Ballers: 10 Most Shocking Moments From The Rock's TV Show Premiere

10. A Death Within Five Minutes

A surefire way to grab the audience's attention is to engineer a character's death within the first few minutes, and Ballers certainly took advantage of this. The second scene of Episode 1 sees an ex-pro driving with a woman implied to be his girlfriend. They share an incredibly mushy exchange before she asks him to leave his wife, revealing herself as his mistress. His reluctant response causes her to attack him, sending their car careering into the path of an oncoming truck. A smash cut to The Rock's character (fellow retiree Spencer Strasmore) speaking at his funeral immediately brings the show's dark side to the fore, showing the vices, temptations and dangers faced by unsatisfied former football players. It also makes no secret of the show's darkly immoral undertone, which sees immoral behaviour casually excused as typical.