#ultimate kevin

[cryptid-paint]

This was basically the plot of ultimate alien right???

[softlysil]

kev

[gh0stfactory]

"People try to be nice to you but you can't ever see it. You're too busy feeling sorry for yourself"

[pilot-of-eva-00]

Benlie: Why I no longer ship it

(And why Bevin is superior)

I’ve made posts before about this but I haven’t really been active in the Ben 10 fandom like I once was and wanted to write one more essay regarding a ship that I used to passionately like. Over a year ago, I wrote an essay defending the pairing of Ben and Julie and now I’m starting to lose that love for it. Some of it has stemmed from leaving the fandom and looking at it from a more critical perspective. The other comes from my taste in ships maturing and changing along with my interests. I went from blogging about Ben 10 and Lego Ninjago when I started on tumblr to The Promised Neverland and Evangelion being my main fandoms which is a big shift. I am going to be focusing on three points, why Julie isn’t a good character or love interest, why the ship fell apart and doesn’t work for me and why Bevin is the best ship of the entire franchise and is underrated.

My main issue with Julie is that she isn’t really allowed to be a character beyond Ben’s girlfriend. Her interests, besides tennis, are never shown, her home and school life aren’t fleshed out and we don’t know anything about her family other than her dad hating Ben. It makes the ship feel bland and boring especially when writing fanfiction where giving her more personality was frustrating for me. The thing is, I liked her for Asian representation because that’s often lacking in western media but she’s not a well written or developed character. What more is there to her than her liking tennis, being good at school and getting frustrated at Ben? What’s her relationship with her culture and being Asian American? We never get any of that and it drags her down.

Back when I liked Benlie, I often compared it to the pairing of Steven x Connie from Steven Universe as there are some things in common. You know what made that relationship work? The fact that Connie was allowed to be more than just Steven’s love interest. She had her own familial conflicts, friends outside Steven and the Gems like Patricia and Daniel but also got to be an active member of the team, training with the Gems and going on missions. Julie didn’t get any of that and it hurt her character. She has no life outside tennis and occasionally showing up to force drama with Ben. Everything she did revolved around Ben but she also wasn’t allowed to be a full member of the team outside occasionally helping with Big Chill’s pregnancy, the Highbreed invasion and Ultimate Kevin. I have a lot of criticisms of SU but Steven and Connie’s relationship was given time to grow and healthy development across the series unlike any of Ben’s romances in UAF and OV which leads me to my next point.

An issue I have with both Benlie and Gwevin is that they are incredibly forced and heteronormative. Some fans used to speculate the AF crew rushed them getting together to sink the infamous Bwen ship but while Gwevin would go on to have SOME decent chemistry, Benlie would constantly have cheap drama despite being somewhat cute in the early seasons of AF. You got the impression that they could barely stand each other and were only dating to keep it going as long as they could. It kind of reminds me of what happened to Blu and Jewel’s relationship in the Rio movies. First film, it was a bit bland and cliche but still somewhat endearing and cute but Rio 2 destroyed any likability it had and made Blu into a punching bag and Jewel completely uncaring towards Blu’s dilemma. Something similar happened to Benlie especially in UA.

I want to get more into why the ship fell apart and why it became painful to watch. One big reason is the reliance on the “superhero can’t make time for his girlfriend” cliche that was already hated at the time. It was there in the Sam Raimi Spider-Man movies with Peter and MJ and Glen Murakami’s previous series, Teen Titans, had Robin become too obsessive over heroism and struggle to express affection for Starfire. Almost every Ben/Julie centered episode post Highbreed arc has some forced conflict be it over Ship, Ben being a “bad boyfriend” or “Ben can’t give Julie the attention she needs”. The only exceptions were Fame and Inspector 13. In three instances, Pet Project, which was when Ben was still his AF s1-2 self, Duped and The Perfect Girlfriend, we saw that Ben preferred watching movies to spending time with Julie. It makes sense as he basically lost his chance at being normal when he put the Omnitrix back on and has very little time to himself but the issue is a lack of communication and that their interests/hobbies clash to the point Ben resorts to lying.

As I said before, the ship doesn’t work for me because it feels bland and frustrating to write for. I deleted my Ben 10 fics because I questioned if I really liked the pairing or was just writing my own OCs at that point. My taste in ships has matured quite a bit since my early days on tumblr and I want ships that are the opposite of bland or boring, I want mature layered ships with drama that doesn’t feel forced, which you aren’t really going to get out of Ben 10. My current OTP that I write for, Shinji x Rei is an example of this. There’s so much depth to explore and unpack when writing that relationship. Same with any ship from The Promised Neverland be it Noremma, Rayemma or Violemma. What is there to like about Benlie? There isn’t really much outside AF season 1-2 and a select few episodes of UA.

Then there’s how fandom treats the relationship. The fandom insists on making either one or the other the “bad guy”. I also noticed that Ben is always treated as scum for flirting with other girls like Elena or Eunice but Max is praised for having various flings. Unless Max believes in polyamory, which would fit his character, he technically cheated on Verdona with Xylene, yet no one calls him on that. I don’t think either Ben or Julie were 100% in the wrong or right when it came to their relationship falling apart. They were teenagers and teenagers are messy when it comes to figuring out what they want out of a relationship. Their careers and interests were just too different to make it work long term. Also, as @execatrix once pointed out, Ben never claimed he was a good boyfriend and repeatedly expressed remorse over not being able to give Julie the attention she deserved.

Before moving onto why I think Bevin is a far superior ship to any other pairing, I want to get into why I think the fandom still likes Benlie as someone who used to like it. It was the longest relationship Ben had and it did have endearing moments from Ben 10 Returns to Fame. Afterwards was when the cheap drama started being forced. There’s also the fact that Benkai was so bad in Omniverse that Benlie looked good by comparison. There’s also the fact that when Julie was introduced in AF, she was a girl that wasn’t Ben’s cousin like Gwen, and fandom was a lot more homophobic with Bevin only being liked by a few hardcore Yaoi shippers. Not everyone will agree with my next point but I want to explain why I think Bevin is a good ship and why it’s hated.

If UAF was made in the same time period as shows like Steven Universe, Twelve Forever, Clarence and The Owl House where LGBT characters were less stigmatized, it seems more fitting to pair Gwen and Julie as Gwen prefers a more stable, normal life while Ben and Kevin get together. Gwen and Kevin barely interacted in the OS but Ben and Kevin’s rivalry was a core part of the series and it continues into UAF and OV with the Ultimate Kevin and Rooters arcs. Even after everything Kevin did in the OS, Ben still felt sorry for what happened to him. Kevin grows to be comfortable with being vulnerable around Ben and goes from hating him to risking his life to save Ben’s especially in The Ultimate Sacrifice. Whether you see it as platonic or romantic, their rivalry, friendship and aspect as narrative foils was the core of all four series from the OS to Omniverse.

There’s other examples of Bevin being a good ship to talk about. Unlike Rook, Kevin didn’t have unrealistic expectations for a 16 year old boy and Ben can be a lot more vulnerable with him compared to Rook who is more professional. Kevin also isn’t disgusted by Ben’s fondness for Burger Shack the way Rook is and while he later hated the reboot series in the AF finale, is fond of Sumo Slammers himself. They have similar interests and good chemistry, training together as shown in The Purge and The Eggman Cometh. Ben trusted Kevin to hold one of the keys to unlock his most powerful transformation, one whose inability to move endangered their lives in his debut. All of which is a strong basis for a relationship. Ben needs a partner who doesn’t resent his job and is willing to accept all his flaws, not one who only likes one aspect of him or has an idealized version he prefers as Albedo called Rook out on.

Then there’s the Ultimate Kevin arc and all the discourse surrounding that. The thing is, whether you agree with Ben’s actions or not, Kevin never held it against him and even admitted he would have done the same if the roles were reversed. Kevin and Ben then proceeded to ignore their girlfriends, when Gwen had nearly died to Kevin at several points, to get smoothies together, again showing where the real chemistry is. Everyone talks about the danger of Gwen and Kevin dating because she’s an anodite and he’s an Osmosian but a Bevin relationship would have similar drama. Kevin’s repeatedly absorbed the Omnitrix and attempted to steal power from Ben, both as a child and teen. He’s been traumatized by being turned into a monster and Ben could relate to the addiction aspect based on his experience with Feedback. There’s so much potential in a Bevin relationship that needs more exploration but fandom insists that they’re sibling coded or just friends and I think there’s an explanation why.

As to why Bevin is hated, homophobia is the simple answer but there’s a bit more to it than that. A lot of dudebro fans like Kevin because he’s a male power fantasy, a teenage Han Solo. Ruggedly handsome, charismatic, a hot girlfriend and a nice car. Similarly, many of them like Ben for the power fantasy aspect too. For them to date each other threatens those fanboys’ views on masculinity and sexuality. Some used to theorize that Kevin dated Gwen because his true feelings were for Ben but cultural homophobia kept him from expressing those emotions. When the main character’s M/F ships are all bland, toxic or poorly written, people are going to look at other options like OCs and gay pairings.

That kind of sums up my thoughts on Ben 10 ships. I can understand and sympathize with those who wanted Benlie to have a better ending but it’s not that good and I’d rather my Roman Empire be for a ship that actually has chemistry, maturity and depth to it. Ben and Kevin is a good pairing that deserves more fans and there’s plenty of evidence to back it up. Moments of vulnerability like Ben helping Kevin get ready for his date or their talk in Perplexahedron. I tried hard to defend Julie and the ship because I want more Asian rep in western animation but there are far better examples than her nowadays like Chloe (We Bare Bears), Molly McGee, Mei (Turning Red), Anne and Marcy (Amphibia) etc. This will probably be the last Ben 10 post I make for a while so it’s fitting that I make it about the ship that I used to spend hours defending and my current views on the state of the Ben 10 fandom.

[electraslight]

"let's go home now."

redraw of a very real screenshot that definitely happened

(the scene in the ulimate kevin arc where gwen confronts kevin in an arcade solidified my main problem with the arc: this would fit ten times better if it was ben. what significance do arcades have to gwen and kevin? sure they met there but just barely, and why would it be a good cute thing that signifies their love to call back to a time when they both hated each other in an ugly way? just in general the arc would fit better if their roles are reversed. in any other situation, even if its not kevin (look at simian, micheal, and reiny as well as kevin and countless others), ben is the one giving too many chances and getting himself hurt in the process and gwen is the skeptical one. the ult kevin arc is a weird vaccum where ben suddenly has gwens pessimistic attitude and overly logical skeptisism and gwen is permissive to the point of hurting herself and overly hopeful. its so strange because they dont act like this at any point in uaf other than this one. im making an au)

[serpentfeverart]

I felt like drawing that one gif of a guy yelling while holding a ferret using Ben and Kevin. Idk who he's talking to but his rant is totally unrelated to nor is it directed at Ben, he just happens to be holding him while doing it lmao.

Here is the original gif btw

[ossy-serenity]

Aftermath

i always enjoy reading fanfics involving an expansion of Absolute Power part 2

or the way kevin tries to salvage things with the ones he has hurt after the whole deal

but how did canon handle it?

very weirdly, mind you

there`s Eye of the Beholder briefly mentioning it as a joke:

Kevin: I mean, if he says, "I saved the whole entire universe," one more time, I'm gonna go psycho. Gwen: Again? Kevin: It's just an expression. Gwen: And yet I still feel the need to check.

then there`s Victor: The Spoils:

Ben: We're going in there and taking that weapon off the table! Kevin: Sounds like a job for the UN, not us. Ben: Except that the weapon is named "Dr. Viktor." What Ben said to Kevin has caught the latter's attention. Kevin: Huh, think he's still mad at me from last time? Ben: Oh yeah, definitly.

that sad comment in Moonstruck:

Ben: How did you fit all this stuff in here? Max: Gradually. I haven't done spring cleaning in the Rustbucket since I got her. Kevin: Except for when I blew it up... which I probably shouldn't mention. Max: Just help carry the boxes outside and stack them up.

this one was weird in general because it was ben who threw him through the RV

then there`s that nightmare scenario in Night of the Living Nightmare:

Ultimate Kevin: You turned me into a monster. Gwen: That's true. Ben: You're not a monster anymore, this doesn't make any sense!

and the last one off the top of my head is in The Ultimate Enemy part 2:

Gwen: Don't you see, Ben? It's the power. You're tempted-- like I was tempted to go full anodite. Kevin: And like when I lost control of my powers.

to get to my point, i always found it so unusual and insulting to some degree that this arc hasn`t been used enough

they wanted to have a cake and eat it too, they had the drama of kevin losing his sanity but not the repercussions after he returned back to his base form

the way UA after that arc sorta gets back to sorta stand alone episodes for a while just breaks the pace again as it did in the first 2 seasons of AF

how can we just brush that aside or only use it as a joke?

don`t quote me on this but i don`t think we know how much time has passed between the end of UA and OV

because it seems that it hasn`t been a lot?

alan has not spoken to kevin since Absolute Power apparently?

Kevin: Hey, Alan. Long time. Alan: What do you want, Kevin? Last time you showed up, you drained my power. Kevin: Yeah. Sorry about that. Alan: Sorry?! (sarcastically) Oh, goodness me. Kevin Levin is sorry. Let's go grab a pie from the windowsill, cut us a couple of slices and let bygones be bygones. Kevin: Look, Alan, I really am sorry, and I'm just here to talk- honest. Alan: Nothing to talk about. Now, I'd appreciate it if you guys turned around and got off my property.

and the way alan reacts to kevin trying to touch him-

Kevin: Okay, okay. No talkin'. How about I show you? Kevin reveals to Alan the energy he had absorbed from Servantis jolting around his fingers. As he draws closer, Alan transforms into his Pyronite form and jumps back. Alan: Back off! Kevin, surprised by Alan's reaction, hides his hand.

kevin didnt try to reach out to the plumbers` helpers?

at all?

[rootski]

I like any self-respecting fan of one of the most retconned cartoons ever, have several headcanons, some lighter ones - like pyronites being one of the first species to do space travel.

but the one I wanna talk about is my view of Ben's fucking overdose on stupid juice in the Ultimate Kevin arc which of fucking course happened cause CN executives wanted MORE money from their biggest cash cow.

I often call back that moment where ben tells kevin to come in already and that he has the powers of a ghost. I feel like throughout that arc, Ben was paranoid but also that Ben was trying to make himself the target for Kevin. He knew Kevin, especially the new one, but dealing with him as a mutant is either for Ben when it's in a way he is familiar when Kevin is charging head first at him, more importantly kevin was absorbing half alien kids left n right, and considering this wasn't a year after Gwen Vs Michael and Gwen being a fucking ANODITE Ben was, in my mind, gambling on Kevin's emotional side making Gwen look like the reasonable loving one while he himself acted as an abrasive immediately disappointed in Kevin so that Kevin would get tunnel visioned on his old rival.

Ben is smart enough for a plan like this.

and at the time being a leader and still without grandpa, he was also the shot caller for the team. He knew that there was a way to help Kevin, but with recently learned Osmosian biology, true or false, he thought it'd be easier to deal with Kevin if he was gunning for him while Gwen was free to roam.

Combined with the fact that ben knew that, especially the new Kevin, he probably knew how to utilize his powers better than even Ben, he probably expected to be spied on 24/7.

I read that moment where he says, "Uhhh... you have the powers of a ghost. Come in already!" As Ben trying to say,"I know you've been spying on us." And not as a "this mf still doesn't know how to use my aliens lmao."