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Cliffhanger
Plot device used in fiction / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A cliffhanger or cliffhanger ending is a plot device in fiction which features a main character in a precarious or difficult dilemma or confronted with a shocking revelation at the end of an episode[1] or a film of serialized fiction. A cliffhanger is hoped to incentivize the audience to return to see how the characters resolve the dilemma.
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Some serials end with the caveat, "To Be Continued" or "The End?" In serial films and television series, the following episode sometimes begins with a recap sequence.
Cliffhangers were used as literary devices in several works of the Middle Ages with One Thousand and One Nights ending on a cliffhanger each night.[2] Cliffhangers appeared as an element of the Victorian era serial novel that emerged in the 1840s, with many associating the form with Charles Dickens, a pioneer of the serial publication of narrative fiction.[3][4] Following the enormous success of Dickens, by the 1860s cliffhanger endings had become a staple part of the sensation serials.[5]