A Ben divided: “Duped”
May. 3rd, 2010 01:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
akinoameFirst, let me say that by its very nature, this episode jumps around a lot. So I’m going to do the best I can for the recap. Second, this episode was apparently billed as “Ten Bens” by Cartoon Network, though the official title (and the one used by the staff) is “Duped”—which makes more sense, given that there were only three Bens, not ten.
Now, onto the review.
Two of the Forever Knights attack the museum in a tank while a couple of old guys watch on, feeding the pigeons. Rath fights them off, but he gets a call from Gwen yelling at him for being late to Julie’s tennis championship, which is apparently international. Ben finishes the battle before heading right across the street to the stadium, where the reporters all immediately turn to cover him. Julie is distracted and misses the next shot, but she’s able to make up for it. Gwen yells at Ben for being late, and when Ben tries to congratulate Julie on winning the next set, Julie turns away in hurt anger for him missing the rest of the game. Gwen continues to yell at Ben, even after Kevin adds that Ben has a point and they should see what the Forever Knights are up to, but Ben proves to be a complete dumbass as he wonders if he can catch the Sumo Slammers movie in the three-hour intermission between matches (more on this time later). Gwen gets pissed and tells Ben he can’t be in two places at once before she storms off to comfort Julie. No comment.
Ben, however, gets an idea from Gwen’s rant and goes Echo Echo, splitting himself into three. At the same time, the three clones set the Ultimatrix to human, resulting in a split of three different personality types: “Smart Ben,” “Emotional Ben,” and one that I can only describe as “Asshole Ben.” Smart Ben heads to the movies, Emotional Ben joins Kevin to track down the Forever Knights, and Asshole Ben sticks around for the match.
Quite obviously, this goes horribly wrong. While Smart Ben enjoys the movie (and seems to enjoy the fight scenes a little too much), Asshole Ben is drawing attention to himself from the media and girls and humiliating Julie, and Emotional Ben is driving Kevin up the wall with his insistence on talking about their feelings and his psychoanalysis of everything Kevin says. Fortunately for Kevin’s sanity, the Forever Knights (a sub-branch I’ll call “Ravenclaw” due to their crest and the crows all around them), led by their King Urian, attacks the museum. The two fight, though not well. Emotional Ben lacks the drive needed to actually fight, and Kevin can’t win on his own, especially when Urian activates an ancient Aztec battle armor. Seriously, Ancients, stop leaving your superweapons where anyone can find them! Emotional Ben calls the other two into action, and Kevin simply says, “If I wasn’t running for my life, I’d totally demand an explanation!” Truer words have never been said.
The three Bens attempt to fight as Big Chill, Upchuck, and Cannonbolt, but they screw each other up. Finally, they switch to Echo Echo and merge into a unified Ben, who destroys the Toltec Armor as Lodestar. Unfortunately, this also results in Kevin’s car being damaged, and he faints in horror, while the two old guys continue to feed the birds.
Back at thePan Globals tournament, Julie won, and Gwen is still pissed off. Julie explains that she can understand that part of the problem of being a Superhero’s Girlfriend is that sometimes, he’s going to have to save the world. But then Ben explains that he also went to see the movie, and she’s entirely pissed off again. Gwen joins her no comment, and Kevin admits that Ben’s really insensitive before leaving Ben to mope alone. Why do I foresee a Letter for Ben in the future?
Up until this point, I’d been operating under the assumption that Echo Echo could not transform back until all clones were accounted for—that it was a physical limitation. As it turns out, the reason why he needs to account for all of them is to ensure that only one Ben is transformed back. While we don’t see it in Echo Echo form, a divided human Ben means division of his personality traits across the copies. I’ve already discussed the potential consequences of this in a separate analysis, but it looks like a good starting point for a theory that Ben has multiple personality disorder/dissociative identity disorder. So, are there any writers in the audience willing to take the “Personality Conflicts” approach to Ben? Just me? Figures.
In the case of these three copies, it leads to a split ala id/ego/superego. Asshole Ben, who is pretty self-explanatory, is the id—narcissistic and short-tempered, always thinking about himself rather than others. He’s very much the worst of the ten-year-old, now in a sixteen-year-old body, pointing out he’s “Ben Classic” when Gwen calls him out on his attitude. He does have a bit of a conscience; when Gwen points out that Julie doesn’t like all the attention he’s drawing to her, he pipes down, not having realized that while he’d like someone to cheer for him, she doesn’t necessarily like it. Unfortunately, it leads him to the conclusion that “If this bothers Julie, it’ll bother her opponent too!” and starts trashtalking the competition, which only embarrasses Julie more. He doesn’t watch what he says, telling off a reporter in response to Will Harangue’s criticisms of him from “Fame” and flirting with another girl when she claims to be his biggest fan. He also insists loudly that Julie wasn’t supposed to win the tournament, indicating he at least doesn’t have much faith in her. Everything is about him and about “now.”
Emotional Ben is the superego, constantly worried about the other person. When his copies try to explain their plan, he’s the one who insists that they had the best intentions—to try to make everybody happy all at once. He’s definitely the gem of the trio, with the most hilarious moments. While Asshole Ben is in your face and unlikable, it’s hysterical watching Emotional Ben try to be the nice one. It’s the return of Pregnant Ben all over again (“Save the Last Dance”)! He tries to analyze his and Kevin’s relationship (though with less ho yay than “Save the Last Dance”) and really wants to be sure they’re on good terms. He picks apart Kevin’s responses and touches on the past—which seems to be the one thing that those two Never Talk About—and drives him completely insane. He does seem to have the ability to snap back into “hero mode,” since the moment they feel an explosion, he acts like a normal, Merged Ben. Unfortunately, this doesn’t mean that he’s suited for fighting. When he transforms into Humongousaur, he pretty much sings out his name. While Humongousaur: The Musical (featuring guest-villain, the Music Meister) might bring in a Tony Award, it’s not going to win any battles. Emotional Ben lacks the ruthless edge needed to fight. He’s almost timid in battle, hiding and practically asking Kevin to fight instead (whether it’s the teamwork he’s insisting on or if it’s actual fear, it’s hard to tell), and he whines when he smacks his head on a pipe, prompting Kevin to tell him to stop being such a wimp. He also completely fails to pull off a Heroic One-Liner (falling flatter than Ziggy in “Ranger Red”), because he lacks the meanness and sharp wit. It’s only when he’s fully merged again that Ben can throw off a quip that pretty much requires sunglasses and “Won’t Get Fooled Again” in the background.
Smart Ben is the Ben with the least amount of screentime, and so the least to analyze. I’d say he falls under ego in Freud’s setup—a slave to the machinations of the id (Asshole Ben) and superego (Emotional Ben), with no real definition on its own. But I have to say that it’s this Ben that had me intrigued at the very beginning. Yuri Lowenthal plays him almost exactly the same way he plays Albedo, with a smug attitude behind his intelligence and creativity. He’s intelligence without conscience, which implies Ben may have more in common with Albedo than either of them would care to admit. He also seems to have that ruthless edge that the other two lack; Emotional Ben can’t find it in himself to hurt anyone, and despite being…well, an asshole, Asshole Ben doesn’t really want to hurt Julie when he tries to cheer her on and fails to realize the consequences of his behavior. Smart Ben is the one who goes to the movie, and he reacts with…um, well, let’s just say he seems to enjoy the action sequences a little too much. He’s also the one who keeps coming back for more in the battle, when he transforms into Big Chill. Upchuck and Cannonbolt are taken down quickly, but Big Chill doesn’t give up, carrying the Merged Ben’s determination. It certainly doesn’t make him the best fighter of the trio, but it’s something worth pointing out. He’s also the one with the snappy dialogue, showing where they got their catchphrase “It’s hero time!” with a line from the movie: “It’s slammer time!” (Can’t touch this?)
This episode introduces another sect of the Forever Knights, who have their own King, Urian. These Knights have a crest of a raven, and Urian keeps the blackbirds around. Urian also has no sense of humor at all, killing one of his Knights for failure with an electrical gauntlet (and we can tell the guy’s dead because the crows—carrion birds—start pecking at the body. Ouch) and threatening the rest. The Ravenclaw Knights look like a small sect from what we see, but if that’s the case, I don’t blame them. Who wants to work with that guy? We also learn that our ancient ancestors were visited by aliens, who left behind their technology (feel free to make Stargate mythos jokes; I sure did!). The Aztecs, apparently in exchange for their chocolate, got a frickin’ sweet battle armor that apparently has some kind of magnetic field because Lodestar is able to manipulate it into attracting the metal nearby. Including Kevin’s car.Take a drink.
I do have to point out a little nit: Gwen says that they’ve got three hours before Julie’s next match, and Ben realizes it means he has time to see the movie. That means that even if Smart Ben had to catch the next show, Emotional Ben should have been fighting before Asshole Ben needed to watch the game. The Ravenclaw Knights did not take long to drill through the ground, and even accounting for traveling time, three hours is a long time to be walking. I can’t see someone as impatient as Urian wanting to walk all that way for three hours.
We also learn that Ben’s middle name is Kirby, presumably as a homage to Jack “The King” Kirby, co-creator of comic book characters such as Captain America, the Fantastic Four, and the characters of the Fourth World (Darkseid, the New Gods, etc.). Also, as a nice nod to continuity, one of the reporters brought up Will Harangue, the pundit from “Fame” who insisted Ben was a threat or a menace. I’m thinking he’ll probably return to plague Ben again.
I pushed this piece of analysis down so as not to completely color the rest of the review. The driving motivation behind this episode is something that really bugs me. It bugs me on the level of Kendrix and Maya in Lost Galaxy’s Orion Rising. Like there, when I had to take Kendrix’s side despite her OOC bitchiness, I’ve got to side with Ben on this one despite his narcissism even before he split himself up. When Ben first arrives late to the match and winds up swamped by reporters, both Julie and Gwen are pissed off. Ben doesn’t get a chance to explain that he ran into the Forever Knights along the way before Gwen rips him a new one. Julie admits at the end that she should have been more understanding about it, but it’s not enough. Yeah, she should be mad at Ben for deciding to schedule his “me time” in the middle of his “girlfriend time,” but she has no reason to get pissed that he probably can’t even go to the grocery store without getting mobbed by something. Think any time the Power Rangers visit Angel Grove Park and add to it Tony Stark’s ability to attract cameras. Ben (at least Merged Ben) doesn’t mean to get into all this trouble, but it just happens. When Ben says, “Forever Knights,” Gwen shouldn’t be yelling at him. She should stop cold and go, “What happened?” And then try to explain it to Julie on his behalf. God, I wonder how they’d react if Ben ran into an enemy Gwen considered much more of a threat.
As for why it really, really bothers me regarding Julie…in my mind, it’s not a matter of who’s right or wrong. All of the characters involved were in the wrong. What matters here is how in-character the response is. For Ben, sadly, this whole mess is in-character, up to and including his being more concerned about a movie than about making things up to his girlfriend. We’ve seen this attitude all throughout Alien Force season three. The idea of him making an ass of himself now that he’s famous is one we’ve had to be ready for going into Ultimate Alien. For Gwen, this is a very strange behavior. She’s usually the one telling Ben to prioritize and take battles seriously. Remember “Vengeance of Vilgax”? She and Kevin were pissed when Ben blew them off repeatedly during missions.
But for Julie, this seems contradictory to her normal behavior. In “Pier Pressure,” she entered a relationship with Ben knowing what she’d be in for—that alien business is going to be a big obstacle in their relationship. Ben will have to blow off dates in order to save the world. She saw what this was like firsthand in “War of the Worlds,” when she joined the team fighting the Highbreed invasion. She and Ben were separated most of the fight, since Ben had to go to the front lines and she had to provide air support. In “Pet Project” and “Don’t Fear the Repo,” she was upset with Ben’s lack of concern about the mission because Ben didn’t like Ship. Ben was arguing with her in the first one about her keeping Ship, and in the second, she wondered if Ben was only taking it seriously because he saw Ship’s value as a weapon, not his personal value to Julie as her pet. These are actually the points where you can argue that it’s all been leading up to this episode—Ben’s continued inability to understand his girlfriend’s feelings leads to a breaking point.
But here comes the dealbreaker: “Fame.” Just one episode ago, Julie was Ben’s confidante. Ben was worried about the consequences of his identity being revealed, and Julie was the one trying to get him to lighten up. She tried to keep his mind off it, turn off the TV when Will Harangue’s poll came up, and reminded him that at the very least, she was there for him if no one else was.
So it seems odd to me that after all of that, she seems to let it get to her so much when Ben’s fame inconveniences her. In my opinion, that’s the exact same thing as Ben only caring about Ship when it comes down to how much he matters to Ben and not to Julie. Julie would have known that Ben would have the reporters swarming him the moment he stepped into the stadium, late or not. She knows that he’s going to have to miss some of his Boyfriendly Obligations because he’s got to do whatever he can to make sure that the world will be around tomorrow for them to be together. Is she allowed to feel upset and forgotten? Sure. But she’s got to remember that this is the danger she set herself up for. It’s like being married to a soldier—you know that the relationship is going to be strained, that he’s going to be deployed anywhere at any time, that there are going to be some things that he’s not going to be able to talk with her about either because of confidentiality or because he’s afraid she won’t understand, and that there will be consequences that he brings home even when he’s not actively fighting. The battle is never over. And up until this episode, Julie seemed to understand that. I’m not going to say that if she wasn’t prepared for that, she should call it off and save herself the heartbreak; she clearly was ready in the beginning. It’s just like it’s all of a sudden that she’s bothered by the consequences, now that they’re affecting her more than they seem to be affecting Ben. She has to realize it’s a two-way street.
So major props to Kevin for coming out of this one smelling like a rose. Oh, and to the two old guys feeding the pigeons. You guys did absolutely nothing, and yet you totally rocked.
“Duped” was written by Len Uhley. Vyvan Pham played Julie. I couldn’t make out who played Urian, unfortunately.
TV.com reports that Jim Paddock played Urian.
Now, onto the review.
Two of the Forever Knights attack the museum in a tank while a couple of old guys watch on, feeding the pigeons. Rath fights them off, but he gets a call from Gwen yelling at him for being late to Julie’s tennis championship, which is apparently international. Ben finishes the battle before heading right across the street to the stadium, where the reporters all immediately turn to cover him. Julie is distracted and misses the next shot, but she’s able to make up for it. Gwen yells at Ben for being late, and when Ben tries to congratulate Julie on winning the next set, Julie turns away in hurt anger for him missing the rest of the game. Gwen continues to yell at Ben, even after Kevin adds that Ben has a point and they should see what the Forever Knights are up to, but Ben proves to be a complete dumbass as he wonders if he can catch the Sumo Slammers movie in the three-hour intermission between matches (more on this time later). Gwen gets pissed and tells Ben he can’t be in two places at once before she storms off to comfort Julie. No comment.
Ben, however, gets an idea from Gwen’s rant and goes Echo Echo, splitting himself into three. At the same time, the three clones set the Ultimatrix to human, resulting in a split of three different personality types: “Smart Ben,” “Emotional Ben,” and one that I can only describe as “Asshole Ben.” Smart Ben heads to the movies, Emotional Ben joins Kevin to track down the Forever Knights, and Asshole Ben sticks around for the match.
Quite obviously, this goes horribly wrong. While Smart Ben enjoys the movie (and seems to enjoy the fight scenes a little too much), Asshole Ben is drawing attention to himself from the media and girls and humiliating Julie, and Emotional Ben is driving Kevin up the wall with his insistence on talking about their feelings and his psychoanalysis of everything Kevin says. Fortunately for Kevin’s sanity, the Forever Knights (a sub-branch I’ll call “Ravenclaw” due to their crest and the crows all around them), led by their King Urian, attacks the museum. The two fight, though not well. Emotional Ben lacks the drive needed to actually fight, and Kevin can’t win on his own, especially when Urian activates an ancient Aztec battle armor. Seriously, Ancients, stop leaving your superweapons where anyone can find them! Emotional Ben calls the other two into action, and Kevin simply says, “If I wasn’t running for my life, I’d totally demand an explanation!” Truer words have never been said.
The three Bens attempt to fight as Big Chill, Upchuck, and Cannonbolt, but they screw each other up. Finally, they switch to Echo Echo and merge into a unified Ben, who destroys the Toltec Armor as Lodestar. Unfortunately, this also results in Kevin’s car being damaged, and he faints in horror, while the two old guys continue to feed the birds.
Back at the
Up until this point, I’d been operating under the assumption that Echo Echo could not transform back until all clones were accounted for—that it was a physical limitation. As it turns out, the reason why he needs to account for all of them is to ensure that only one Ben is transformed back. While we don’t see it in Echo Echo form, a divided human Ben means division of his personality traits across the copies. I’ve already discussed the potential consequences of this in a separate analysis, but it looks like a good starting point for a theory that Ben has multiple personality disorder/dissociative identity disorder. So, are there any writers in the audience willing to take the “Personality Conflicts” approach to Ben? Just me? Figures.
In the case of these three copies, it leads to a split ala id/ego/superego. Asshole Ben, who is pretty self-explanatory, is the id—narcissistic and short-tempered, always thinking about himself rather than others. He’s very much the worst of the ten-year-old, now in a sixteen-year-old body, pointing out he’s “Ben Classic” when Gwen calls him out on his attitude. He does have a bit of a conscience; when Gwen points out that Julie doesn’t like all the attention he’s drawing to her, he pipes down, not having realized that while he’d like someone to cheer for him, she doesn’t necessarily like it. Unfortunately, it leads him to the conclusion that “If this bothers Julie, it’ll bother her opponent too!” and starts trashtalking the competition, which only embarrasses Julie more. He doesn’t watch what he says, telling off a reporter in response to Will Harangue’s criticisms of him from “Fame” and flirting with another girl when she claims to be his biggest fan. He also insists loudly that Julie wasn’t supposed to win the tournament, indicating he at least doesn’t have much faith in her. Everything is about him and about “now.”
Emotional Ben is the superego, constantly worried about the other person. When his copies try to explain their plan, he’s the one who insists that they had the best intentions—to try to make everybody happy all at once. He’s definitely the gem of the trio, with the most hilarious moments. While Asshole Ben is in your face and unlikable, it’s hysterical watching Emotional Ben try to be the nice one. It’s the return of Pregnant Ben all over again (“Save the Last Dance”)! He tries to analyze his and Kevin’s relationship (though with less ho yay than “Save the Last Dance”) and really wants to be sure they’re on good terms. He picks apart Kevin’s responses and touches on the past—which seems to be the one thing that those two Never Talk About—and drives him completely insane. He does seem to have the ability to snap back into “hero mode,” since the moment they feel an explosion, he acts like a normal, Merged Ben. Unfortunately, this doesn’t mean that he’s suited for fighting. When he transforms into Humongousaur, he pretty much sings out his name. While Humongousaur: The Musical (featuring guest-villain, the Music Meister) might bring in a Tony Award, it’s not going to win any battles. Emotional Ben lacks the ruthless edge needed to fight. He’s almost timid in battle, hiding and practically asking Kevin to fight instead (whether it’s the teamwork he’s insisting on or if it’s actual fear, it’s hard to tell), and he whines when he smacks his head on a pipe, prompting Kevin to tell him to stop being such a wimp. He also completely fails to pull off a Heroic One-Liner (falling flatter than Ziggy in “Ranger Red”), because he lacks the meanness and sharp wit. It’s only when he’s fully merged again that Ben can throw off a quip that pretty much requires sunglasses and “Won’t Get Fooled Again” in the background.
Smart Ben is the Ben with the least amount of screentime, and so the least to analyze. I’d say he falls under ego in Freud’s setup—a slave to the machinations of the id (Asshole Ben) and superego (Emotional Ben), with no real definition on its own. But I have to say that it’s this Ben that had me intrigued at the very beginning. Yuri Lowenthal plays him almost exactly the same way he plays Albedo, with a smug attitude behind his intelligence and creativity. He’s intelligence without conscience, which implies Ben may have more in common with Albedo than either of them would care to admit. He also seems to have that ruthless edge that the other two lack; Emotional Ben can’t find it in himself to hurt anyone, and despite being…well, an asshole, Asshole Ben doesn’t really want to hurt Julie when he tries to cheer her on and fails to realize the consequences of his behavior. Smart Ben is the one who goes to the movie, and he reacts with…um, well, let’s just say he seems to enjoy the action sequences a little too much. He’s also the one who keeps coming back for more in the battle, when he transforms into Big Chill. Upchuck and Cannonbolt are taken down quickly, but Big Chill doesn’t give up, carrying the Merged Ben’s determination. It certainly doesn’t make him the best fighter of the trio, but it’s something worth pointing out. He’s also the one with the snappy dialogue, showing where they got their catchphrase “It’s hero time!” with a line from the movie: “It’s slammer time!” (Can’t touch this?)
This episode introduces another sect of the Forever Knights, who have their own King, Urian. These Knights have a crest of a raven, and Urian keeps the blackbirds around. Urian also has no sense of humor at all, killing one of his Knights for failure with an electrical gauntlet (and we can tell the guy’s dead because the crows—carrion birds—start pecking at the body. Ouch) and threatening the rest. The Ravenclaw Knights look like a small sect from what we see, but if that’s the case, I don’t blame them. Who wants to work with that guy? We also learn that our ancient ancestors were visited by aliens, who left behind their technology (feel free to make Stargate mythos jokes; I sure did!). The Aztecs, apparently in exchange for their chocolate, got a frickin’ sweet battle armor that apparently has some kind of magnetic field because Lodestar is able to manipulate it into attracting the metal nearby. Including Kevin’s car.
I do have to point out a little nit: Gwen says that they’ve got three hours before Julie’s next match, and Ben realizes it means he has time to see the movie. That means that even if Smart Ben had to catch the next show, Emotional Ben should have been fighting before Asshole Ben needed to watch the game. The Ravenclaw Knights did not take long to drill through the ground, and even accounting for traveling time, three hours is a long time to be walking. I can’t see someone as impatient as Urian wanting to walk all that way for three hours.
We also learn that Ben’s middle name is Kirby, presumably as a homage to Jack “The King” Kirby, co-creator of comic book characters such as Captain America, the Fantastic Four, and the characters of the Fourth World (Darkseid, the New Gods, etc.). Also, as a nice nod to continuity, one of the reporters brought up Will Harangue, the pundit from “Fame” who insisted Ben was a threat or a menace. I’m thinking he’ll probably return to plague Ben again.
I pushed this piece of analysis down so as not to completely color the rest of the review. The driving motivation behind this episode is something that really bugs me. It bugs me on the level of Kendrix and Maya in Lost Galaxy’s Orion Rising. Like there, when I had to take Kendrix’s side despite her OOC bitchiness, I’ve got to side with Ben on this one despite his narcissism even before he split himself up. When Ben first arrives late to the match and winds up swamped by reporters, both Julie and Gwen are pissed off. Ben doesn’t get a chance to explain that he ran into the Forever Knights along the way before Gwen rips him a new one. Julie admits at the end that she should have been more understanding about it, but it’s not enough. Yeah, she should be mad at Ben for deciding to schedule his “me time” in the middle of his “girlfriend time,” but she has no reason to get pissed that he probably can’t even go to the grocery store without getting mobbed by something. Think any time the Power Rangers visit Angel Grove Park and add to it Tony Stark’s ability to attract cameras. Ben (at least Merged Ben) doesn’t mean to get into all this trouble, but it just happens. When Ben says, “Forever Knights,” Gwen shouldn’t be yelling at him. She should stop cold and go, “What happened?” And then try to explain it to Julie on his behalf. God, I wonder how they’d react if Ben ran into an enemy Gwen considered much more of a threat.
As for why it really, really bothers me regarding Julie…in my mind, it’s not a matter of who’s right or wrong. All of the characters involved were in the wrong. What matters here is how in-character the response is. For Ben, sadly, this whole mess is in-character, up to and including his being more concerned about a movie than about making things up to his girlfriend. We’ve seen this attitude all throughout Alien Force season three. The idea of him making an ass of himself now that he’s famous is one we’ve had to be ready for going into Ultimate Alien. For Gwen, this is a very strange behavior. She’s usually the one telling Ben to prioritize and take battles seriously. Remember “Vengeance of Vilgax”? She and Kevin were pissed when Ben blew them off repeatedly during missions.
But for Julie, this seems contradictory to her normal behavior. In “Pier Pressure,” she entered a relationship with Ben knowing what she’d be in for—that alien business is going to be a big obstacle in their relationship. Ben will have to blow off dates in order to save the world. She saw what this was like firsthand in “War of the Worlds,” when she joined the team fighting the Highbreed invasion. She and Ben were separated most of the fight, since Ben had to go to the front lines and she had to provide air support. In “Pet Project” and “Don’t Fear the Repo,” she was upset with Ben’s lack of concern about the mission because Ben didn’t like Ship. Ben was arguing with her in the first one about her keeping Ship, and in the second, she wondered if Ben was only taking it seriously because he saw Ship’s value as a weapon, not his personal value to Julie as her pet. These are actually the points where you can argue that it’s all been leading up to this episode—Ben’s continued inability to understand his girlfriend’s feelings leads to a breaking point.
But here comes the dealbreaker: “Fame.” Just one episode ago, Julie was Ben’s confidante. Ben was worried about the consequences of his identity being revealed, and Julie was the one trying to get him to lighten up. She tried to keep his mind off it, turn off the TV when Will Harangue’s poll came up, and reminded him that at the very least, she was there for him if no one else was.
So it seems odd to me that after all of that, she seems to let it get to her so much when Ben’s fame inconveniences her. In my opinion, that’s the exact same thing as Ben only caring about Ship when it comes down to how much he matters to Ben and not to Julie. Julie would have known that Ben would have the reporters swarming him the moment he stepped into the stadium, late or not. She knows that he’s going to have to miss some of his Boyfriendly Obligations because he’s got to do whatever he can to make sure that the world will be around tomorrow for them to be together. Is she allowed to feel upset and forgotten? Sure. But she’s got to remember that this is the danger she set herself up for. It’s like being married to a soldier—you know that the relationship is going to be strained, that he’s going to be deployed anywhere at any time, that there are going to be some things that he’s not going to be able to talk with her about either because of confidentiality or because he’s afraid she won’t understand, and that there will be consequences that he brings home even when he’s not actively fighting. The battle is never over. And up until this episode, Julie seemed to understand that. I’m not going to say that if she wasn’t prepared for that, she should call it off and save herself the heartbreak; she clearly was ready in the beginning. It’s just like it’s all of a sudden that she’s bothered by the consequences, now that they’re affecting her more than they seem to be affecting Ben. She has to realize it’s a two-way street.
So major props to Kevin for coming out of this one smelling like a rose. Oh, and to the two old guys feeding the pigeons. You guys did absolutely nothing, and yet you totally rocked.
“Duped” was written by Len Uhley. Vyvan Pham played Julie. I couldn’t make out who played Urian, unfortunately.
TV.com reports that Jim Paddock played Urian.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2010-05-03 08:54 pm (UTC)I see Julie's reaction, while totally not her usual style as previously evidenced, somewhat reminiscent of Mary Jane in Spider-Man 3-how she had to deal with Peter being admired and adored by lots of fans, and him just basking it in. (It was the opposite in Spider-Man 2 but that's a subject for another time.)
Gwen was partly right when she said that Julie's match was important at the beginning but when Ben brought up the Forever Knights she could've mobilized the troops with him and Kevin, gone out to save the world and dragged Ben back to see Julie finish her set-then he could've gone with Julie to see the movie.
At the least, the next time Ben breaks out into song, he should go with Echo Echo instead of Humongousaur. "Never do that again...!" Pure gold. Hopefully things don't go the way of that particular letter as Julie is more than just 'Ben's girlfriend' and can be utilized more often than not even though the team has Ben's car, Kevin's should-go-to-a-shop-to-get-fixed car and the new Rustbucket. Sure she wouldn't let Ship fire the more dangerous weapons but that doesn't mean she couldn't defend herself as things progress. And, definitely can't wait for JJ's alternate Ben 10 version to show back up.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-05-03 09:31 pm (UTC)Y'know, maybe it's a good thing that Ben never really knew Grissom all that well in Dive. I don't know how Kevin would react to random Shakespeare.
Yeah. I understand Julie, but I've got to say it just doesn't match with what we've seen of her character. Especially when she JUST told Ben that she was going to be there for him through the unmasking. Now she knows what Ben was going through, but instead of empathizing with him, she just got mad at him--and before he really did something to warrant it.
Agreed so much about Gwen. Julie's tennis match is important, but it's not as important as the end of the world. Ben's got to blow off his own soccer games to save the world; why expect him to treat anyone else differently? Priorities, girl!
Oh yeah. We don't need to see Ben completely heartbroken, forced into an awkward relationship with a girl who's liked him in the past and really deserved a better written relationship than a rebound, or his friends setting him up with a ski instructor twice his age, or Julie coming back a year later while on a scuba trip with a friend they said goodbye to in the finale, only for them both to be sacrificed to an evil volcano god and brainwashed into evil, and Ben has to get strangled by his brainwashed friend before they break through the spell.
...Though, on the other hand, I wouldn't mind seeing a fic ten years later, after Ben's mysteriously become a doctor and a teacher, his students beg him to take them to an "Alien Force Day" back in his hometown of Bellwood, and he winds up in a lot of bizarre situations as all of his friends team up with his students in the attempt to set Ben and Julie back up again. Oh, and it involves Mr. Mongolian Hamster and Ms. Syrian Gerbil.
Yeah, Julie's got a lot of potential, and it bothers me that they never really use her as anything other than "Ben's girlfriend" (and sometimes, I think, Gwen's). It bugs me about a few characters, actually, including the Tennyson family and Elena--you've got these people on the border of normality, who know what's going on and while aren't superheroes, certainly know how to hold their own. They can act as the liaison between normal life and the weird life, and there's really not a lot of exploration of that.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-05-04 01:00 am (UTC)Ben 10: Dino Thunder, where Azmuth enlisted in the help of Paradox to go back in time and collect the DNA samples of over 10,000 different dinosaur species and calls this latest watch the Dinomatrix. Guess who finds it, slaps it on and has to maintain a secret identity? Hint-not Ben Tennyson, but someone who's DNA is a close enough match. Kevin would be like 'long as no one messes with my car!' regarding setting Ben and Julie back up.
The only way the liaison between normal life and the weird life is shown is with Ben, and as awesome as that is it needs to branch out to more of his non-powered friends and family-Ben's family, Julie and Elena for example or even Grandpa Max - an excellent way to show that is by having Julie teamed with Elena to prevent Bellwood from being destroyed by Vilgax while Ben and co. are trying to get back in time to help from a peace conference off-world, which would totally be Paradox's suggestion; Max could even help out by saying that he's pulling his grandson from a soccer game.
And, no-as much as Kevin would appreciate it, the Stargate cannot be used to get them back home instantaneously.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-05-04 01:21 am (UTC)I feel like Ben's not even getting much of a role being in-between normal and weird now that everyone is in on the weird. I'm not sure what I feel about it. On the one hand, I like that it's upfront, and that he's going to have to handle issues maturely. But on the other hand, it feels like there's this unbreachable divide between Ben and "normal people" that's only gotten bigger now that his identity's been revealed. There are levels of interaction you can have when you've got a secret identity that you can't have anymore when you've gone public. (Felt that way regarding PRiS/LG in "To The Tenth Power" until Kendrix set herself on even footing with Cassie with her sacrifice in "Power of Pink")
I don't know. Maybe I'll get a better feel for it after "Hit 'Em Where They Live." Kinda interesting that all these villains were nice enough to wait until AFTER Ben had gone public to attack his family.
Oh, and let's not talk about Peace Conferences. You're lucky if you get called back from one to become the new Gold Ranger.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-05-04 04:57 am (UTC)The fact that Ben was shocked to be kissed on the cheek by Jullie after dating her for what, close to a year? A kiss shouldn't shock him. It showed that Ben's thinking of her wasn't where it should be. After that much time they should be at least be comfortable playing touncil hockey.
I don't think I'm the only one seeing a problem. Gwen knows Ben's relationship is in trouble with Jullie, that, in her mind, Ben is seriously dropping the ball. Not saying it's all Ben's fault, Jullie has her own issues, but Gwen isn't seeing that side of it. She knows the tournament is important to Jullie. Ben has had his moments to shine, and his girlfriend was there to see him save the universe. Now it was Ben's turn to see the greatest achievement Jullie could accomplish, and he was going to miss it.
Gwen's anger wasn't about him missing the tennis tournament, it's about Ben's relationship with Jullie becoming more strained.
As for Jullie, it's the timing. Of course she's going to be frustrated at him showing up late and blowing her concentration. She's tense and filled with adrenilin as she's competing in the middle of a tournament. She was perfectly willing to forgive afterwards when she had time to cool off and relax. Then to learn that part of him split to go watch a movie instead of watch her important moment, that after promising to be there for him, he _intentionally_ failed to be there for her, I don't see anyone forgiving that.
I fear that Ben will be gaining a throw away girlfriend. Jullie is a girl to marry, but chances are the next one would be one to have sex with. A girl more interested in Ben's fame than in Ben. Course, if such a girl does come forth, she's likely to scare the crap out of Ben, wanting his 'alien child.'
(no subject)
Date: 2010-05-05 01:11 am (UTC)