Was Ben 10 intended to be Captain Marvel?
 

Forget Alien Force, and Ultimate Alien, the evolutions of the Ben 10 mythos, and go back to the original cartoon.

For some reason, I was thinking about it last night, and the simularities between Ben 10, and Captain Marvel are striking.

Ben Tennison- a 10 year old boy who accidentally gains cosmic, almost mystical powers to transform into a series of aliens with multiple powers.

Billy Batson- a young boy who's given magical powers to transform into an all-powerful superman-like being.

Gwen Tennison- a very close cousin of equal age, who eventually gains powers of her own, and shares in our hero's adventures.

Mary Batson- a long lost twin sister of equal age, who eventually gains powers of her own, and shares in our hero's adventures.

The comparisons don't end there. Ben's Grampa seems to share a simular mentor/caretaker role as Billy's Uncle.

And Kevin Levin also seems to be a combination of Black Adam and Captain Marvel Jr.

I could also easily see a SHAZAM series with a simular road-trip setting.

So... what's the verdict?
Does it seem to anyone else that Ben Ten was inspired by Captain Marvel, or more-so may have originally intended to actually *be* a captain marvel series but completely reworked from the ground up for whatever reasons?
Or am I seeing things that just aren't there?

theres about a billion comics references in that show. the writers work for either marvel or dc.

Well, isn't it made by Bandai and not Mattel? Even thought Teen Titans cartoon toys were made by Bandai too. I pretend my Ben 10 aliens are Green Lantern from 3011.

Because Bandai America picked up the lisnece for Ben 10 toys, and not Mattel doesn't bare any sort of significance over anything. They didn't create Ben 10, just like they didn't create Teen Titans, and just like Mattel didn't create Superman.

They just picked up the lisnece to produce Ben 10 toys. It's that simple. Cartoon Network could pluck the lisence from them at any point and sell it to Hasbro, or Mattel. Just the same as Warner Bros could pluck the DC lisence from Mattel and give it to Hasbro or Bandai. (Please no please no please no please no bandai toys suck)

I think it's coincidence. You look at any 'superhero' origin and it probably bears so resemblance to another one. They can't think of anything completely new.

ok......

kevin is absorbing man
gwen is the scarlet witch
ben tennison is a combination of DC's b'wana beast and Marvel's Morph, an x - men character. I have a hard pinning down something pretty exact, especially with the watch thing.

I'm going to say no, he was always intended to be Ben 10.

It was originally going to be Dial H for Hero, a DC comic, but CN wanted something they could cash in better on, so they opted to commission an original work with the same idea from Man of Action. That's what created Ben 10. Man of Action are former comic book writers/artists themselves so they nod a lot of the stuff throughout. Most heavily Jack Kirby, but you can see references from both marvel and DC in tons of it.

Very few talk about this origin, but when Ben 10 started it was all everyone talked about. Think of it as similiar to Once Upon a Time and Fables. CN even briefly had the rights for Dial H, but scrapped it because of some royalties snafu while they had JL/U.

Dial H for Hero, yeas, that makes a lot more sense.

You know your stuff Snowflakian.

That makes a *lot* of sense.
I knew there was more to it than meer coincidence or inspiration. I just had the property wrong.

the bigger thing is it's also like the 1970's TV show where Ben rides around the country in an RV with an Older Mentor

I think Coincidence. I highly doubt men of action got together and said "Hey, lets rip off Shazam". Sometimes things just....happen and similarities naturally come due to the natural progression of the story.

I am a would be novelist, and I cant count the times I've been working on plot ideas and the natural progression of the story ends up slightly mimicing somthing else. The best thing you can do in this situation is try to make it yours as much as possible, and disregard any real connection the two have unless youre making a specific nod to somthing else.

I could be working on a story, and reach a point where somehow the villain ends up being the protagonists father naturally, but I cant think "Oh crap, I just did Star Wars" and do a complete 1/80 that dosent make no sence what so ever and will turn off the audience. Same can be said for making it so blatently obvious that that is where you are heading. Suprises, but natural suprises

But I digress, I'm sure those are just unintended similarities.

Oh yeah. I'm always struggling to come up with original ideas, or new takes on things I haven't seen done before. So I believe in coincidence. (I've been trying to develope my own archer hero... and every damned costume I design for him, some version of Green Arrow comes along with almost the exact same design.

But my original question and theory wasn't that it MoA sat down and said "Let's rip off Shazam!" But more that they developed, and pitched a Shazam cartoon which was shot down, and instead of giving up, they reworked things they liked into something different, becoming Ben 10.

As someone already said earlier in the thread, I was half right. Just got the wrong property. Turns out it was intended to be Dial H for Hero (Which makes a world of sense)