10 Most Shocking TV Episode Endings

With a lot of television these days, it seems like all the focus is placed on the finales. Massive, game-changing events don't happen until the final moments of the season, and then the viewers are stuck to wait another year or two to see what happens next.

The best TV shows, however, are the ones that don't save all the good stuff for the end, and instead throw in plenty of twists and surprises along the way.

These are the episode endings that made viewers gasp or cry or shake with horror, and written with all the weight and gravitas you'd expect from a season finale.

This may be hard to remember nowadays, but there was once a time where The Walking Dead was actually exciting. During that first half of season three, the show was as thrilling and as off-the-walls as it would ever be. This was one of the few periods throughout the show where it genuinely felt like anything could happen, where any character could die a horrible, gruesome death at any moment.

Even still, few people expected the death of Lori. At the time, she was the third-highest ranking cast member, not to mention Rick's pregnant wife. If they were going to kill her off, they'd wait at least until the midseason finale, right? Nope, they killed her off in episode four, dying from an emergency C-section performed by a traumatized Maggie, right in front of her thirteen-year-old son.

Those final moments of the episode, where Rick breaks down at the realization of Lori's death, is still one of the most haunting, iconic moments in television history, even if it's been memed to death.