Ben 10: My Idea for Malware
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This one is pretty much a quickie here. Shorter than the usual length of my other articles. I'm not really going to criticize Malware here. He's a decent villain. One of the better aspects of Omniverse. There are certain aspects about him that could be improved but he's alright. I have been thinking of this idea about him for a while though. A direction that I've been thinking could be really interesting to see with this villain. Something that could make Malware stand out more. Make him less conventional and more unique. Something that hasn't really been tackled that much or at all in the Ben 10 franchise. Something that could make Malware much more dangerous and challenging than what we've seen him as in Omniverse. Something that is more reflective of his actual name.
Yes, what I've been thinking is having Malware behave more like actual malware or an actual virus. He would remain as a Galvanic Mechamorph but something would happen to him that would change his behavior to be more instinctive and remove his traits of being a sentient being while also having a constant hunger for more technology. Almost like a weaponized, zombified Galvanic Mechamorph. Either Malware could be hacked and corrupted or the classic died and resurrected or something of the likes that could put him in that state and then he would be let loose on whatever the intended target would be, consuming whatever piece of technology that's unfortunate enough to be in his path and he takes a particular interest in. The more technology that Malware absorbs and consumes, the bigger, more powerful and thus less controllable he becomes. This could prove to be a very dangerous situation that Ben would have to handle and resolve; especially since that Ben has one of the most advanced pieces of technology in the universe attached to his wrist and Malware would most certainly take a very strong interest in that. Things can also get very intense, scary, and chaotic really fast as well if Malware becomes powerful enough from consuming all sorts of technology. However, Malware can still suffer from the same weaknesses and vulnerabilities that other Galvanic Mechamorphs, and much of technology in general, have but Ben and his allies would really have to exploit and take advantage of those very weaknesses in order to take down Malware. They would really have their work cut out for them. Granted, I don't find this direction to be as long term as Omniverse's portrayal of Malware and likely not as deep but I find that this could make Ben's encounter with Malware to be quite interesting, challenging, and intense and could work well in a different continuity for the Ben 10 franchise.
Again, this is just a quick topic that I want to make that's shorter than the usual length of my other articles. That's my idea of what I find that could be an interesting direction for Malware. If anyone has any thoughts of their own in regards to this topic, feel free to leave a comment down below.
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@Tactical-Ochoa I know that this post is 3 years old but I found this idea for Malware really interesting. Particularly because your interpretation of Malware shares quite a few similarities with the iteration of the Carnage symbiote from the Ultimate Spider-Man comics by Brian Michael Bendis.
This version of Carnage is different to one in the Prime timeline of Spider-Man. Rather than being a symbiotic slime-like alien who can bond to a host and enhance all their physical capabilities but also possibly corrupt their personality, the Ultimate universe version of Carnage is a regenerating vampiric organism who was created from a combination of Spider-Man's blood as well as the Venom symbiote. Anyway, its genome is severely damaged when it becomes sentient and escapes its holding lab, and so in order to stabilise its genetic code it begins to feed on people by draining their life force (killing them in the process) and becoming more powerful and crazier every time it does so. However it's main target is Peter Parker/Spider-Man (whose memories it has due to it being Peter's DNA used to create it) whom it wants to feed on to fully repair its genome, and it goes on a killing spree on its way to him before being eventually defeated by Peter who throws it into a raging fire to kill it.
Now obviously Malware is not the same, but a similar idea could be implemented but using technology instead of living beings because lets be real, something like Ultimate Carnage would be waaay too dark and disturbing for Ben 10. Malware would be an incomplete/corrupted Galvanic Mechamorph absorbing all technology in his path (rendering it useless afterwards) with one of his end goals being Ben's Omnitrix , and as you said every time he absorbs tech he becomes more powerful but also more unhinged which would make him more dangerous as time goes on. I think it could make for a great storyline.
“There’s always another way. In fact, sometimes to do something, all you need to do is nothing.” -Professor Paradox
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The aspect about Malware being unstable and needing to feed on technology to stabilise himself also parallels Carnage, but with Malware we would see him become more power-hungry as time goes on because unlike Ultimate Carnage, Malware would be driven not just by animal instinct but also by a certain degree of intelligence, which would make him a dangerous foe
“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 Interesting. This is a direction that I wanted for Kevin to go down as well. I don't like how Kevin became a hero character in Alien Force. I don't think it makes sense and I don't think it fits him as a character. I also don't think that his transition was handled well either. I find that having Kevin stay as a villain is a better route for him. I find that Kevin has the potential to be one of the best and most terrifyingly dangerous villains in the Ben 10 franchise. Kevin to Ben is like Joker to Batman...or in this case, like this version of Carnage to Peter Parker.
And yeah, again, this is very much the type of direction that I wanted for Kevin to be as a villain. Someone who's just so disillusioned with his views towards Ben due to Kevin's past interactions with Ben and therefore just has an incredibly strong desire to defeat Ben and make him suffer. Therefore, Kevin would just try to absorb as much energy and DNA that he can get his hands on, making him stronger and stronger in hopes of being strong enough to defeat Ben. However, this would also cause Kevin to become more and more mentally unstable and his mutated form would become more and more unstable as well. And yet, he would still have his desire to defeat Ben.
Funny that you referenced Carnage and Peter Parker. I find Ben Tennyson and Peter Parker to be quite similar to each other; especially in regards to their personalities and appearances. Even made a page on here about that.
https://ben10club.org/topic/99/ben-10-and-spider-man-main-character-comparisons-analysis -
I personally need to see some more Spiderman stuff to be able to engage with these sorts of conversations better. Only played SpidermanPS4 and yet to play Miles Morales. Where would be good place to start. In terms of the shows there is a lot of iterations and I don't wanna start with a crap one.
You'll never find a safer place for all LGBTQ+ people than this Ben 10 Club profile.
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@Tactical-Ochoa Yeah that kind of angle could work really well with Kevin actually, I always thought it would’ve been better to see him walking the line between good and evil as a vigilante or just being full blown insane, the true mirror image of Ben. Though i would say that in terms of their relationship it would be a bit more akin to that of Peter Parker and Eddie Brock/Venom because of how with Kevin his motivations against Ben were almost always personal and revenge driven, just like Brock (Carnage doesn’t really share that personal hatred , he’s fundamentally a murdering nutcase, but just more animalistic in the Ultimate universe). Batman/Joker is also a good shout when talking about Ben and Kevin.
With regards to Malware the storyline could also give us a chance to demonstrate just how well Ben can adapt to defeating Malware without the use of technology, including communications links with others, possible weapons, vehicles etc. The story could do a great job of showing just how reliant humans are on tech and when it’s been absorbed by Malware, or would be interesting to see how Ben tackles it
As someone who watched Spectacular Spider-Man around the same time as Ben 10, I too found Peter Parker and Ben Tennyson uncannily similar as characters and it would’ve been great to see teenage Ben be wisecracking and confident but at the same time as knowing where his responsibilities lie and getting serious when needs be.
“There’s always another way. In fact, sometimes to do something, all you need to do is nothing.” -Professor Paradox
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@npzman I would suggest either watching the 1994 "Spider-Man: The Animated Series" or the 2008 "Spectacular Spider-Man" . I believe that these two shows do the best job of telling the story and are probably the two most acclaimed. I would recommend "Spectacular" a bit more though just because I believe that the writing (particularly the character developement) is better, and it is more relatable in our modern age but it still manages to cover the themes and tell the stories of the characters from Spider-Man really well. I'd give it a watch, though it was tragic that it never got a third season.
Also apologies if I'm going off on a tangent on this thread
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@coreofthesun Venom is a better comparison to Kevin. I wouldn't be surprised either if the creation of Ben was inspired by Peter. Makes sense to me since that Man of Action were former Marvel writers before they formed Man of Action.
That's one of the things that made Ben at his best. When he's being cocky and fun-loving yet also mature and serious. This is something that I think the Original Series did well with and the sequel shows and the reboot show often fell short on. Ben was either too serious and therefore boring and uninteresting to watch or too much of a goofball and therefore became annoying and unlikable. I felt that the Original Series had a good balance between the two sides of Ben. In fact, I say that the Original Series had a good balance of a lot of things. The characters, the tone, etc.
I think it also helps that Ben had Gwen by his side. I think one of Omniverse's biggest mistakes was separating Ben and Gwen. Those two just work so well together. They balance each other out. They keep each other in check. They're like Batman and Robin, or on the topic of Spider Man, like Peter Parker and Mary Jane. I think Ben doesn't work well as a character without Gwen and vice versa. It's why I don't think Ben worked well as a character in Omniverse and it's why I don't think a Gwen spin-off show would work either.
