★

One of my favorite aspects of the Passenger is how the two lead characters kinda show two different ways I see Trauma manifest in people personally. And how it can shape adults.

I mean when you break it down, it's all about control or lack there of. Something that happened that fundamentally changes your brain chemistry, and you come up with coping mechanisms to recover from it.

so take Randy for example, obviously the incident with Mrs. Beard was a situation where he had agency, choose to launch an eraser in her eye. And he permanently injured her face, as a 3rd grader doing something like that. Playing a harmless prank that ended up causing actual harm? Forget about it? That would be devastating to any kid. And honestly it makes Randy's extremely passive behavior throughout the film make more sense, bc the one time he decided to do something for himself he accidentally ended up knocking his teacher's eye out. Being a doormat is his defense mechanism, as well as in my opinion his way of like "punishing" himself for what happened. I wouldn't be surprised if he thought he deserved to get treated like shit by his coworkers, or be controlled by his mom. A lot of my experience with PTSD is blaming myself for everything so hard to a point where it isn't even accountability anymore it's just self hatred and abusive.

And then we have Benson. While it is never explicitly stated in the film it's at least implied heavily that he was abused by his teacher as a kid. Obviously extremely damaging to anyone let alone a child as he would've been around 8-9 when this happen iirc. This would fuck up anyone, and I believe all of Benson's Behavior makes a lot of sense as a survivor of similar kinds of abuse. As in the kind that strips the victim of any agency in the situation, so the way I see it. Worst part is I am pretty sure he just snapped one day, like genuinely the way Benson's character was written reminded me of someone (exaggerated for the sake of drama) mental breakdown because of the fact that they never really addressed their own damage. I know people who act like Benson, hell Some of my behavior as a sufferer of PTSD mirrors Benson's. (Minus the murder duhh) That whole demeanor of masking your emotions, almost like a guard when you're in public, is like a defense mechanism I have. I have a resting bitch face because I feel like if I look mean enough people won't mess with me. And I also just never wanted to talk about the shit I went through as a kid either and it got to a point where It just made me freak the absolute fuck out. I firmly believe Benson's character in the passenger is just a highly fictionalized version of that type of emotional reaction to suppression of those types of experiences. Not to mention the frustration of never feeling like you are in control of your life because of your own trauma.

What's worse is if you look at the context clues in the story you won't be surprised that he ended up like this. I mean look at the relationship with his mom, look at how he threatened to kill Randy when he mentioned the vice principal, or his final monologue about wanting to be a Giraffe. All things that very much indicate to me personally that he never really got to actually process this shit.

So what I've noticed with Randy and Benson is while their respective traumatic experiences are different, they ultimately are about the same thing. Control,

You got Randy who is a person who fears being able to do anything for himself because the last time he did he partially blinded his teacher. And then you have Benson who is a person who desperately seeks being in control, because he was someone who had none and his innocence stolen. The way I see it he spent years being passive like Randy, until one day he just fuckin snapped. Doing all these things that seem corrective, tormenting Randy saying that it's all for him. When as Randy Correctly points out they've been driving in circles the whole time. Not to mention most of the "advice" he gives to Randy just sounds like projection.

And personally that's the beauty of the Ranson Dynamic in my mind. It's the fact that Benson sees himself in Randy, hell it's possible he could've been just as pathetic as Randy at some point.

My personal theory and headcanon is that he was a Randy at one point, and once enough time passed he just became numb. Masking as some dude who doesn't care about anything, when in reality he was probably angry the entire time. Honestly I could make a whole seperate post analyzing how even his body Language definitely is that if someone who is extremely guarded and seems to have almost conditioned himself not to feel the emotions he doesn't wanna feel. (Seriously that bathroom scene is top notch acting from Mr. Gallner)

So him latching onto what may be someone who reminds him of his younger self, is kinda the heart of this entire movie. I think him saying all that stuff about this being for Randy is bullshit, but I also do think that Benson Randy is the only other person who understands how he feels. Because Benson literally WAS Randy. Or at least he saw himself in him to some extent. Ultimately their little road trip ended up helping Randy too in an oddly dark way, and his character development is like most clearly shown when he finally stands up to Benson. Calls him out for his worldview making no sense, it's really well done. And ultimately it's just a matter of breaking the cycle and not letting what happened to you define who you are in the present.

Benson's Whole Worldview is just fueled by anger from demons he never really faced. And honestly the story speaks to me on a level a lot of other stories don't because of how well it captures the CPTSD experience imo. The ugly parts too, the parts where you take your anger out on the world, the parts where you train yourself to not show emotion because that's the same as showing weakness. The parts where you might hurt other people, the parts where you develop a deep hatred for yourself and maybe even others who are like you.

And honestly I think the most telling line in the whole movie is "I was never in charge" that right there had me thinking like crazy the rest of the night on my recent rewatch of the film, like that says a lot.