Yes Dan, missing (or "off-screen" as Jackson explains it) in the film was the great histories of a lot of the characters, including Aragorn... The fact that the Rangers had long protected the lands of the heedless who had long forgotten them, and the history of Aragorn's friendship with Gandalf, and the role he played tracking Gollum down and getting the real story out of him.
Isn't this a 'real' moment ... that makes Stryder seem 'real' to us?
"I hoped you would take me for my own sake. A hunted man sometimes wearies of distrust and longs for friendship"...
It is one of the moments that let's us open our heart to him (a bit). Rings of 'real' truth. I do not consider it to be whiny. Maybe I look to hard for warmth in another.