SPOILER ALERT: If you have no finished ‘The Umbrella Academy’ Season 2, this article includes massive SPOILERS so turn back now or proceed with caution.
There is still at least one question viewers still have after ‘The Umbrella Academy’ Season 2: How did Ben die? All fans know is that his death led to the group disbanding. This is actually a question that is never answered in the comic books. Then again, as the actor that plays him, Justin H. Min pointed out, Ben or Ben’s ghost doesn’t appear as a character in the comics. That’s one way that the show differs from the source material.
When asked about Ben’s death by Collider‘s Christina Radish, Min stated:
“Oh, Christina, you know I can’t tell you that.”
Ben was not a series regular during S1, but was more heavily featured in S2. Then, in the final scene, he is shown to still be alive, thanks to the Umbrella Academy’s time-travel mucking changing history.
“I know some stuff. That’s all I’m able to say, or I’ll be sent to Netflix jail. I will say that I appreciate the ambiguity and the mystery behind it. You get into that in Season 2, particularly with the flashback in the last episode, but from a storytelling and writing point of view, it allows them way more freedom when they keep it ambiguous and a little more mysterious. There are so many things to continue to explore with the death because it’s one of the main instances for why the family split apart, in the first place. I think it allows them the freedom to lean into how that plays out in the sibling dynamics and relationship. I, for one, am glad that they continue to keep it a bit of a mystery, although I know the fans are really craving concrete clear answers… I don’t even have all of the clear answers myself. I’m sure Steve [Blackman], and maybe Gerard [Way] know, but I have crumbs.”
So while you won’t receive an answer as to how Ben died, if you haven’t yet watched, ‘The Umbrella Academy’ Seasons 1 and 2 are available in their entirety on Netflix.
