EastEnders star Max Bowden has staged a very brief return to the BBC One soap this week, following a departure in March 2024.
His exit storyline saw character Ben Mitchell sent to a prison in America for fraud.
Prior to this, he was involved in a hugely powerful and emotional storyline that saw Lola Pearce (Danielle Harold), the mother of Ben’s daughter Lexi (Isabella Brown), die after being diagnosed with a brain tumour.
He’d flown to the States to try and find alternative treatments for Lola, and had committed the fraudulent behaviour while travelling.
This week, he’s come home to Walford to attend his father-in-law’s funeral, only to learn that husband Callum (Tony Clay) has been unfaithful, cheating with Johnny Carter (Charlie Suff) for months.
The dramatic graveside reunion continues in today’s episode, with the dramatic cliffhanger leaving us to wonder whether Ben will perhaps put in another appearance this week – or if we could see him again in the future.
But why did Max leave last year?
Why did Max Bowden leave EastEnders?
Originally playing Ben between 2019 and 2024, Max was at the centre of several huge storylines.
Continuously filming such intense plots became so much, and he started to experience burnout.
‘The important thing was my time was ready. I was very tired and, like I said, I wasn’t me, I wasn’t’, he responded when asked about whether he was sacked from the show, or chose to walk away.
‘The Max sat in front of you today was kind of a ghost, and they recognised that – I recognised that’.
Adding to his chat in an episode of The Lewis Nicholls Show, Max said: ‘I did nearly six hundred episodes in five years, which is a hell of a lot, and it was time for a rest. The character was tired, I was tired, they [the producers] were probably tired of me being tired.
‘From an honest perspective, I think yeah, a lot of it was that I needed to go for a bit. I needed to go work on me, get myself back to a place of really good mental health, focus on healing and also be a dad.’
Reflecting on Ben’s involvement in Lola’s final storyline in the soap, Max explained filming this was like ‘life imitating art to an extent’, after he lost his best friend to a brain tumour as well.
‘It laid a lot out on the table, and it exposed me to a lot of vulnerability which probably at the time I didn’t navigate well. It was a tough old time, but you know what, I’m a hell of a lot stronger for it.’
‘That was definitely the hardest period of my professional life.’
In March last year, Max opened up about the death of friend Maxwell during an interview on BBC One’s Morning Live.
‘I felt like it wasn’t well registered or understood as losing a family member or next of kin,’ he began.
‘Of course because I spent so much time with him, I really noticed his absence when he was gone. That overwhelming sentiment of loneliness was so apparent.’