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Warning: This article contains spoilers for Insidious: The Red Door.Insidious: The Red Door features the character Ben Burton (David Call) through a special connection to director and star Patrick Wilson’s Josh Lambert. The fifth installment in the Insidious franchise opens with Josh and his son Dalton (Ty Simpkins) being hypnotized by psychic medium Carl (Steve Coulter) in order to suppress any memories they have of astral projection or their horrible experiences in The Further. In the decade after, the Lambert family is fractured, with Josh and Renai (Rose Byrne) separated, his relationship with Dalton damaged, and Josh’s mother Lorraine (Barbara Hershey) passing away.
No sooner has he buried his mother than Josh runs into Carl again and, unknowingly, another figure from his past who proceeds to haunt him throughout Insidious 5. Eventually, while trying to regain some of the memories Carl helped suppress, Josh is attacked by the figure in broad daylight, and their altercation overturns a box of photographs in his mother’s closet that depict what Josh has taken for a demonic entity as a man; Ben Burton. As Josh stares at a picture of Ben and Lorraine smiling together, he begins to realize who Ben Burton is to him, and after some research, how he connects to what has become a Lambert family curse.
Insidious: The Red Door’s Ben Burton Is Josh Lambert’s Father
After finding some of Ben Burton’s public records, Josh realizes that the man who’s been stalking him is his father, who was completely absent from his life as a boy. The lack of a father figure in his life resulted in Josh developing a fierce need to be a better father for his own children, which is why he’s so distressed when he keeps falling short of his own expectations and disappointing Dalton. He carries the hurt, blame, and rejection of his father into his adulthood, never understanding why his father abandoned the family.
Ben is present from the moment that Josh leaves his mother’s grave site, visible first as a blurry figure in the background, then slowly becoming more discernable as he comes into focus in the back window of his car. He’s not able to reach Josh until he’s actively trying to retrieve some of his repressed memories through a children’s matching game, and Ben comes crashing through his front window. What Josh perceives as an attack is a desperate attempt to communicate with his son and tell him the truth about his abilities and connection to The Further.
Was Ben Burton In Any Other Insidious Movies?
While he might look like the long-haired demon that first appeared to terrorize the Lambert family in Insidious, he’s a brand-new character who hasn’t been in any other movies in the franchise. While this is the first time fans meet Ben, his presence has loomed large over the Lambert family, particularly in the lives of Lorraine and Josh. Lorraine struggled to raise her son alone without any help with his nightmares, eventually having to call upon Elise (Lin Shaye) and Carl to help make sense of his outbursts.It’s possible that Ben has been trying to reach his son for some time, but apparently was only able to do so after Lorraine passed away. As Elise Rainier explains in a video that appears during Insidious: The Red Door, the spirits trapped in The Further are endlessly tormented by the worst things they did while alive, which for Ben was abandoning his family (albeit with good intentions). For whatever reason, he’s finally able to get through to Josh and, in his own spectral way, guide him to discovering the truth about astral projection and The Further.
What Insidious: The Red Door Reveals About Ben’s Past
Part of Josh coming to terms with his own past involves doing the same with his father’s. Josh comes to find out that Ben was diagnosed as a possible schizophrenic who was also capable of astral projection. He suffered from the same night terrors as Josh, and was eventually checked into an institution for treatment. He ended up throwing himself off of the roof in an effort to not only bring himself some peace, but refrain from passing down the trauma of interacting with The Further to his son.
Leaving Lorraine a note that reads, “It ends with me,” Ben seemed to think that taking his own life would save her and Josh, but this sadly wasn’t the case. Josh still developed the ability to astral project into The Further, where he became the object of desire for Parker Crane and his mother (as seen in Insidious: Chapter 2), and his son Dalton exhibited a strong, bright spiritual energy that attracted the Lipstick-Face Demon. Lorraine did her best trying to help Josh by calling upon Carl and Elise, but she didn’t understand that her son was suffering from a real demonic threat as well as a mental health crisis.
Ben Burton’s Abilities & Connection To The Further Explained
Ben not only has the ability to astral project just like Josh and Dalton but also to make himself physically present in the real world. He isn’t, as Josh initially thinks, a malevolent spirit, though he does appear to be tormented by the pain he inflicted on his family. When Josh eventually regains some of his memories and reenters The Further, Ben is able to act like a guide and help Josh find his way to Dalton without encountering as many hungry spirits as he has in the past.
The movie really drives home the concept that Ben’s ability to astral project and the demons he encounters in The Further are metaphorical examples of mental illness and its affects, which might make The Red Door less scary and violent than other Insidious movies, but no less poignant. Josh becomes worried that he’s passed on his father’s inherited schizophrenia to Dalton which, while not true, opens up a dialogue about the weight of chronic illness suffered in silence. Ben couldn’t find any respite except in death, and when he sees his son and grandson suffering because of something he’s given them, tries to help them mend their relationship.
Why Ben Burton Is So Important In Insidious: The Red Door
Ben becomes incredibly important to Insidious: The Red Door for several reasons. For one, he’s a guiding beacon for Josh in The Further that he couldn’t be for him in real life, and for another, he helps him regain some of the memories he suppressed in order to find some semblance of serenity. And finally, he’s part of the discussion about chronic mental illness as well as emotional dysfunction for the men in the Lambert family who have difficulty communicating their feelings.
In Insidious: The Red Door’s ending, when Josh is struggling to hold back the Lipstick-Face Demon long enough for Dalton to escape The Further, he accepts the fact that he will need to sacrifice himself. When the Red Door is closed and Josh finds himself alone, his father appears in his time of need and presents him with a lantern to find his way home. Ben may not have been able to be there for Josh when he was alive, but he reminds him how important it is that he lives, for his family as well as himself, which is how the Red Door truly closes and the healing begins.
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