Ben Mitchell

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Villain Overview Gallery

Evil-doer
Full Name	Ben Mitchell
Alias	Ben Mr. Mitchell
Origin	EastEnders
Occupation	Businessman Mechanic Local bully Seasonal hardman
Powers / Skills	Intimidation Charisma Deception High intelligence Exceptional hand-to-hand combatant Gunmanship Usage of personal henchmen
Hobby	Spending quality time with his father Phil Mitchell on both family and criminal affairs Bullying people
Goals	Get away with killing Heather Trott, with his father Phil's help (succeeded for a while, later failed) Help his father Phil maintain their family's criminal reign in Walford (finished)
Crimes	Manslaughter Assault Breaking and entering Criminal damage Arson Perjury Conspiracy Blackmail Abuse Extortion Coercion Torture Perverting the course of justice Possession of an unlawful firearm Gang connections Human Trafficking Attempted murder
Type of Villain	Psychopathic Mastermind

“	You need slapping down!	„
	~ Ben Mitchell to Jordan Johnson before attacking him with a wrench in 2010 which later became a meme.

Ben Mitchell is a fictional character and major protagonist the BBC British soap opera EastEnders.

He originally appeared as an infant from 1996 to 2001 before becoming a supporting protagonist from 2006-2009, a major anti-hero in 2010, a main protagonist villain in 2011, the secondary antagonist of 2012, an overarching character of 2013, one of the main protagonists from 2014-2018, and one of the main protagonist villains/anti-heroes in 2019-2024.

The character was portrayed by Max Bowden, having been formerly played by Charlie Jones in his first stint; Joshua Pascoe in his second stint; and Harry Reid in his third stint.

Biography

Ben Mitchell was born at an Albert Square at Walford, a fictional borough in East London, on 21 March 1996; conceived by the square's criminal hardman Phil Mitchell and his second wife Kathy Beale. Over the years their marriage broke down due to Phil's alcoholism and in the end Kathy left the square with Ben to start anew in South Africa.

Throughout the years, Kathy got married to her estranged husband Gavin Sullivan and allegedly the pair were killed in a car crash in 2006; it was then Ben was sent to Walford to live with his half-brother, Ian Beale. Soon after his son's arrival at the Square, Phil began a legal battle with Ian over which of them should have custody over Ben; the courts ultimately ruled in favour of Phil, and Ben moved in with his father, but remained on good terms with Ian.

In 2007, Ben disliked Phil's girlfriend Stella Crawford. It was then Stella began abusing Ben for months until he eventually spilled the truth to his father on their wedding day; Stella later committed suicide and was disgraced by everyone in Walford for the ordeal she put Ben through. Not long afterwards, Phil and Ben's relationship was strained to the point where he nearly abused him until Phil's uncle Archie Mitchell talked him out of it - as Phil had been abused in the past by his late father and Archie's brother Eric, which was caused by the fact that both Eric and Archie had been mistreated by their late father Phillip in the past as well. In 2010, Ben went to prison for attacking his enemy Jordan Johnson on a GBH charge and was confronted by the latter's father Lucas about it.

By the time he has been released in 2010, Ben has somewhat evolved into a much more aggressive individual. He grows jealous of his best friend Jay Brown being appointed as Phil's surrogate son and later falls out with Phil's fiancé Shirley Carter. Soon enough Ben further resents his father after coming out as gay, to which Phil is unhappy with after local general practitioner Yusef Khan informs him about Ben's odd behaviour. Thereupon Ben sets out to get revenge and begins stalking Phil over the knowledge of his past crimes, such as the death of his old nemesis Steve Owen in 2002. Eventually, Ben sets up Phil for Stella's death and reveals the truth to him.

However, Phil is released in 2012 after Ian tells the police that Ben had lied. Ben wrongfully asserts that Shirley's best-friend, Heather Trott, grassed him up to the police and confronts her about it. The confrontation ends in tragedy when Ben smacks Heather on the head with a picture frame, accidently killing her as a result. Phil thereupon arrives to find that Ben has accidently killed Heather and ends up covering up the crime. Months later, Ben reveals the truth to Shirley and she disowns him and Phil for what they did. Ben turns himself into the police for Heather's murder and goes to prison, but not after it had transpired that he slept with his cousin Lola Pearce and thus got her pregnant with their daughter named Lexi.

In 2014, Ben is released and gets acquainted with Phil's new wife Sharon Watts. A year later he is implicated for the murder of Ian's daughter Lucy Beale, who in reality was murdered by her younger brother Bobby Beale; that same night, it is revealed that Kathy is alive. Eventually Ben learns of his mother's return and they reconcile, whilst Phil frames his business rival Max Branning for Lucy's murder in order to prevent Ben from facing police investigation.

In 2016, Ben reunites with his sister Louise Mitchell. They are devastated when their grandmother Peggy dies from suicide due to her cancer, but a much more devastating incident occurs later on when Ben and his boyfriend Paul Coker are subjugated to a homophobic attack; Ben survives but Paul dies, leaving Ben devastated and vengeful against the killers. In 2017, he learns that his mother was raped by her former boss James Willmott-Brown whilst dating his son Luke Browning at the same time. When Ben threatens to expose their illicit activities, Luke attacks him and hospilatizes him. Phil later arranges for Luke to be kidnapped by his old partner-in-crime Aidan Maguire, who ends up killing Luke against his reservations. Following this, Ben flees Walford with the money that Phil and Aidan had for an armed robbery.

In 2019, Ben returns with his family and it turns out that he is involved with Phil's latest criminal rival Danny Hardcastle along with fellow competitior Midge. At one point Ben arranges for Midge to kidnap Louise in order to start a war between Phil and Danny in the hopes of taking over the Mitchell empire. But in the end Ben's plan is foiled and exposed, prompting Phil to cast him aside afterwards. This continued even after Phil is hospilatized by Archie's killer Stacey Slater. Eventually, though, Ben and Phil reconcile after Ben later gets shot by Louise's ex-boyfriend and Steve's convicted son Hunter during a raid in The Queen Vic; Hunter is eventually killed by a police marksman, whilst his mother and Steve's widow Mel Healy would later be killed months later in a road accident. Thereafter Ben helps Phil confront Louise's boyfriend Keanu Taylor for having an affair with Sharon behind their back. That same year, Ben gets romantically involved with policeman Callum Highway and they eventually get married.

In 2022, Ben gets acquainted with a new arrival named Lewis Butler. They develop a close friendship at first until the pair are alone in a room one night. Ben attempts to leave, but Lewis stops him and ends up raping Ben in a scuffle between them. Ben struggles to come to terms with his ordeal but eventually reports Lewis to the police and is supported by his family when they learn the truth about it. Ben later attempts to overcome his trauma by focusing on Lexi, which only strengthens when Lola suffers from terminal cancer and she dies a few months later; Ben is devastated by Lola's death and the fact that his daughter has lost her mother. In 2024, Ben is arrested and jailed for stealing a credit card as part of his last-ditch plan to get enough finances to save Lola's life to no avail.

Trivia

• The two infants who played the character were Matthew Silver from 1996-1998 and then Morgan Whittle from 1999-2001.
• The character Ben Mitchell has been acclaimed to the point where the actors who portrayed him were nominated for several awards because of their respective performances; at one point Joshua Pascoe was nominated for the "Villain of the Year" award at the 2012 British Soap Awards ceremony.
• Ben Mitchell is the first character in EastEnders to have been featured in a male rape storyline.
• In the Who Killed Archie Mitchell?" storyline, Ben has been suspected as the culprit on a number of occasions; this turned out to be false when the killer was eventually revealed to be Archie's rape victim Stacey Slater.