Bwen
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Reviving another ancient topic lol.
I have said before that personally I'm not a Bwen fan personally . The way I see it is that Ben and Gwen work off each other like brother and sister - in fact given that Ben is an only child, for me it seems that Gwen is like the sister than he never had . But they balanced each other out really well in the original. I think that the reason the ship was so popular was that Gwen was the only girl of his age whom Ben spent time with in the original - Lucy only had two short scenes in one episode while Kai...yeah fans didn't like her after how she treated Ben at the end of "Benwolf". And of course their chemistry with each other naturally led to a lot of shipping. Personally I think that if one sees romantic vibes in their relationship then the shipping makes sense, and if one doesn't then the relationship is purely platonic and non-romantic.
However I think that their bond with each other definitely fell to the wayside by the later shows, and while Kevin's good guy transition was one reason (I will get to that) I think that the primary reason was because Gwen and Ben weren't that well written as characters in AF, especially in comparison to the original series. Due to Alien Force trying really hard to push the "mature" theme of the show, they made Ben an essentially morally perfect protagonist initially, making him very mature and serious. I get what they were going for but it just made him feel so boring and generic rather than being a distinct character. Gwen was just as bad if not worse in terms of character. In the original she was a pretty distinct character - yes she could sometimes get annoying due to her personality but she was someone who you could root for and care about, just like Ben was. Alien Force changed all that by basically reducing her to being the stereotypical "mature token girl" of the series. She was so drastically different from who she was before that it didn't feel like she was the same person at all. She felt really passive and almost soft , and seemed to have lost most of her wit and feistiness to the point where this 15 year old girl was acting like a mother. Heck they even changed her magic from blue to pink to further make her the token girl.
However, my biggest problem with Gwen as a character was how she became so dependent on her relationship with Kevin in UAF. Again, this is taking an independent female character and making her too dependent on romantic motivations which doesn't feel right at all for me. The Gwevin ship itself doesn't make a whole lot of sense in context but that's a different can of worms. Regardless, introducing Kevin into the fold and forcing Gwevin (within what, 4 episodes?) disrupted the balance between Gwen and Ben (as mentioned earlier in the topic). It placed the focus on Gwen and Kevin's rushed romance rather than the bond between Ben and Gwen and how they balance each other out
To be fair to Ultimate Alien it did do some things right. They brought back Gwen's hot blooded nature from the original series, and although it felt that she complained more, it was still a huge step up from Alien Force Gwen. Ben was a bit of a jerk but I think that UA was the closest to giving us a balanced teenage Ben who can be both cocky and serious. I think that UA for all of its flaws did a slightly better job of writing their main characters - but they didn't nail them. The Ultimate Kevin arc was once again guilty of making Gwen overly reliant on her romantic motivations, and while she and Ben did work together in this arc, Ben was acting out of character anyway so...yeah the characterisation in that arc was a bit all over the place.
But anyway, because of the focus on Gwevin we barely have any interactions between Ben and Gwen. Gwen often sides and spends time with Kevin over Ben due to the romantic subplot and thus we never really get to see them have any banter or meaningful intereactions and as Primarily because Ben and Gwen in Alien Force are just either dull or inconsistent as characters and one could even say generic. I get that the narrative is that they've matured and don't fight as much anymore, which is fine. However they have hardly any chemistry and rivalry between them in UAF, if any at all because of the focus on Gwevin. I know that many people prefer them always getting along as opposed to their bickering, but personally I think that there should've been a midground in the sequel series: yes have them act more respectful and less immature towards each other but keep their distinct personalities and their banter with each other. I mean they're 15/16 year olds for crying out loud.
“There’s always another way. In fact, sometimes to do something, all you need to do is nothing.” -Professor Paradox
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@coreofthesun I've been wanting to make a revised, more updated version of the original post on this page but never got around to it.
That does seem like one factor behind why Bwen was so popular, but ultimately, I say it comes down to how their relationship was handled. Ben and Gwen's relationship in the Original Series was well written. It was dynamic and engaging and had a lot of chemistry. Ben and Gwen start off on not so good terms with each other and over time, they've grown to really care for each other. Ben and Gwen have the best relationship in the franchise. Whenever those two are on screen doing something together, everything just works. It works so well that Ben and Gwen just don't work as characters without their relationship. They need each other in order to work as characters. Gwen is just as important to have on the franchise as Ben is. That's why many think that Ben and Gwen would be a good fit to be in a romantic relationship with each other.
Everything else I agree with. In fact, you suggest having a middle ground with how Ben and Gwen's relationship should be handled in the sequel shows and, well, I recall that the Little Moments series did that. In that series, Ben and Gwen do gradually become more and more mature but they still maintained their usual banter with each other. It became more of a game to them. It went from Ben and Gwen pushing each other's buttons to annoy each other to pushing each other's buttons just to have fun with each other and tease each other. Their relationship was handled so well in Little Moments that it felt very natural and fitting.
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@Tactical-Ochoa Oh yeah totally agreed that their relationship was great in the original series - they compliment and balance each other out incredibly well. It's just that I think that maybe they wouldn't have been shipped as much if other possible love interests were developed in the original series (eg. if Kai didn't make those insensitive comments at the end of "Benwolf", maybe she would've been more popular). Although I'm not a Bwen shipper I don't mind other people shipping them. As for the cultural side of things while cousin relationships are frowned upon in the US that isn't the case everywhere: I have South Asian heritage (even though I've lived in the West my entire life), and over there cousin relationships and marriages do still happen (albeit not so commonly anymore) and it's perfectly legal in that part of the world, where Ben 10 is also watched widely so yh.
Regardless, they need that dynamic bond between them. We need to see both of them developing as characters and paralleling each other's growth which was something that was missed out on in the sequels. And whether their relationship is romantic or not they can still have playful banter which is not just to get on each other's nerves rather than because they hate each other.
“There’s always another way. In fact, sometimes to do something, all you need to do is nothing.” -Professor Paradox
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@coreofthesun In the case with Kai, a really easy solution would've been to just have her apologize to Ben and have her be more kind and respectful towards him. Instead, they made her even worse in Omniverse. I could at least excuse Kai's behavior in the Original Series as her simply being a kid and not knowing better. Kai having an attraction towards Ben's alien forms while not being respectful towards Ben himself was just stupid.
There is that cultural factor as well. It's one of the reasons why I don't mind about cousin relationships. Different countries have different cultural views towards all sorts of stuff. As you said so yourself, the southern Asian region are more accepting towards cousin relationships and marriages. People (as far as I can tell, it's usually Americans) that would condemn Bwen and be disrespectful and throw insults at Bwen shippers I don't think tend to factor this stuff in. Almost like they think that their cultural views apply to everywhere or they think that everyone should conform to their cultural views or something of the likes. That's my assumption at least.
As long as it doesn't cause actual harm towards others, I prefer respecting other people's cultures. Even if I disagree with them, it's not my right to demand that they should conform to something else. It's also not right to disrespect other people's cultures either.
As for your last point, once again, like how Little Moments handled their relationship. Whether their relationship is made to be romantic or not, at least maintain that dynamic that Ben and Gwen had in the Original Series. Have their relationship improve and grow more but also keep Ben and Gwen as their old selves and maintain their banter with each other.
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Just very curious on what was the deleted posts that @Ultimate-OmniTri @Oldtaku_dd posted. Something tells me it wasn't deleted by them
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I’m not someone who is massively into shipping characters for the sake of it. Especially not when it comes to the...R34 fanart. Yet I adore the Bwen ship because Ben and Gwen just complete each other so naturally and well. The only thing that stops this from being one of the most obvious ships in fiction is the fact that they are cousins. The thing is that in the early versions of the OG series, they were actually classmates rather than cousins, but when the writers changed it last minute, they still left behind quite a bit of the romantic subtext betweeen them. Which is one of the reasons why the ship became so popular.
Yet because of the whole incest issue, Bwen shippers don’t exactly get a good name. I was active a few years ago within the fandom and when I said that I was a Bwen shipper I was called a paedophile, told that I needed to be locked away in a mental asylum, accused of wanting to shag my cousins, and other responses in a similar vein. I am absolutely against paedophilia and personally find the fanart which sexualises the younger versions of the characters utterly sickening, but apparently the Ben 10 fandom is actually infamous to others for that fanart. I detest porn and R34 art in general as a girl since I find it really disrespectful and degrading , but sexualising minors is utterly unacceptable. I also do not have any kind of attraction to my cousins just because I ship Ben and Gwen. Some of the things which were said to me was a massive reason why I left the fandom for a few years.
Earlier in this thread it was mentioned that being in a relationship with your cousin isn’t taboo everywhere in the world, and Ben 10 is watched widely in areas which allow cousin relationships. Also, incest tends to only really become an issue if inbreeding is repeated over generations leading to a smaller gene pool. Besides, there are cousin couples who adopt children in case they are scared that their own child would not turn out well if they were to conceive one. Anyways, although I understand why they didn’t make Bwen canon, I think that it would have been a very brave decision if they did, and ultimately one which makes the most sense. Far more than...ugh Gwevin. Wtf were they thinking with that? If anyone likes the ship then that’s fine but it wasn’t some epic romance to me, more an edgy guy/good girl combo which made zero sense given that Kevin tried to murder Gwen twice 5 years prior.
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@KineceleranGirl I'm really sorry for what you had to go through due to being a supporter of Bwen. Nobody should be slandered to that extent for their opinions on the characters of an animated series. The argument of simply shipping them together being paedophilia is stupid. This therefore means that shipping Phineas and Isabella from Phineas and Ferb is paedophilia, or shipping Ash and Dawn from Pokemon is paedophilia, and so on (I'm not really into shipping either and I imagine that there are countless other examples). Yes there are the weirdos in every fandom who get kicks out of looking at NSFW fanart of underage characters going at it like jackrabbits which I also find absolutely disgusting, but simply shipping two fictional characters isn't creepy by itself.
Although I'm not a Bwen shipper, I can perfectly understand why people ship them and given that a large amount of the fanbase is from the US, it is the taboo against cousin relationships which causes such outcry. Another part of the "ew" outlook towards Bwen seems to be the infamy that the fandom has acquired because of the R34 fanart of the 10 year old versions of Ben and Gwen doing...inappropriate stuff. What people don't understand is that there are Bwen shippers like yourself who ship them not because of the NSFW stuff, but because you care for them as characters first and foremost.
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If you want to be isolated from the majority of the Ben 10 community and miss out on having friends that you could have been having. Then keep on advocating for Bwen and defending for it.
You'll never find a safer place for all LGBTQ+ people than this Ben 10 Club profile.
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@npzman If people don’t like the ship I have no problems at all with that. I just want us to get to the point where we can all respect each other’s opinions. For example, I detest the Gwevin ship myself because it makes no sense given that Kevin was a bit of a psycho in the original series and not once did he or Gwen show any care towards each other. More of the opposite actually since Kevin tried to kill Gwen twice for no real reason. When I rewatched Ultimate Alien, the excuses that Gwen was giving to Ben for Kevin’s behaviour...”He only hurts me when he’s absorbed too much power!”..those really started ringing alarm bells for me because that sounds eerily similar to an abusive relationship - what if Kevin starts absorbing Gwen’s powers again at any point because he’s tempted?
Despite all my misgivings about Gwevin, I still don’t mind at all if people support the pairing and don’t find that there is any point in attacking people over something which remains in fiction. It’s just that personally I cannot see how one can defend Gwevin at the same time as directing hate towards Bwen fans because the latter is apparently an unrealistic and immoral relationship. Truth be told you’re probably more likely to find someone in a relationship with their cousin than in a relationship with someone who tried to hurt them in the past. I just want all of us to be cool with each other’s opinions.
I will say that if they were siblings I certainly would not ship them as that is definitely delving into immoral territory even in different cultures.
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For crying out loud this post was from 2015 and here we are today still debating on this nonsense in 2021. This shows we haven't progressed anywhere as a community. I don't care what the other countries laws says on cousin marriages and relationships. What is legally right is not always morally right. Cousin shipping is just as bad a brother/sister shipping. Even if it's not a pedophilic ship and above age still it is wrong. Best to just let it go. There is nothing you can do to convince others to respect your opinion on Bwen. As you will just get casted from 80% of the Ben 10 fandom. So lets just do casual Ben 10 talk.
You'll never find a safer place for all LGBTQ+ people than this Ben 10 Club profile.
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Hey @Tactical-Ochoa just curious is there any other American Bwen shippers like yourself. You don't have to name names. Even just Bwen fans in first world countries and that lived in that country in their whole life.
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@npzman How about you let people talk about what they want to have a discussion on. Doesn't matter if this was posted in 2015. If they want to talk about Bwen, let them.
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I can't be stuffed to repeat what I just said but if you are going to advocate and defend the Bwen ship. Then I'd suggest you all to make a 2nd account with a entirely different nickname so you don't carry any Bwen baggage when you go to the major Ben 10 communities and that you be clean. No amount of Bwen gratification is worth loss missing out on having friends and respect from people. However if you like to talk about Bwen here then I can't stop you. Even if I could you'd just find a different place to talk about it.
