight rivalry with fellow female teammate Rojo.

Ben 10: Alien Force
In Ben 10: Alien Force, Charmcaster looks thinner, taller, with pointier ears and has orchid eyes and black lips as opposed to pinkish purple eyes and purple lips. Her clothing resembles the Enchantress, a super villain from Marvel Comics from The Mighty Thor but McDuffie states her redesign was influence based on Clea from Doctor Strange. Charmcaster sends one of her rock monsters to attack Ben, Kevin and Gwen while the trio were relaxing at the beach, the rock creature appeared to be immune to Gwen's energy attacks and proceeded to oust Kevin. Just as Ben was about to take down the rock monster, a magical portal opens up and sucks it away. It was later shown that Charmcaster was hiding in a nearby cave watching the events unfold. After voicing her deep hatred for Gwen and her plan to take something precious from her (which was Kevin, since Gwen stole her spell book) transforming into a beautiful blonde haired girl named Caroline and attempted to seduce Kevin.

Charmcaster set her plan into motion after saving a child from being knocked down by a truck, she and Kevin journey to the beach where she revealed a partially false life story while removing his ID mask which concealed his mutant form and clearly growing jealous when Kevin says "You think you can do magic? She's made of magic". She then kisses him, putting him under a spell and ordered him to bring Gwen to the Planetarium before midnight where she can drain Gwen's magical and Anodites powers. After a skirmish with Ben and Gwen, Kevin was broken free from Charmcaster's spell. After the trio arrives at the Planetarium at Gwen's request, Charmcaster sends her rock monsters to deal with Ben and Kevin while she dealt with Gwen herself. Upon meeting, Charmcaster gloats sarcastically at Gwen's hairdo then engaging her in a short magical duel, in which Gwen was led to stand upon some runes while directly under the sky-panel which then opens up, exposing Gwen to the full blaze of the moon light. Charmcaster then drains Gwen of all her magic. Confident that she had won, Charmcaster retreats with her two rock minions.

After a short argument with Gwen, Kevin tricks Charmcaster into meeting him on top of a tall building where he lured her with a lie about his loyalty to Ben and that Gwen still had power left, angering Charmcaster even further. The duo later shows up at a fast food joint where Ben and Gwen are having smoothies. After scanning Gwen and realizing that she had no power left and that Kevin tricked her, she uses her magic to bring a Mr Smoothie sign to life as well as controlling a parked van to kill Kevin and Ben, while her rock monsters attempted to annihilate Gwen who mocks Charmcaster saying "You're the one who's useless Charmcaster, can't take on one powerless girl" and proceeds to challenge her to a one-on-one fist fight which Charmcaster nonchalantly turned down, opting to kill Gwen with a bolt of mana. However, Gwen turns the tables on Charmcaster by reciting one of her spells and reabsorbs her magical and Anodite powers which Charmcaster stole earlier, much to Charmcaster's horror. Gwen overpowers Charmcaster's mystical bolt of magenta-colored mana, and it hits her hand. In a burst of pain, Charmcaster backs down her hand and is hit on the chest. Gwen begins draining Charmcaster's magical powers while Charmcaster tries to deny losing them. While Gwen is weakening Charmcaster, Gwen remarks that Charmcaster relies on magic itself, while magic is only one aspect of Gwen. Powerless, Charmcaster gets help from her rock monsters to make one last stand against Gwen. Charmcaster was finally defeated after Gwen summoned a mystical vortex which sucked her and her rock monsters away. It is not known where Gwen sent her after this.

She reappeared in Time Heals alongside her uncle, Hex. When Gwen travels back in time in order to stop Kevin's mutation, the duo appeared and because Kevin was weak the trio was unable to win. Charmcaster forced Kevin to absorb one of her rock monsters and then she used a spell on him to put him in a trance. She also killed Gwen during the battle and weakened Ben for Hex. When Gwen freed Ben from the pits of Hex castle, Ben fights off Charmcaster, Hex, and Kevin with the rock monsters so Gwen can repair the damage she had done in the past.

Ben 10: Ultimate Alien
Charmcaster returns in the episode Hit 'Em Where They Live, where she assists Zombozo and Vulkanus in a plot to kidnap Ben's parents. She was defeated by Kevin, who scares her away by almost causing a roller coaster to crash on her (If the episode is played scene by scene, it is shown that Charmcaster got out of the way); Kevin making sure she was not killed as he had promised Ben and Gwen not to finish off his opponent.

In Where the Magic Happens, Charmcaster is brought back to her home world, Yahwahtacsip (Ledgerdomain as the natives refer to) to bring help to Gwen and the team. In this episode much is revealed on Charmcaster's past and her feelings toward Gwen. It was shown that Charmcaster had always dreamed of becoming a great sorceress, saying that she had studied magic her whole life but found it extremely unbelievable that Gwen could just come out of nowhere, steal her spell book and become so strong and powerful and suddenly 'out-magic' her. It is also revealed that when she was a child, her father Spellbinder and her people were at war with an enemy, Adwaita, the greatest magical, mystic being ever lived. Her father helped her and Hex escape safely to earth, but failed in battle and was murdered by Adwaita as a result. Charmcaster's villainous actions were all to gain more and more power so that she could somehow return to her home dimension and free her people. In this episode Charmcaster moves past her feelings of resentment toward Gwen and actually develops a great bond with her, chiefly due to learning that the two of them are actually stronger and more powerful as a team than individually; her knowledge of magic coupled with Gwen's magical powers. She even ends up putting her life on the line, buying time for the trio to escape, leaving herself behind in her home world with the hopes of freeing it at last.

Powers and Abilities
In the original series, like Hex, Charmcaster uses magic, but instead of using a staff, she has a magic bag from which she can draw all manner of magical mystical items, such as magical explosives in shades of glowing purple, throwing purple glowing blades, or even a variety of clay animals which she can magically enlarge and animate to do her bidding. Although small, the bag seems to have something of a pocket dimension inside(basically a magic satchel), allowing Charmcaster to store a wide variety things within it that logically should not fit(at one point, she produces Hex's magical mystical staff, an item that is at least four feet tall). The bag also appears to have some degree of sentience, as it found its way back to Charmcaster under its own power. She is also highly skilled in various magical mystical spells, although it is clear that because of her inexperience, she is not as strong and powerful as her uncle. She also possesses a miniature dark purple and gold-stripped spell book (which ten-year-old Gwen takes as keepsake in the original series episode, A Change of Face) hidden in her long-sleeved purple-colored coat instead of her bag.

In "Ben 10: Alien Force", Charmcaster does not use her bag anymore, relying instead mainly on magenta-and-pink mana-controlling-manipulating powers and abilities similar to Gwen's. However, she is still seen using various exceedingly strong and powerful spells, including water-manipulation-and control, shapeshifting, bringing

inanimate objects to life, teleportation and opening pink-purple portals and vortexes to other worlds and interdimensional realms. She also uses some kind of upgraded version of her clay animals, who now look like golems and are far more powerful than before. Her powers and abilities are very similar to Verdona's: transform mana into elements, alter her appearance and transfer her energy to inanimate things. Unlike Gwen's, Charmcaster's magic has a lightning-like effect and a whiter coloration, while Gwen's is more solid and darker, also instead of creating balls of pure mana for projectiles attack, Charmcaster creates lightning bolts. An interesting fact is that when creating magical attacks the large sphere that forms on her hand is atom shaped(two thin rings can be seen), Also she never used a shield unlike Gwen, mainly because when she attacks her spell will collide with the enemy's attack. Also despite losing her bag she seems to still being able to summon objects from another dimension as seen in Hit 'Em Where They Live where she puts her hands together and when separing them, a flash of whitish pink energy teleports the staff to her. In Where The Magic Happens, Charmcaster's magic bag has returned without explanation.

Ben 10

 * Tough Luck(first appearance)
 * A Change of Face
 * Don't Drink the Water (cameo)
 * Ben 10 vs. the Negative 10 (Part 1) / Ben 10 vs. the Negative 10 (Part 2)

Ben 10: Alien Force

 * In Charm's Way
 * Time Heals

Ben 10: Ultimate Alien

 * Hit 'Em Where They Live
 * Where The Magic Happens

Naming and Translations

 * Greek: Μάγισσα-Magissa / Sorceress
 * Portuguese: Encantriz
 * Spanish (Spain): Hechizera /Hechicers
 * Spanish (Mexico): Charmcaster/Charmcaster
 * French: Enchanteresse / Enchantress
 * Polish: Czarodziejka / Sorceress

Kevin Levin
It is possible that Charmcaster may have been in love with Kevin at one stage. In the episode "Hit 'Em Where They Live", Kevin stated "Used to love carnival rides. Now they just make me sick." Charmcaster then replied "You have precisely the same effect on me", but now he just makes her sick. She also kissed Kevin in the Alien Force episode "In Charm's Way". But it is believed she kissed Kevin just to take advantage of him so he could bring Gwen to her.

Trivia

 * It is confirmed by Dwayne McDuffie that Charmcaster was raised by Hex.
 * After Kevin's departure in Alien Force she's the youngest villain in the series.
 * Charmcaster looks thinner, taller and more serious in personality in Alien Force and Ultimate Alien.
 * She is the only female villain to appear in every series.
 * She is the only villain that fought in Mr. Smoothy without destroying it.
 * Charmcaster is shown in possession of Hex's staff. As stated in the original series, only a master magician can use it. Since Charmcaster was able to do so, it implies that she has become a master magician since her appearance in Ben 10: Alien Force.
 * Charmcaster appears as a boss in Vilgax Attacks in the level Terradino. (Humongousaur's homeplanet).Curiously she breaks many of her habits such switch her magic bolts for magic balls, use her old rock monsters, create powerful force fields, know about the Plumbers and use melee attacks.
 * Charmcaster's appearance in Alien Force resembles the Enchantress, a supervillain from Marvel Comics from The Mighty Thor (but McDuffie states her redesign was influenced based on Clea from Doctor Strange.)
 * According to Dwayne McDuffie, Charmcaster is one of his favorite villains, along with Aggregor, Darkstar, and (despite only appearing in one episode) Ragnarok.
 * Charmcaster's original design, as seen on the "Ben 10 Complete Third Season" DVD, looked just like the one that was actually used except her coat was red instead of purple, her hair black instead of white, and with paintings on her face that makes her more closely resemble her uncle Hex.
 * In the episode In Charms Way, Charmcaster pretends to be a girl named Caroline, so in the episode Where the Magic Happens, Kevin thinks that that is her true name, only for her to tell him that it's not, saying that she would not tell them her name. Humorously she may be trying to avoid being controlled by Kevin.
 * Charmcaster has many similarities with Kevin. Both were the arch-enemies of Gwen and Ben respectively, both have lost their fathers to powerful villains, and both reformed and became allies/friends to the formers.
 * She's the only non-plumber relative that have fought Agreggor.
 * Dwayne McDuffie has stated that ruling the world was always Hex's goal, not Charmcaster's. Her main objective was still to get Hex to use his newly strengthened and enhanced magical powers upon conquering Earth to re-open a portal to Ledgerdomain and free it. Although she seems to not rely on her uncle much as she tried to get the Omnitrix, join forces with the Forever Knights, steal Gwen's magic and join forces with Vulkanus.
 * According to Dwayne McDuffie, Charmcaster's true name will eventually be revealed as well as her relationship with her paternal uncle Hex.
 * Charmcaster is the only member of the Negative 10 to become a hero eventually.
 * Charmcaster's relationship with Gwen mirrors Kevin's with Ben.
 * Dwayne has confirmed that Ben, Kevin and Gwen would return to help Charmcaster save Ledgerdomain.
 * She is like Gwen's Psyphon.