(Note: this article will refer to ‘neurodivergence and mental illness’ (or variations thereof), because whilst I consider mental illness to fall under the umbrella of neurodivergence, I know that not every mentally ill person does, and I want to make it clear that much of this is explicitly about mental illness.)
Trigger warning for mentions of sexual assault and eating disorders.
In the 1996 documentary The Celluloid Closet, which chronicled the depiction of queerness in the first 100 years of Hollywood films, academic Richard Dyer says: “You know you’re watching a heterosexual movie. You know that’s the deal when you pay to see a Hollywood movie. But somehow, you’re still not quite ready to be insulted.”
I’ve never felt that quote more acutely than last week, as a neurodivergent and mentally ill person enduring Ben Mitchell’s exit story in EastEnders. I went in with full expectation that it was going to be bad – last minute rushed exits are generally pretty appalling – but even then, I really wasn’t prepared for how viciously upsetting and offensive it was going to be.
In order to explain why it was so insulting, here’s a quick whistlestop tour of Ben’s arc over the past few years.
Ben Mitchell is a so-called legacy character, the son of Phil Mitchell and Kathy Beale, who was born onscreen almost thirty years ago. He is an extremely damaged man, who has been through a swathe of traumatic and abusive experiences (including parental abuse, intimate partner violence, and rape). Whilst EastEnders has never shied away from the messiness of this character, and the impact of his history on his behaviour, they tended to fall just short of outright framing this in terms of mental health (this is a wider problem in the media that needs a whole article of its own to address). However, and importantly to their decisions regarding his exit storyline, in the past few years these issues have canonically crystallised into a very clear story about chronic and complex mental illness.
Very distinct from simply ‘bad behaviour’, we saw clear signs of complex post-traumatic stress disorder (or CPTSD, common symptoms of which can be found here), such as traumatic flashbacks, kicking off in early 2022 after he and his husband, Callum, were victims of a homophobic hate crime (a similar crime having killed his boyfriend, Paul, in 2016) and continuing through his sexual assault in May 2022. In 2023, we saw all of this accumulated trauma manifest in the form of an eating disorder (bulimia) – a common long-term impact of trauma.
The fact that this was a mental health storyline was never subtextual. His eating disorder was explicitly named on screen. When Lola (his close friend and mother of his child) was dying from a brain tumour, he was deliberately portrayed as erratic and irrational, a devastating portrayal of mania and obsessive focus as he ran to America in search of a miracle cure to keep her alive. This behaviour was in keeping with both CPTSD and his named eating disorder, and it was overwhelmingly sympathetic to the audience. Indeed, weeks later, when another character finally realised that Ben had an eating disorder, the ensuing conversation openly discussed the traumatic things that had happened in Ben’s life, and how it had all led to his bulimia. The canon is very clear – Ben was extremely mentally unwell.
But then, he got help. We saw him admitting to Callum that he had a problem, going to a support group for male survivors of sexual assault, a brief mention that he was seeking professional help for his eating disorder, and then, finally, a scene in which he told Callum how much better he was feeling, how helpful therapy was and how healing it was to be able to talk about things and feel heard and not like a burden. The show might have been wishy washy and disappointingly vague on the detail, but the bare bones were that he was getting help, and he was doing well. The show depicted a man in recovery, finally addressing years’ worth of complex trauma and mental health issues, standing up to be a good parent to his daughter with his loving and supportive husband proudly by his side.
And then, in January, it was announced, out of the blue, that Ben had been axed. And three months later, along came his exit.
There’s always a challenge when you’re telling stories that feature representation of marginalised identities. You want these characters to be fully realised, fleshed out, complex and nuanced and human, and not restricted by the pressure of being good (ie. wholesome and unchallenging) representation – but this has to carefully balanced with the responsibility that you absolutely do have when you decide to create a character that inhabits some sort of marginalised identity. I recognise that it’s a tricky tightrope to walk. But EastEnders didn’t even make an attempt – instead, they threw the balancing pole over the edge, yelled ‘YOLO’, and swan-dived ungracefully into the abyss.
His exit week centred on the revelation that whilst in America in May 2023 – a time when, as you will recall, Ben was very explicitly extremely mentally unwell – he had spent thousands using a stolen credit card, and was now being arrested and extradited for the crime. Whilst the real devastation of this story should lie in the unfairness that this has come back to bite him at a time when he had just got his life together, the show inexplicably made the decision to omit any reference to his recovery. Even worse, they opted to erase Ben’s mental illness entirely; framing his actions as simply bad behaviour and an example of ‘ugh, typical Ben’, before forming a three-episode long conveyer belt on which his loved ones (his husband, his daughter, his best friend, his parents) could queue up to decry how much of a failure, a disappointment, and an irredeemable screw-up he was.
The show did not even, at any point, express concern that being extradited to an American prison (doubly cruel given the context that Ben went to prison as a teenager and it is the root cause of a lot of his trauma) could be seriously dangerous for a deaf gay rape survivor with complex trauma and in the early stages of recovery from an eating disorder.
EastEnders’ treatment of Ben is, sadly, reflective of the way in which wider society treats people with complex mental health issues and neurodivergence, particularly those whose chronic issues have placed them in the ‘challenging’ or ‘difficult’ box. It clearly did not matter that Ben was, canonically, extremely unwell when the (retconned) crime took place, and it did not matter that he had previously been depicted as putting a lot of effort and work into his recovery, and was getting better – none of this was recognised by the show, and, instead, he had the weighted label of ‘bad person doing bad things’ thrust around his neck rather than his story receiving the care and understanding that it deserved.
This is in stark contrast to the way that neurotypical characters are treated when they make mistakes – for example, Jay’s grief last year led him to drive (and crash) whilst high on ketamine, and the characters (and the show) had an unending well of love, compassion and understanding for him. Love, compassion, and understanding that Ben decidedly did not receive last week for the much lesser crime of credit card fraud. In fact, everyone who demanded last week that Ben not fight the charges against him, demanding that he ‘take responsibility’ and ‘do the right thing, for once’, were, just a few months ago, encouraging Jay not to give a blood sample to the police following his crash (and this was depicted as wholesome and lovely).
The message is clear, as it so often is: if you are a neurotypical person who does something bad whilst struggling, you are a good person deserving of compassion, but if you are someone with complex mental health issues who does something bad whilst struggling, then you are a bad person deserving of ire and condemnation.
This societal attitude was horrifically on display when the news of Ben’s axing was leaked in the tabloid press. Endless gossip about actor Max Bowden’s mental health followed the announcement: gleeful excited whisperings about his rumoured ‘behaviour’ (whilst Max has publicly talked about his mental health in the past, there is no evidence backing up the claims that he was fired for his ‘behaviour’) and assertions that, if he was struggling with his mental health, then he deserved to be fired. There was not a single ounce of compassion to be found – mental health issues were a moral failing to be gossiped about and deserving of condemnation.
In the ultimate irony, EastEnders has reflected and mimicked the ableist/saneist prejudices of their own fanbase with their treatment of Ben’s exit.
The week culminated in an horrific scene with Callum, Ben’s husband, who had previously been understanding of Ben’s mental illness and had firmly but lovingly supported him through his recovery (yes, he had struggled in the past with his understanding, but he had come a long way in the past couple of years, and truly reflected the hope that neurodivergent and mentally ill people can find love with people who truly understand and support them).
In a seemingly unending (for me, as a neurodivergent viewer watching it happen, it felt like these scenes went on for hours) barrage, Callum:
- said that Ben’s actions trying to save Lola (ie. the actions of an extremely mentally unwell man) were him making everything about himself;
- declared that ‘it’s not the Ben Mitchell show’ (a lovely shout-out to the small group of people on social media who have made hating Ben their entire personality);
- accused Ben of being attention seeking;
- accused him of running away from his responsibilities whenever Ben tried to explain himself;
- accused Ben of throwing a pity party when he started blaming himself (which is a common trait in someone with CPTSD);
- told Ben that sometimes he hates him.
It should be plainly stated that at no point was Ben given the right to defend himself, and at no point did the show give any indication that we were supposed to be doing anything other than agreeing with Callum’s assessment of Ben.
Again, these are things that will be painfully recognisable to any neurodivergent person who has found themselves with the ‘challenging’ label pinned to them. The erasure of our struggles, the declaration that our neurodivergent behaviours (which we often cannot help) are selfish, self-absorbed, and dramatic, and the crushing sense that we are unbearable hateful burdens who only cause pain to the people we love. But for these things to come from a character who had, up until this point, been someone who understood, validated, loved, and supported Ben, felt like a particularly cruel twist of the knife both for Ben as a character and the people in the audience who very much see themselves in Ben.
Perhaps the most shocking, and despicably offensive, element of it all was the way in which EastEnders left Ben’s relationship with his eleven-year-old daughter, Lexi. Regardless of his issues and struggles, Ben has always been depicted as a good dad. And, in a year in which Ben was depicted as taking huge strides to heal and be the best parent he could possibly be for Lexi in the wake of Lola’s death, we saw it all come crashing down with Lexi coldly telling Ben that he was ‘not good’ for her.
This was their final interaction.
It was one last offensive blow in a stream of questionable decisions taken by EastEnders with regards to Ben’s role as Lexi’s parent, which included the insinuation that Ben isn’t fit or able to raise Lexi (due to, again, canonical mental illness), and therefore Jay, Lola’s partner of approximately six months, should be given parental responsibility in the wake of Lola’s death (but not Callum, the gay stepdad who had been in Lexi’s life consistently for over four years).
These decisions by EastEnders do not exist in a vacuum. Neurodivergent parents already face a huge amount of stigma and persecution – a study in 2023 found that safeguarding procedures, which can even lead to the child being placed in care, or a criminal investigation into the family, are more frequently being taken against neurodivergent parents than other parents surveyed. This, in turn, the study argues, leads to a ‘climate of very real fear’ when trying to access support for them and their children, and leads to parents not disclosing their own neurodivergence to social services and other authorities.
In ending things as they did between Ben and Lexi, EastEnders has sent a very real message to the neurodivergent/mentally ill parents in its audience who are already dealing with stigma and prejudice around their ability to parent – that you are ‘not good’ for your child and they are better off in the care of a neurotypical.
I happen to think that we, as neurodivergent and mentally ill people, deserve a damned sight better than that.
And, thankfully, we are no longer in a situation where these depictions are all we have, and we have no choice but to accept this treatment from the media we consume. There are now numerous examples of shows handling mental illness and neurodivergence with kindness, respect, and sensitivity – if watching Ben’s exit taught me anything, it’s that I know now what it’s like to be treated with the love and care that I deserve, and I will not accept anything less.
Characters like Ed in Our Flag Means Death and Sara and Wilhelm in Young Royals provide an unflinching yet loving portrayal of neurodivergence and complex mental health issues, never shying away from depicting the challenges and messiness, whilst also never making the audience feel like they do not deserve to be chosen, to be loved, and to be supported to come through the difficulties that they face. These are characters who are unwaveringly depicted as deserving of love, and never, ever depicted as burdens or curses to the people who carry that love for them.
On that note, a final scene in Ben’s last episode seemed to half-heartedly attempt to salvage Ben and Callum’s relationship, purporting to leave it on a semi-positive note. But there was still little to celebrate here.
Yes, Callum came back and declared that he loved Ben, and would wait for him, but nothing that had been previously said was refuted or taken back or even, god forbid, apologised for. Given those circumstances – he didn’t talk about any of Ben’s positive traits that shape why Callum loves him so much, or say what a good husband and father Ben (canonically) is, or even tell Ben how proud he was of the progress he has made in the past year since confronting his trauma, going to therapy, and beginning the process of recovery – we can only assume that Callum stands by every single thing he threw at Ben in this episode. And given that context, how can we possibly interpret his love for Ben as anything other than a curse and a burden? He keeps coming back because he can’t help it – he’s cursed to love this horrific person who only ever brings him pain.
And, as we saw in the unfolding scene, Ben must always therefore be pathetically grateful for that love because he (and the audience) knows that he doesn’t ‘deserve’ it: he has no right to reply, or to defend himself, or to demand better than someone who professes to hate him and who actively minimises his complex trauma and mental illness.
As someone who is neurodivergent, including being mentally ill, I have been in the situation where someone has said those exact same things to me – that I am a drama queen, that I am making it all about me, that I need to grow up and take responsibility, that they love me but also hate me because I’m just that infuriating and that much of a burden on the people I love – and then come back and declared their love for me without taking back a single thing they’d previously said. And, just like Ben, I was left to gratefully accept it, with the underlying understanding that those things were true and I should be thankful for this love that I really didn’t deserve.
It’s taken a lot of work with therapists over the years for me to recognise that that relationship was abusive and did me lasting harm. And this isn’t solely anecdotal. We know that neurodivergent people, and people with complex mental health issues, are incredibly vulnerable to abuse of every kind. A study in 2015 showed that people with some form of chronic (long term) mental illness are two to five times more likely to experience emotional, physical and sexual intimate partner violence (although these rates were higher in women, men with chronic mental illness were found to be approximately twice as at risk of some form of intimate partner abuse).
So you can see why, in the context of my own experience and the data we have around mental illness and abuse, it’s horrifying for me that this is how it was ended – for this to be where we leave off a relationship that had previously been such a beautiful example of queer supportive love, and for Ben, a character whose arc is that of a person with complex issues being unconditionally loved and supported to recover, to have this as his final moment.
What hurts more than anything else is how unnecessary it all is. Whilst sudden, unexpected exits do limit a show in terms of what they can do (and I have previously defended EastEnders for choices they have made under difficult circumstances), so much of what happened here was an active choice. There was an opportunity here for the sort of real, character-driven, emotional drama that EastEnders used to be good at: drama that actually acknowledged Ben’s journey, that explored the devastating irony of this happening when he’s just got his life back together, and that gave us real emotional conversations between characters that do right by these rich relationships.
We could have seen Ben go off to prison knowing that he is loved, supported and believed in by everyone around him, and firmly declaring that he can continue his recovery, even with everything stacked against him. It wouldn’t have been happy, but it would at least have been something.
But, instead, it feels like EastEnders prioritised whatever internal drama was happening over their responsibility to do right by Ben as a character with explicitly defined complex mental illness.
Not only was it one of the most over-the-top vicious exits I’ve ever seen for a character (right up there with Pauline’s exit, where the actor, Wendy Richards, was punished for disagreeing with the producers on a storyline by being given an exit where she ended up hated by everyone and dying alone in the snow), but it also sent a very clear message: if you have complex trauma and mental health issues, like Ben, then do not even bother trying to recover and be better, because you will always be, fundamentally, a screw up and a burden to everyone you love.
Ben deserved better than this. And so do we.
