The Best TV Twists Of The Last Decade

While plenty of great TV shows aired during the last decade, some of them offered up twists, tricks, and turns to keep their fans guessing, rather than pursuing a more straightforward path. By giving audiences well-earned surprises every now and then, these shows kept viewers on their toes throughout their viewing experiences, ultimately providing the 2010s with some of the small screen's most unforgettable moments.

From sprawling fantasy epics and modern telenovelas to anthology shows and network sitcoms, these twists are the most surprising, unexpected turns in this last decade of television, scenes that shocked and thrilled fans of each of these shows. Of course, it should go without saying that if you're behind on any of these shows, you might want to turn back now. To really get into the details of why these twists work so perfectly, we'll have to reveal them, so major spoilers lie ahead! But if you're okay with that, then keep reading for the best TV twists of the last decade.

If you'd never read George R.R. Martin's sprawling fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire before its HBO adaptation, Game of Thrones, you probably thought that Ned Stark (Sean Bean) was the story's protagonist. As the noble and honest Warden of the North, Ned is called to King's Landing during Thrones' inaugural season to serve as the Hand of the King to his old friend, Robert Baratheon. But before long, Ned lands himself in hot water by (correctly) suggesting that Robert's son and heir, Joffrey (Jack Gleeson), isn't Robert's son at all but the illegitimate child of Queen Cersei Lannister (Lena Headey) and her twin brother, Jaime (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau).

Joffrey, who's crowned king after Robert's sudden death, tells his advisors and the Stark family that he will show Ned mercy by simply banishing him to serve in the punitive Night's Watch, but when the young king brings Ned before the city, he announces that no mercy will be shown, beheading the Stark patriarch in front of Ned's two young daughters, Arya (Maisie Williams) and Sansa (Sophie Turner), instilling a thirst for revenge in both of the Stark girls. Game of Thrones would become notorious for subverting expectations, but Ned losing his head was its first truly great twist.

In 2015, writer and director Sam Esmail gave future Academy Award winner Rami Malek an extraordinary opportunity by casting him in Mr. Robot, the highly ambitious and layered drama series. During its first season, audiences meet Elliot Alderson (Malek), a socially inept engineer and hacker who teams up with a group of other underground computer experts to overthrow the government. Elliot is initially brought on board by the enigmatic and mysterious Mr. Robot (an excellent Christian Slater), who mentors him throughout the season.

However, as it turns out, there's much more to Mr. Robot than meets the eye — specifically, Elliot's eye, as Eliot is the only one who can see him in the first place. The character played by Slater isn't actually there. Instead, Elliot is disassociating and seeing his dead father, and as it turns out, Elliot is actually leading the hacking effort himself as Mr. Robot. Sounds pretty confusing, right? It is, but Esmail lays it all out perfectly, creating an unforgettable twist.

When a new show is adapted from a popular telenovela, a genre characterized by its plot twists, you can probably expect some serious turns and surprises. This is definitely the case with Jane the Virgin, a fizzy yet carefully mapped CW series which is a (fairly loose) adaptation of a Venezuelan drama called, naturally, Juana la Virgen. The woman behind Jane, Gina Rodriguez — who won a Golden Globe for her performance in 2014 — brings real heart and truth to her role as a 23-year-old virginal woman who's accidentally artificially inseminated during a routine visit to the gynecologist.

This insane life development is troubling for several reasons, not the least of which is that it throws a serious wrench into Jane's relationship with her boyfriend Michael (Brett Dier), but despite a love triangle with the baby's biological father, Rafael (Justin Baldoni), the two eventually get married. Tragically, Michael dies in the third season from an aortic dissection from a previous gunshot, which he sustained in the line of duty as a detective. But from the transition from the fourth season to the fifth, audiences were shocked to learn that Michael wasn't only still alive but suffering from memory loss and living as "Jason." In a show that features surprise twins, mistaken identities, and even an all-seeing narrator, it's remarkable that Michael's return from the dead was Jane's most shocking development.

One of Netflix's first forays into original content, House of Cards, created by Beau Willimon and adapted from the 1990s BBC miniseries of the same name, had all the makings of serious, prestige television. With a pilot directed by David Fincher and a core cast that included Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright, House of Cards painted Washington D.C. as a dirty, scandal-ridden town filled with people who will do just about anything to gain more power.

And as Frank Underwood, a man who would stop at nothing to climb the political ladder, Kevin Spacey — who was later fired from the show over several accusations of sexual assault and harassment from throughout his career — clearly had no limits where wrongdoing was concerned, which came to a head during the show's second season. During an argument with Zoe Barnes (Kate Mara), a young reporter he's having an affair with, Frank realizes there's no way to keep her quiet, and after he tricks her into going into an empty metro station, he shoves her in front of a train without a second thought. With one push, House of Cards set a standard for shock value in prestige dramas, and though it ultimately never matched other shows like Mad Men or Breaking Bad, this jaw-dropping moment was entirely unforgettable.

Charlie Brooker's anthology series Black Mirror, which originally aired on Britain's Channel 4 before moving exclusively to Netflix in 2015, tackles an important and incredibly relevant question for the modern age. As technology keeps advancing, what should we all be afraid of? Turns out, the answer is "most things," from Google Glass-style eye implants and Star Trek-inspired alternate realities to real-life social media ranking systems.

Pretty much any episode of Black Mirror, from its groundbreaking "Bandersnatch" to its heart-wrenching "San Junipero," provides an earth-shattering twist, but to get a good idea of what the show is all about, check out its very first episode, "The National Anthem." In the series premiere, the British Prime Minister (Rory Kinnear) is given a choice. He can have sexual intercourse with a pig on live television, or a kidnapped member of the royal family will be killed. After a harrowing process, he decides to go through with it, only to be told that the "missing" princess had been released before he aired his act with the pig. Black Mirror set out to be a bleak look at modern technology right out of the gate, and stomach-turning as it might be, "The National Anthem" and its twist set the standard for the entire series.

Phoebe Waller-Bridge's award-winning, groundbreaking series Fleabag — which she created, wrote, and stars in — gave us one of the best TV characters of the last decade and is known for its foul-mouthed humor and perfect blend of pathos and comedy. However, it also bears one other important hallmark. Throughout the show's first season, the main character — who's only ever known as "Fleabag" — constantly breaks the fourth wall, letting Fleabag talk to the camera as if it's her closest friend in the world. It's important to note that nobody else ever notices or sees Fleabag confiding in her imaginary friend, until a new person arrives in her life who sees through her facade.

As the second season opens, Fleabag meets an important new person, the Priest (Andrew Scott), who's been personally handpicked to perform her father's second wedding. As the season progresses, the two strike up an unlikely friendship that threatens to become something more, despite the Priest's holy vows. Fleabag begins spending more and more time with the Priest, and before long, something interesting happens. He watches her break the fourth wall and comments on it, asking where she "goes" and even looking directly into the camera himself as if searching for Fleabag's mysterious friend. After so much time with just Fleabag, it's incredibly jarring for another character to share her control over the fourth wall, but it also shows how much the Priest understands her, adding a seriously heartbreaking layer to their ultimately doomed relationship.