Ben Tennyson

This article belongs to the Classic Continuity

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Benjamin Kirby "Ben" Tennyson was a normal ten-year-old kid until he found the Omnitrix, a powerful watch-like device that allowed him to turn into ten different aliens. Though initially immature and clumsy, Ben grew to be a true hero. By the time he was sixteen, he had become famous in not only his hometown of Bellwood but on Earth and beyond. Ben has also been deputized by the Plumbers and gained more aliens as time progressed.

Appearance

Ben's physical appearance has changed throughout the series from a ten-year-old to a sixteen-year-old. However, he retains some recurring characteristics. He has shaggy brown hair, green eyes, pale skin, and he's quite skinny for his age, though he shows a lot of muscle definition due to being athletic.

Regular Appearances

In the Omniverse flashbacks in which he was 5 years old, Ben wore green overalls with a white shirt underneath it. White numbers saying "5 1/2" were on a black square in front of his overalls.

In the original series and Omniverse flashbacks, Ben's usual clothes consisted of a black-striped, white shirt with short sleeves, military green cargo pants with side pockets, and black and white sneakers with black stripes. Ben wore the prototype Omnitrix on his left wrist.

In Alien Force and Ultimate Alien, Ben wore a black shirt, blue jeans and a green jacket with white stripes and the number 10 on it, and black and white Converse-style shoes. Ben wore the prototype Omnitrix in Alien Force and the Ultimatrix in Ultimate Alien on his left wrist.

In Ultimate Alien, he wore a standard Plumber suit during a few of his off-world excursions.

In Omniverse, Ben wears a black shirt that has a green stripe in the middle with a white 10 and green stripes on the sides of his shirt. He wears brown cargo pants with pockets at the knees and green and white shoes. He later gains a white hooded jacket with green stripes on both arms and a green number 10 on the right side for some time. He wears the Omnitrix on his left wrist.

In Omniverse, while riding the Tenn-Speed, he wears a white helmet with the number 10 on it, a green visor, a short-sleeved black T-shirt, long white pants and a belt with the number 10 on it.

Occasional Appearances

In The Unnaturals, he wore a blue baseball shirt with the letter "C" at the front and number 23 at the back, white shorts, blue and yellow socks, blue and white shoes, and a blue baseball helmet. Before the baseball game and after he battled the Squires and Coach Finn, he wore a blue and yellow baseball hat with the letter "C" in the middle.

During water-based activities in the original series, he wore a blue swimsuit in The Krakken and A Small Problem and a red and yellow swimsuit in Divided We Stand and Big Fat Alien Wedding.

In Back with a Vengeance, he wore a yellow raincoat while touring Niagara Falls on a ship.

In Big Fat Alien Wedding, during the wedding ceremony, he wore a purple tuxedo with a red ribbon and white polo shirt.

In Secret of the Omnitrix, he wore a light-blue pajamas. Later in the movie, he wore a spacesuit.

In Ben 10 Returns: Part 1 and War of the Worlds: Part 1, Ben's soccer clothes consisted of the T-shirt he wore as a 10/11 year old but with the number 10 at the back, a long-sleeved green undershirt, green shorts, gray gloves with black stripes, and knee-high socks.

In What Are Little Girls Made Of? and In Charm's Way, he wore green trunks.

In Birds of a Feather, when on the Moon, he wore an orange spacesuit with four arms.

In Video Games, he wore a blue full-body motion capture suit with white balls on it.

In Fused, Revenge of the Swarm, and Night of the Living Nightmare, Ben's sleeping clothes consisted of his usual black T-shirt and white shorts.

In Basic Training, while at the barracks in the Plumbers' Academy, he wore an olive tank top and black shorts.

In Inspector 13, he wore a green T-shirt and black shorts.

In Bros in Space, he wore a ceremonial female Revonnahgander outfit.

In Special Delivery, while working for Mr. Baumann, he wore a pink and white cap and a pink apron with a black 'B' on it.

5 year old Ben in Omniverse

10 year old Ben in Destroy All Aliens

10 year old Ben in Ultimate Alien

10/11 year old Ben in Omniverse

Ben in Alien Swarm

Ben in a Plumber suit in Ultimate Alien

16 year old Ben in Heroes United

15/16 year old Ben in an Omniverse flashback

16 year old Ben in Omniverse, with the white jacket

16 year old Ben in his Tenn-Speed riding clothes in Omniverse

4 year old Ben in Don't Drink the Water

10 year old Ben in Heroes United

Ben's first swimsuit in the original series

Ben in a yellow raincoat in Back with a Vengeance

Ben in The Unnaturals

Ben wearing a tuxedo in Big Fat Alien Wedding

Ben's second swimsuit in the original series

11 year old Ben with 16 year old Ben's clothes in Omniverse

Ben in his soccer clothes in Alien Force

Ben in Alien Force without a jacket

Ben's swimsuit in Alien Force

Ben in an orange spacesuit in Birds of a Feather

Ben in a motion capture suit in Video Games

Ben in his sleeping clothes in Ultimate Alien

Ben in Basic Training

Ben in Inspector 13

16 year old Ben in Heroes United without a jacket

16 year old Ben in Heroes United with Rex's jacket

16 year old Ben in a ceremonial female Revonnahgander outfit in Bros in Space

16 year old Ben while working for Mr. Baumann in Omniverse

Personality

Initially cocky, childish, and arrogant, Ben's immaturity and attention-seeking behavior often led him to joke around, regardless of the situation. His allies often criticized his attitude, unaware of the fact that he used humor to mask his fears. Despite some childish attitude, he was heroic, caring and generally good-natured, always willing to save others at any time. As seen in Heroes United, Ben seems to be oblivious to certain things, such as the fact that he was transported to another dimension, yet he thought he was still in his world.

Over the years, Ben has displayed good leadership skills, as well as the ability to adapt his attitude to a situation, becoming serious when it's called for. He became more mature, responsible and sensible. He's kind-hearted, willing to sacrifice even his own life for others. His idealistic views and unwillingness to compromise his values – aspects condemned by Azmuth, yet commended by others – sometimes drive him to act against reason, such as helping his enemies if they need it (most remarkably Vilgax).^[3] Professor Paradox has praised Ben's good nature, going so far as to say he had the gift to make the right choices at the right moments.^[4]

However, when Ben fails to save someone, or if someone gets hurt because of his failures, he becomes angry and much more violent. Perhaps the most notable of these instances is when Kevin willingly mutated himself to succeed where Ben had failed and stop Aggregor, Ben was set on killing Kevin, even fighting Gwen when she refused to help him.^[5] He also threatened to hunt down and destroy the Forever Knights once making Driscoll promise to cease the hunting of aliens.^[6]

Though often stated to be silly or unintelligent because of his immaturity, Ben is cunning and resourceful when needed, quickly adapting when the Omnitrix doesn't provide him with the alien he wanted.

Later on, Ben starts thinking of himself as more of a superhero than a Plumber, often remarking that he's not a cop, but a superhero.^[7] Although he once again became cocky, he retained his selfless and heroic nature.

History

Powers and Abilities

Ben has been trained in hand-to-hand combat by black belt Gwen, Max, as well as various years fighting aliens, and received a basic Plumber training.^[8] He proved to be quite skilled in basic hand-to-hand combat as well-armed and unarmed combat, being able to easily dodge shots from Manny's blasters and proceed to disarm him while in human form.^[9] Ben was able to hold his own against Pierce, and Max hinted that Ben was a highly-skilled fighter, even as a human.^[10] Another hint of his exceptional hand-to-hand skill is when he succeeded in the Plumbers' Academy with a 95 out of a 100.^[8] He is also a crafty fighter and actually uses freestyle fighting.

It's evident that Ben is smart in some respects, possessing an above-average intelligence. Gwen even stated that he really isn't working up to his potential at school.^[11] He also has fairly moderate grades. Physics and Chemistry are his toughest subjects, yet he still maintains a B+ average.

Ben has an extraordinarily sharp memory, as he was perfectly capable of remembering and writing down the mystic rune-like symbols for entering the inter-dimensional realm of Ledgerdomain with just one glance from a distance.^[11] This is even more true for things that interest him.^{[DM 1]}

Ben is also a cross dominant, skillfully wielding tools and weapons in either hand, in human or alien form.

Equipment

Ben is the wielder of the Omnitrix (formerly the Ultimatrix and first Omnitrix), which gave him the power to modify his own genetic code in order to turn into various alien creatures. Traditionally, he could only transform into ten aliens at the beginning of both the original series and Alien Force, but he later gains additional forms by either unlocking them or by scanning the DNA of aliens he meets.

When transforming into an alien, Ben gets all the creature's features, including its appearance, voice, all of its unique and special abilities and powers, strengths and weaknesses. Though he mostly retains his personality, there are some cases where the transformation causes a change in it, like with Rath and Juryrigg.

Though he usually uses his alien forms to fight, he can impersonate aliens as he did with Water Hazard to convince P'andor to go home, and though he was unsuccessful at convincing him, P'andor believed him to be Bivalvan.^[12]

In addition to transforming into aliens, the Ultimatrix included what is referred as an "evolutionary function", that allowed Ben to evolve his alien forms in order to get upgraded versions of them, referred to as Ultimate Forms.

In addition to the primary transformations and evolutionary function, the Omnitrices and Ultimatrix can both be used for various purposes. Both have a built-in Universal Translator that allows Ben to communicate with most aliens that don't speak English.^[13]

The prototype Omnitrix displayed the ability to manipulate and repair genetic damage, a function he used to cure DNAliens^[14] and save the Highbreed from extinction.^[15] Azmuth also mentioned that Ben could use the prototype Omnitrix to bring back to life any species stored on Primus.^[16]

The Omnitrix also has a failsafe to help prevent Ben from dying. If Ben is in mortal danger and the Omnitrix is in recharge mode, it will automatically go into active mode.

Weaknesses

Whenever the Omnitrix times out, Ben is left powerless until he either dodges or switches to a new alien form. In addition to gaining the selected alien's powers and strengths, he gains its weaknesses. Additionally, at times the natural biological behavior of certain aliens can override Ben's behavior, such as Big Chill's reproductive phase^[17] or Swampfire's blossoming process.^[18] Furthermore, any illness Ben is experiencing in his human form will also affect his alien forms.^[19][20]

Whenever Ben unlocks a new alien form, he is at a disadvantage of not knowing its abilities and weaknesses until he gains experience with using the new alien.

Despite his experience in using the Omnitrices and Ultimatrix, Ben still does not know every function of them. Due to his inquisitive nature and impatience, he has accidentally unlocked new functions such as the Master Control^[21] and the randomizer,^[22] which can at times do more harm than good.

Though the current Omnitrix is designed to work only for him, Ben still has not mastered it. According to Azmuth, Ben may get the Master Control on his 18th birthday.^[23]

The Omnitrix does not actually mistransform, but rather it is due to Ben hitting the Omnitrix too hard, thereby causing the time-out function to select another alien at random.^[24]

Ben has an allergy to peanuts^[25] and has a fear of peacocks.^[26] He also has coulrophobia, the fear of clowns.^[27]

Ben's left eye twitches whenever he tells a lie, but only Kevin appears to notice this.^[28]

Ben appears to have a short attention span at times, and more often than not it can get him into trouble.

Though he has matured substantially since receiving the original Omnitrix, he is still a teenager with much to learn and is prone to irrational impulses and recklessness.

Relationships

Appearances

Episodes

Ben has been in every episode, movie and short except the "what-if?" episodes, Gwen 10, Goodbye and Good Riddance and Ben 10: Race Against Time, which feature Bens from alternate timelines. Here's a list of all his appearances throughout the series.

• Ben 10/Episodes
• Ben 10: Alien Force/Episodes
• Ben 10: Ultimate Alien/Episodes
• Ben 10: Omniverse/Episodes

Books

Ben has appeared in every book, except for Old Friends and It's a Set Up.

Video Games

Ben appears in every Ben 10 video game. Ben is also seen in the crossover video game Punch Time Explosion and Explosion XL.

Ben 10: Protector of Earth

While Ben is sleeping at the Grand Canyon, Vilgax extracts DNA of the Omnitrix. Ben travels around the United States to retrieve all parts of the Omnitrix.

Ben starts with Heatblast and Four Arms. But later obtains XLR8, Cannonbolt, Wildvine, and Perk Upchuck (DS if player cheats). Later, he unlocks the Master Control.

Ben 10 Ultimate Alien: Cosmic Destruction

Ben confronts a new villain, Evil Way Big. To defeat him, Ben looks for parts of the Potis Altiare's located in places around the world. In The Final Battle with Evil Way Big, Ben puts the Potis Altiare together and uses it as Way Big. Later during the Battle, Way Big uses a very powerful cosmic ray and sends Evil Way Big to space.

Ben uses the Ultimatrix, but has access one group of aliens: See Here

Punch Time Explosion and XL

Punch Time Explosion

Ben hunts down Vilgax, the latter conquers Chowder's Universe. Ben later teams up with other cartoon network characters to hunt down Vilgax throughout other universes. He is the first usable character.

• Swampfire (standard attack)
• Big Chill (up/extra jump attack)
• AmpFibian (down attack)
• Humungousaur (side attack)
• Ultimate Humungousaur (Punch Time Explosion)

Punch Time Explosion XL

In this game, nothing is much different in the storyline. However, young Ben Tennyson is available as a playable character, even though he does not appear in the storyline. Young Ben doesn't appear in the storyline but is also playable. He costs 1500, which is more than the average character, making him rarer.

• Heatblast (up/extra jump attack)
• XLR8 (side attack)
• Cannonbolt (down attack)
• Wildvine (standard attack)
• Four Arms (Punch Time Explosion)

Cartoon Network Online Games

• FusionFall (NPC)
• Project Exonaut (NPC)
• Formula Cartoon (NPC) (Young Ben)
• TKO (only in alien forms)

In Other Media

MAD

Ben appeared briefly in a snippet of the new Cartoon Network show, Mad. They were doing a Star Trek parody and the crew was watching Ben 10 on their screen.

Then, they did another parody, but this time with Benjamin Franklin.

They later did a Cowboys and Aliens parody. In Cowboys and Alien Force, Jedediah Benjamin Tennyson wakes up on the left side of Jake Lonergan saying he has no pants and gets punched by Jake. A cowboy said that Jake was wearing Ben's pants, his hat, and his Omnitrix. Jake presses the Omnitrix, turning into an alien similar to Diamondhead or Chromastone and he crushed the cowboy with its hand. The Omnitrix in this episode is more like a square and does not have the black and green color sequence.

South Park

In the South Park episode "You're Getting Old," Cartman's Mom mentioned that Cartman gets upset when he doesn't get a present every time someone else gets a present at a party. One of the presents Cartman gets is a "Ben 10 Wrist Rocket."

Robot Chicken

Ben made an appearance in the fifth episode of the sixth season of Robot Chicken, Hurtled from a Helicopter into a Speeding Train, where Ben is just turning 14.

Uncle Grandpa

Ben, among other Cartoon Network characters, made a cameo watching an awards show hosted by Uncle Grandpa. Omniverse Ben, who did not speak, was annoyed by a lame joke that Uncle Grandpa made.

Etymology

Benjamin is a name from the Hebrew name בִּנְיָמִין (Binyamin) which means "son of the south" or "son of the right hand" going back into the Tanakh (called the Hebrew Bible by Christian scholars), a name of one of the sons of Jacob. His name, "Ben," is to create a rhyming effect between his first name and the number Ten. Also, his surname is a reference to 'Ten' of Ben 10.

His middle name, Kirby, was named as reference to comic book artist Jack Kirby.^{[DJW 1]}

Trivia

• Initial concepts for Ben's Alien Force and Ultimate Alien design were made by Glen Murakami. His head and hair were reworked by Glenn Wong, who also gave him his green jacket, while colors were added by Chris Hooten.^{[GW 1]}
• Ben will have a glorious future.^[29][4] Azmuth even said that Professor Paradox once told him of Ben's "grand destiny" and that Ben would be "the legendary being who..." before Paradox cut him short.
• Ben's history now has to be read at the Plumbers' Academy. It comprises approximately a "chapter and a half."^[30][31]
• Gwen's birthday is in December,^[30] which would put Ben's in December too, as they both share the same birthday.^[32] Their rivalry in the original series was caused by this.^{[pop-up 1][33]}
• Ben has received an honorary doctorate degree from Friedkin University.^[34]
• Ben does not have good table manners.^[35][36]
• Ben can play guitar and also snowboard.^[37]
• Ben used to shout the names of his aliens because they were asserting their identity as they gained consciousness,^{[DM 2]} as well as to strike fear into his opponents.^[38] He stopped doing so in Omniverse because he got tired of it.^{[MW 1]}
  • This is also why he changed his outfit.^{[MW 1]}
  • It was Dwayne McDuffie's idea to have Ben shout the names of his aliens, as he thought it would help younger fans know the aliens' names.^{[DM 3][DM 2]}
• In Alien Force, Ben was in his freshman year of high school.^{[DM 4]}
  • Ben still goes to school in Omniverse, but not much. He can get an excused absence very easily, and his assistance to the Plumbers counts as work-study.^{[39][36][MW 2][MW 3]}
• Ben considers both Rook and Kevin his best friend.^{[MW 4]}
• Ben still owns several black T-shirts.^{[MW 5]}
• Ben sometimes goes to Undertown just to hang out.^{[MW 6]}
• Ben sometimes thinks about moving to an apartment or Plumber Headquarters due to the trouble he brings to his home.^{[MW 6]}
• Ben knows some things about the original Ultimatrix that Eunice doesn't, and vice versa.^{[MW 7]}
• Ben's worst subject is Physics.^[28]
• Ben passed the third grade by choosing C for all the answers on multiple-choice tests.^[40]
• Ben's favorite color is green.^[26]
• Ben's favorite food is Chili Fries.^[26]
• Ben's favorite drink as a teenager is smoothies from Mr. Smoothy's, despite hating it when he was 11 years old.^[41][42]
  • He is still searching for his favorite smoothie flavor. Up until So Long, and Thanks for All the Smoothies, he never tried the same flavor twice.^{[DM 5]}
• Ben's worst fear is peacocks.^[30][26][43]
• Ben's first crush was Patty Berkinfield from 3rd grade.^[30][26]
• Ben has a scar on his body in the shape of New Jersey.^[30][26]
• Ben has a habit of referring to other members of his aliens' species by the names he gives his aliens.
  • He does not know the species' name of most of his aliens, and is often surprised on hearing them, but never admits to this.^[44]
• When Ben was 10, he used to sleep with his teddy bear, called Furry Freddy.^[45] However, Ben defended himself saying that Furry Freddy had his own bed, which happened to be right next to his.^[46]
• According to Azmuth and Sir George, Ben is the same as they were when they were young.^[47]
• Before the events of the original series:
  • Ben and Gwen once did not speak to each other for two months over an argument about a stick of gum.^{[pop-up 2][48]}
  • At one point, the arguing between Ben and Gwen had gotten so bad that their parents refused to take vacations together anymore.^{[pop-up 3][49]}
• During the road trip in the original series, disliking Max's cooking was one of the few things Ben and Gwen agreed on.^{[pop-up 4][50]}
• Sumo Slammers is Ben's favorite game, book, and TV show - followed by Space Pirates and Weirdworld.^{[pop-up 5][51]}
• Ben has a knack for turning his weaknesses into strengths.^{[pop-up 6][49]}
• When he was younger, Ben's high energy often got him into trouble. As he got older, he learned to focus that energy into sports.^{[pop-up 7][49][52]}
• Hoverboard-based combat generally requires intensive training and the use of holographic simulators. Ben, however, is a natural at it.^{[pop-up 8][49]}
• Ben's remarkable pilot skills in Secret of the Omnitrix are a result of the combination of playing video games and tap lessons Sandra made him take, but he would never admit it.^{[pop-up 9][49]}
  • Kevin is a better pilot than Ben.^{[DM 6]}
• Ben has a lot of pull with the Plumbers.^{[DM 7]}
• Ben has other friends than the ones seen onscreen, but his coming out of retirement in Alien Force pushed them away.^{[DM 8]}
• Ben misses the good old days when he used to hang out with Gwen and Kevin without being mobbed by fans.^{[DM 9]}
  • In fact, Ben, as Ultimate Echo Echo, once admitted to Ultimate Kevin that he truly hates being famous and wishes he had his secret identity back.^[53]
• Ben has not thought about his career plan at all.^{[DM 10]}
• The reason Ben plays soccer as a goalie is because Dwayne McDuffie used to play competitive soccer as an All-State Goalie in school.^{[CF 1]}
  • Ben still plays soccer when he can.^{[DM 11]}
• Derrick J. Wyatt compares Ben to Scott Pilgrim.^{[DJW 2]}

References

Crew Statements

Derrick J. Wyatt

Matt Wayne

Dwayne McDuffie

Charlotte Fullerton

Glenn Wong

Pop-ups

See Also

• Ben Tennyson and Julie Yamamoto
• Ben Tennyson and Kai Green
• Ben's Team
• DX Mark 10
• Tenn-Speed
• Ultimatrix
• Omnitrix