Ben 10 2016 Reboot Episode Review: Story, Bored

[Tactical Ochoa]

I.J. Crowling, huh? Ah yes, an obvious reference to J.K. Rowling, a beloved writer who recently undermined much of her reputation thanks to her disillusioned, bullshit, and hypocritical political views. Such times we live in now.

Also, when Crowling is reading the actual magic book, why do the pages look like they're blank? What, the animators and artists can't just put little scribbles on the pages to make it look like there's writing in it?

In this episode, Ben and Gwen go to see an event where they meet I.J. Crowling with Ben being more interested in checking out the castle itself because he's more interested in it being haunted. Hex shows up and acquires a magic book, the Grimoire of Archamada, which he used to become a giant snake. Ben battles Hex, Ben gets the Grimoire away from Hex, Hex gets defeated, the end.

Let's talk about Hex. I've read on some people's comments on how because Hex is a giant snake in this episode, he's now portrayed better and more threatening as a villain as he was in the previous episodes that he appeared in. No, that's not even the case here. This is no different from when Hex used a set of magic gauntlets and from when Hex had a magic wand. Reboot Hex in this episode is still reboot Hex. He is still the same as he was in Freaky Gwen Ben and Brief Career of Lucky Girl. This episode didn't improve him and make him better. It just gave us more of the same. In this episode, Hex is still a once great villain now turned into a shell of his former self made to be stupid and whacky just for the sake of bringing in more comedy to a show that is supposed to be focused mainly on action and not comedy.

There is some tension with the action though; especially after the Omnitrix timed out on Ben. Therefore, this action scene is a little better than most of the action scenes shown in previous episodes. Granted, however, the writers still find ways to put in slapstick comedy, which hurts the action in this episode as well. The action in this episode isn't great but it is good except for those moments where they put in slapstick comedy.

Overall, this episode is an another ok episode. I guess you can make the argument though that it's good. I just find it to be average, just like most of the other episodes. It just doesn't offer much, just like at least most of the other episodes. At least we get to see Gwen use a spell at the end of the episode though. Please more of that but I doubt that they'll do it.