Submitted by GrumpigPlays t3_1220eec in television
the_original_Retro t1_jdo6yw2 wrote
It goes all the way back to before television. A ton of radio "serial" shows had cliffhangers at their ends so you would want to turn into next week's episode to see how the heck the hero survived.
It predates TV, and predates TV series. There are hundreds in USA alone.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_old-time_radio_programs
MarkovCow t1_jdocjpy wrote
The storyteller in the frame narrative of one thousand and one nights kind of did the same thing too.
omnilynx t1_jdpra9x wrote
Hate to one-up you but it goes back before radio, too. Serial novels, published in newspapers and magazines, have been doing episodic cliffhangers since at least Dumas and Dickens' time.
the_original_Retro t1_jdqhsi2 wrote
Agreed, with the caveat that I was being adhering to OP's wording.
Their question was what "show" pioneered the cliff-hanger ending, so I took my answer from that context.
theyusedthelamppost t1_jdt89hg wrote
and I'm sure even the radio people grew up in a world where cliffhangers had already been an established storytelling strategy
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