2016 was a great year for television. From great new shows like Westworld and Stranger Things to returning favorites like Game of Thrones and The Walking Dead, it was hard to keep track of all the great moments that happened this year.
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Luckily, ComicBook.com is here to help with a rundown of television’s biggest moments. We’ve largely limited our picks to shows that ComicBook.com typically covers, and shied away from live TV moments from the Olympics or other sporting events.
Once you finish with the slideshow, be sure to let us know what your favorite moments were in the comments below!
“Hold the Door” – Game of Thrones
Season 6 of Game of Thrones had tons of buzzworthy moments, but none were more devastating than Hodor’s death in “The Door”. As Bran and Meera made a desperate getaway from the Three Eyed Raven’s compromised hideout, Meera ordered Hodor to cover their escape and “hold the door” while she dragged Bran away.
Bran had previously split his consciousness in order to glean more information from the Three Eyed Raven while simultaneously warging into Hodor to protect Meera and his body. Unfortunately, the strain grew to be too much and Bran accidentally warged into Hodor’s body in the distant past. The trauma caused young Hodor (then known as Wylis) to go insane, as he heard Meera’s repeated cries to “Hold the Door” over and over. In the end, the only thing Hodor could say was the last words he’d ever hear.
Christmas Lights – Stranger Things
Stranger Things begins with the disappearance of Will Byers, an 12 year boy from Hawkins, Indiana. Although the police suspected that Will had either run away or died, Joyce learned very quickly that her son wasn’t dead like everyone suspected. After receiving several cryptic phone calls and noticing that her lights flickered whenever Will tried to “talk” with her from the alternate dimension he was trapped in, Joyce used Christmas lights to find a way to communicate with her son. In an instantly iconic scene, Joyce nailed the Christmas lights to the wall and used a code to establish that Will was in fact alive but was in mortal danger thanks to the Demigorgan stalking their town.
Ward Finally Dies – Agents of SHIELD
Agents of SHIELD‘s greatest villain over the course of its first three seasons wasn’t a famous supervillain, but rather one of SHIELD’s own agents gone rogue. Grant Ward was a recurring thorn in Agent Coulson’s side, having nearly killed half of Coulson’s team in various schemes and escaping certain death on multiple occasions. Even after Coulson crushed Ward’s chest in with his prosthetic hand on an alien planet, Ward still found a way to plague Coulson, as the ancient Inhuman Hive possessed his body and used it to return to Earth.
Luckily, SHIELD fans didn’t have to suffer through too much of “Zombie Ward”. In last spring’s season finale, Ward finally met his fiery fate after Coulson trapped him on a quinjet and detonated it in space. Sadly, Daisy Johnson’s beau Lincoln Campbell was also on the quinjet when it exploded, but sometimes sacrifices have to be made to rid a TV show of a villain that far exceeded his expiration date.
Negan’s Grisly Introduction – The Walking Dead
Fans of AMC’s The Walking Dead got an unforgettable introduction to the popular zombie series’s most terrifying villain. Rick and his friends spent the latter half of Season 6 skirmishing the Saviors, whom Rick assumed was just another gang of ruffians preying on weaker communities. After several early victories against the Saviors, Rick and his closest allies find themselves out-manuevered in the woods and are forced to kneel before the Savior’s leader: Negan.
Armed with a baseball bat wrapped with barbed wire named Lucille, Negan promises to teach Rick a lesson for killing so many of his men. After fans were forced to wait all summer to find out who Negan’s victim would be, they watched Negan beat Abraham to death with his bat. But that wasn’t all: Negan also murdered Glenn in gruesome fashion after Daryl tried to fight back against Negan and his new “rules”.
It was one of The Walking Dead‘s most brutal scenes, something that most Walking Dead fans won’t soon forget.
Alex Comes Out – Supergirl
Over the summer, CW executives promised they would address the lack of LGBTQ representation in their superhero shows. True to their word, a major part of Supergirl‘s second season was Alex Danvers’s coming out and accepting her sexuality.
Alex grappled with her sexuality after meeting and befriending Maggie Sawyer, a National City Science Police Officer. Maggie recognized that Alex was being more than “friendly” with her and encouraged her new friend to acknowledge her long buried sexuality. After Alex admitted to herself that she was gay, she came out to her sister Kara and struggled with her feelings with Maggie, who didn’t want to date someone who had just discovered her sexuality.
Alex’s coming out story is surprisingly nuanced and sensitive, a sign of just how far storytelling has come in superhero shows.
“That Doesn’t Look Like Anything to Me” – Westworld
Eagle eyed fans suspected that Bernard wasn’t human early in Westworld‘s first season, but that didn’t mean that it’s reveal in Episode 7 wasn’t any less powerful. Bernard led his ex-lover Theresa to a cabin filled with “off the map” hosts maintained by Ford, under the pretense that Bernard suspected Ford had something to do with Bernard’s subordinate Elsie. While they couldn’t find Ford’s hosts, Theresa discovered a door leading to a secret facility in the basement of the building.
There, Theresa discovered plans for several hosts….including a host that looked identical to Bernard. When she handed Bernard the plans, Bernard claimed that they didn’t “look like anything to me”, as hosts couldn’t see or understand anything that made them realize they weren’t human.
It turned out that Ford had ordered Bernard to take Theresa to the cabin, in order to prevent her from assisting the board of director’s attempted hostile takeover. Ford ordered Bernard to kill Theresa, which he coldly carried out without emotion.
Bernard’s true nature was the first domino to fall in a chain reaction that led to Westworld‘s exciting finale.
The Big Bang – Game of Thrones
Game of Thrones ended its sixth season in truly explosive fashion. Faced with public humiliation and the prospect of either exile or death, Cersei Lannister showed why a Lannister should never be underestimated.
The High Sparrow had successfully outmanuevered Cersei at every turn throughout the season, pulling Cersei’s son King Tommen under his influence with plans of reestablishing a strong church within Westeros. His coup de gras was supposed to occur at Cersei’s public trial, which was to be held in the middle of the city at Baelor’s Sept.
But with all her enemies gathered together in one place, Cersei decided to remove them all from the board. Cersei and Qyburn discovered caches of wildfire placed throughout the city and moved them underneath the sept. After ensuring that Tommen couldn’t leave his room in the Red Keep, Cersei lit the wildfire and blew up the Sept….along with a large part of the city.
Cersei’s fiery solution to her problems caused an unforeseen chain of reactions. Tommen quickly committed suicide after hearing about the death of his wife Margaery (who was in the Sept when it exploded), which led to Cersei taking the Iron Throne for herself. However, Margaery’s grandmother vowed revenge and offered her armies and power to Daenerys…who was crossing the Narrow Sea to invade Westeros.
