Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-5501448-20160509010655/@comment-26816267-20160514135918

Great Ochoa wrote: Well the Ben 10,000 universe wasn't really an alternate universe in the Original Series. It was Ben's actual future that unfortunately ended up getting retconned and changed around throughout the sequel shows. I don't really consider the Ben 10,000 universe as an alternate universe but instead as Ben's intended future. There's a saying that "time is set in stone" or something of the likes and I watched this YouTube video from the channel Vsauce 3 about time paradoxes that further backs this up. Time is a closed cycle and no matter how much you try to change the future, it will happen no matter what. The first couple Terminator movies pretty much got this right. In fact, much like the first Terminator movie, the events of the episode Ben 10,000 may have very much actually set the stage for Ben's future as Ben 10,000 to happen. So yeah again, I don't really consider the Ben 10,000 universe to be an alternate universe but instead to be Ben's intended future.

The good vs evil Ben episode would have been a nice episode to watch but what really killed it for me was Vilgax's plan to use a time bomb. Now regardless of whether the time bomb destroys other timelines or erases the different versions of Ben, it still greatly affected the main timeline to the point where Paradox and No Watch Ben still had to go back in time and reset everything to ensure that the events of the main timeline still happen. Now taking a look at the various time paradoxes that the Vsauce 3 video discussed, here's two major questions to ask about. One, why does Ben Prime's Omnitrix still exist if Ben Prime was erased from existence and all the events of the main timeline were erased as well? Two, why does Vilgax still exist? He's part of the main timeline and all the events that happened in the main timeline. Not only that but Vilgax's plan was terrible. Even if his plan worked, because Ben Prime no longer exists and all the events of the main timeline were erased, what this means is that there would have been no need for Vilgax to use the time bomb because those events no longer exist and since that Vilgax wouldn't use the time bomb at that exact moment, that means that the timeline didn't get erased and thus Ben would still exist and everything is thus back at square one. It's a little complicating to explain but yeah again, time is a closed cycle. Nothing can really change it. Paradox and No Watch Ben wouldn't even need to reset the timelines because the timelines would just end up resetting all by themselves. This type of stuff is pretty much what killed those episodes for me.

Overall, the whole multiverse concept pretty much just made the series at least a little too complicating. It would have been better to either scale it down to like two alternate universes or just not have a multiverse at all. Heck, Joe Kelly of MOA stated on his AMA a while back that one of the original concepts for Ben 10 was that the Omnitrix would allow Ben to transform into alternate versions of himself from alternate universes. The idea got scrapped because Joe Kelly stated that it would make the series too complicating for viewers to understand and follow. Even MOA understood that having a multiverse in Ben 10 was that good of an idea. Just too complex and too complicating for the series.

I would think that if Ben made a choice to take off the Omnitrix, and, unlike he did, NOT put it on at 15 or 16 or anywhere between 12 and 20, it would probably affect the future. But if he had it on when he was 15, things should have eventually played out the way they did leading up to Ben 10,000.