Ben 10: Alien Force

Template:Infobox TV Show

***Ben 10: Alien Force*** is an American animated television series created by team Man of Action (a group consisting of Duncan Rouleau, Joe Casey, Joe Kelly, and Steven T. Seagle), and produced by Cartoon Network Studios. It takes place five years after *Ben 10*.

The series premiered on Cartoon Network on April 18, 2008, in the United States, with its Canadian premiere on Teletoon on September 6, 2008, and ended on March 26, 2010. The series was originally produced under the working title of *Ben 10: Hero Generation*. The series ran for a total of three seasons and forty-six episodes with its final episode being aired on March 26, 2010.

The series takes a different turn than its predecessor, taking on a darker tone. It also was nominated for four Emmy Awards, winning one for Outstanding Sound Mixing - Live Action and Animation.

In September 2016, Boomerang will plan for Ben 10 Going Hero marathon from 4-7 pm.

## Characters

### Heroes

* **Benjamin Kirby Tennyson**:

At the age of fifteen, Ben fills the role of the leader after Grandpa Max mysteriously disappears. The powerful Omnitrix has recalibrated, giving him access to a new set of alien heroes that are much stronger and more powerful. Over the past five years, Ben has matured dramatically, and has gained strength, leadership and wisdom. He is voiced by Yuri Lowenthal.

* **Gwendolyn Catherine Tennyson**:

At the age of fifteen, Gwen is much more skilled and proficient with her innate magical powers, able to create, control and manipulate pure magenta/fuchsia/pink-colored magic energy and mold it into various shapes and forms; such as ropes, bridges, slides, grappling hooks, shields for protection, and even stepping stones for transportation. Although she's not nearly as fiery or short-tempered as before, Gwen is still always looking out for her first cousin. Ashley Johnson replaces Meagan Smith as her voice actress in this series. She cares more about Ben than before.

* **Kevin Ethan Levin**:

A former nemesis of Ben, Kevin is now getting by as an alien tech dealer. He unintentionally gets involved in the Highbreed plot, and joins Ben out of a desire to make up for his actions. His Osmosian abilities now allow him to absorb the properties of any solid matter he touches. Kevin is voiced by Greg Cipes.

* **Julie Yamamoto**:

Julie is Ben's love interest, sweetheart, and girlfriend. She enjoys tennis, eating chili fries, and caring for her pet, Ship (an alien Galvanic Mechomorph found by her and Ben). She is voiced by Vyvan Pham.

* **Max Tennyson**:

Max is a semi-retired member of the Plumbers and Ben and Gwen's paternal grandfather. He disappears while investigating the Highbreed plot, leaving only a few cryptic messages for Ben to find. He is briefly reunited with his grandchildren in "Max Out", but sacrifices himself to destroy a Highbreed factory at the end of the episode (actually transporting himself to the Null Void). In the episode "Voided", Ben and Max reunite in the Null Void, and he promises Ben that he'll come back soon. He eventually returns in the second season finale of the show to aid Ben in his final assault against the Highbreed. He is voiced by Paul Eiding.

### Villains

* **Highbreed**:

The Highbreed believe themselves to be the purest and most powerful of all species, and intend to cleanse the galaxy of impure lower life forms. It was later revealed that they were dying out, having become sterile and vulnerable to disease due to heavy inbreeding, and that they intend to destroy the rest of the universe.

* **DNAliens**:

Hybrids of humans and alien drones that serve the Highbreed called Xenocytes, the DNAliens are able to disguise themselves as humans using special identity masks, called ID Masks.

* **The Forever Knights**:

A paramilitary organization that has worked in secret ever since their formation in the Middle Ages. The Forever Knights will trade alien technology with anyone who is willing to pay large amounts of money, even the Highbreed.

* **Vilgax**:

Vilgax returns in Season 3 with new powers and abilities. He loses to Ben in the episode "Vengeance of Vilgax" and was banished from Earth, though he swore vengeance. Keeping his promise, Vilgax returned in the episode "The Final Battle" to procure the Omnitrix and destroy Ben, but was unsuccessful.

* **Albedo**:

Albedo is a young and arrogant Galvan. At one point, he was the assistant to Azmuth, whom he asked for an Omnitrix of his own. When Azmuth refused, he built one of inferior quality and synchronized it to work exactly like Ben's. Because Ben's form was the default, Albedo was transformed into a clone of Ben (until his Omnitrix came into contact with Ben's, giving him whitish-gray hair, a dark red jacket, black pants and deep red eyes). As a result, he also developed many of Ben's habits, which he considers utterly repulsive.

## Themes

*Ben 10: Alien Force* is set five years after the original series. The second series is quite different from the first one: the story-line is notable for having matured the character and taken a darker tone, with more complex plots, more characters dying, and much less humor; the original logo has changed from the original series. This change received mixed reactions from the fans, and caused a division among them. Despite this, *Ben 10: Alien Force's* ratings were successful, allowing the production of *Ben 10: Ultimate Alien,* taking place one year later.

### The Evolved Omnitrix

When the Omnitrix was recalibrated, it gained a more watch-like shape and a green wristband, became smaller and sleeker, with the face plate becoming black and green. The inside of the hourglass shape now glows in different colors at special moments; these colors signify the state that the Omnitrix is in. Occasionally, the Omnitrix's safeguard mode initiates and randomly transforms Ben into another alien that he did not choose.

In Ben 10, the reason Azmuth invented the Omnitrix was for all the beings of the universe to better understand each other. It was revealed in Ben 10: Alien Force that there was another reason for the creation of the Omnitrix. Azmuth tells Ben that the Omnitrix was invented to preserve the DNA of all living beings in the Milky Way Galaxy, and to restore them if they should ever become extinct.

**Recalibration Mode**

The Omnitrix begins transforming whilst selecting an array of new alien forms. The Omnitrix makes a beep-like noise and flashes a blue light, then it changes to a glowing black and green and finally morphs into its more watch-shaped form. The opposite can occur as well, as shown in "Vengeance of Vilgax" when the watch turns from its new form into its original form. The trigger for Recalibration mode is unknown, but Dwayne McDuffie said it recalibrated as a result of Ben's maturity.Template:Citation needed

The display mode of the black silhouettes of the desired alien were replaced by a dark green hologram. Dwayne McDuffie confirmed that by changing the settings on the Omnitrix, either display can be used in either one of the Omnitrix's forms.

The abilities of his old aliens were recognized by the Omnitrix and therefore "upgraded" as well, bringing 10 new aliens with the same abilities as the old aliens such as Swampfire, for example, replacing Wildvine and Heatblast. This feature of the Omnitrix was first seen in "Ben 10 Returns Part 1"; while it rescans Ben, the Omnitrix turns a darkish blue color. Benjamin Tennyson said "it never did that before".Template:Citation needed Also, during the transformation, all information on the alien is dumped into the user's mind.

**Active Mode**

After the Omnitrix was recalibrated, the symbols on the aliens were also of the same color, and located on their chests (Dwayne McDuffie said this was because it means the Omnitrix was working properly).Template:Citation needed

It was revealed that the Omnitrix's main function was to act as a wireless receiver for the Codon Stream, Azmuth's DNA database on Primus. By accessing the Codon Stream, the Omnitrix rewrites the wearer's DNA on a quantum level and transforms them into one of the 1,000,913 species in the Codon Stream (excluding the wearer's species). In order for the host to change size, matter is created from energy or reconstituted to energy as needed.

**Delete Mode**

When the Omnitrix Was recalibrated, all of Ben's aliens when he was 10 years old were deleted, but many of the original aliens were unlocked.Template:Citation needed

**Plumber's Badge use**

The Omnitrix is revealed to be a Plumber's Badge and became Ben's badge. It has the same uses as a normal Plumber Badge:

* Can be a communicator
* Creates a holographic map that can be used to track and show the location of another Plumber's Badge
* Universal translator, translates alien languages and writing to the wearer's language
* Detect radiation, produces a flashing red light and sounds
* Accesses the Extranet (an intergalactic Internet).

**Healing Mode**

The Omnitrix is able to restore the DNA of DNAliens, but it is unknown if it is able to restore the DNA of humans or any other alien species. It is also unknown if this function is meant to eliminate the foreign DNA from a being and if it can change hybrids such as Manny, Helen, and Pierce back to their human forms.

In "War of the Worlds: Part 2", the Omnitrix shown to be able to genetically manipulate alien DNA or reprogram the species' DNA (in this case, fuse DNA from different species of aliens).

**Time Out Mode**

The recalibrated Omnitrix does not do this; instead, it simply reverts the transformation without a warning given because this feature was accidentally switched off when the Omnitrix recalibrated. In "War of the Worlds Part 2", the Omnitrix had reset, also turning the time out warning function back on. The hourglass, when recharging, also flashes red instead of remaining a solid red as it had when the Omnitrix was in its original configuration. In "Ben 10: Alien Force The Video Game", when the Omnitrix was out of power it beeped differently from in the original series. From "The Secret of Chromastone" and so on, the Omnitrix flashes green instead of red when signaling a time out.

**Capture Mode**

When a new DNA sample has been unlocked from the Codon Stream for future use (it identifies the DNA against the database on Primus, then unlocks that code on the Omnitrix), or when the Omnitrix actually captures new DNA that is not already present in the Codon Stream.

It can also reclaim lost alien forms that may have escaped the Omnitrix. Absorbing lost alien forms can be done in two ways: when transformed into an alien, the Omnitrix flashes a yellow light and absorbs the alien; or when the Omnitrix is inactive, it sends some radar waves and then reabsorbs the alien. Unlike in the original series, if an alien touches the Omnitrix in Ben 10: Alien Force, it will not be captured because it doesn't work the same way after it recalibrated.

**Self-Destruction Mode**

It was used when Ben wanted to take back the Omnitrix from Vilgax, but it didn't work; despite that the S.D.M was used and successfully triggered in, it only destroyed the Omnitrix rather than the universe, though this is because it only charged for 30 seconds.

The voice-activated self-destruct sequence is the same code from *Star Trek III: The Search for Spock* that James T. Kirk used to activate the Enterprise's one minute self-destruct sequence (000 destruct-0).