User blog comment:Cokedragon/Why the "Multiverse" is Broken in Ben 10/@comment-3441048-20140521022902/@comment-4848837-20140522001033

I understand your point here, Brandon, and it's great to get involved in discussions of the like, but -- and pardon me for saying this -- I think you've missed the point here. I totally understand what you're trying to say about universes, about timelines, and about dimensions and how (especially the latter two) are strictly distinct classifiers, but right off the bat it's clear that I've failed to present what I'm trying to say.

You see, while what universes, timelines, and dimensions are tend to be lucid throughout other shows (hell, most disregard some of those so that paradoxes that can't happen in Ben 10 can happen whenever time travel comes into question), Ben 10 has put forth a new system, one all its own (mainly by Alien Force and Ultimate Alien, and slowly working our way to having Omniverse also support this with the time traveling arc 5 finale on the way).

Ben 10 makes its own definitions for these things, but (save for Omniverse which completely diced all that)  uses them consistently in one way. Universes? They are places in one part of all of existence, like planets are part of a solar system, and subsequently solar systems part of galaxies, and galaxies of universes, then universes of multiverse. That much we've made clear, and Ben 10 doesn't deviate from that, but where it does deviate is when you reach beyond a multiverse.

I feel I can't explain this without some diarama or some other sort of visual, but stick with me in picturing this. Blank canvas (whatever color you want blank to be, black is preferable for space though). In it: one small circle that we'll refer to as human beings for the sake of this; outside it is another circle representing the land mass on which it lives (on Earth, countries/continents/islands, whatever); outside that another circle belonging to the planet we're on; then to the solar system (yes, I know they're multiple systems, but let's work with humans on our Earth here) it belongs to; then to the galaxy that belongs to; then to the universe that belongs to.

After that? Then the second-to-last circle, for that universe which belongs to one multiverse. Now we can call this multiverse many things: all of existence, (axiomatically) a multiverse, an omniverse, or as it's most fitting a timeline.

Now over this timeline we have the name of it: the "Ben 10 Canon timeline." Every event that has unfolded in the still-flowing timeline of canon throughout the Ben 10 franchise belongs here. Next to that timeline's circle, we have another timeline. Let's say this one is the "Generator Rex timeline." These two exist separately, because thanks to Ben 10's definition, each timeline consists of a multiverse of its own -- maybe multiple multiverses even exist in a timeline, though as far as we can prove (see The Forge of Creation) only multiple universes exist.

And then we can place a multitude of other timelines, belonging to any number of other TV shows, or even the timelines that exist here on BTFF that go by "Earth-[#]" or any other moniker. Now if we zoom out one last time, then, and only then, do we create one whole mass of timelines. What do we call this?

Well, maybe Omniverse fits better here. But as far as we've been told, this all = Crosstime.

At least, that's how Ben 10 works.