10 Best TV Pilot Cliffhangers Ever
3. Mad Men - A Family Man
ABC’s iconic period drama raised the bar for network television at the time and is commonly credited among the early ‘Prestige Television’ works that went on to define our current entertainment era. The drab, smokey veneer of the series elegantly hid themes of consumerist culture, class anxiety and existentialism.
Throughout the show’s opening gambit we begin to get a feel for our mysterious hero, Don Draper. An enigma in his own right, the iconic Draper is shown to be a consummate, if erratic, professional within the world of the 1960s Madison Avenue advertisers. So far, as much as the audience is concerned, this fits in with the ‘mad men’ archetype we’ve been educated on.
The effortlessly cool Draper spends much of the first episode smoking, drinking, womanising and looking suave. He even improvises an entire client presentation; pulling a genius marketing strategy out of thin air for one of his company’s major clients, Lucky Strike cigarettes.
As the episode draws to a close, and just when we’re ready to follow this man into battle blindfolded, Draper drives home to a suburban paradise and into the arms of a loving family. The seemingly ‘lone wolf’ Don Draper is actually a duplicitous family man with a wife and two kids. This last-minute rug pull took everyone aback and is the exact moment Mad Men had us hooked forever.