Warning: spoilers ahead

As the 2016 election heats up, the nation is getting closer and closer to picking its next president. For some who would rather tune out the nastiness of it, they turn to Netflix. One show they may watch to escape the political reality is the acclaimed political drama series "House of Cards".

What they may or may not notice, though, is just how similar to real life that the show has become. With the first four seasons written either before or early in 2016, many of the events in the fictitious drama have coincidentally drawn parallels to real life events that happened later. Here are 10 things that the show's writers created that ended up being similar to a real life political event later on.

1. First Lady on the ticket

In Season four, in a stunning move, First Lady of the United States Claire Underwood joins her husband Frank on the Democratic ticket as his running mate. It marks the first time ever in the show's timeline that a First Lady goes on to serve in such a high-ranking capacity. In real life 2016, a similar moment occurred. Former First Lady Hillary Clinton became the first first lady to run on a major presidential ticket, only this time as president. Unlike Underwood, Clinton has held elected office as a Senator from New York and as Secretary of State. Still, it makes for an interesting moment in American history.

2. The Democratic Primary

In Season three, President Frank Underwood runs for reelection to his first full term. However, this isn't as easy as it seems. Despite being an establishment figure from serving in Congress for years and later as Vice President, he faces a tricky primary opponent. Hillary Clinton faced a similar challenge during her run this year. Clinton has been a big name in Democratic politics since her husband originally ran for president in 1988. Despite being an establishment figure with wide name recognition, she still faced a difficult opponent in the primaries in the form of Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. Sanders ran to Clinton's left and fired up the liberal Democratic base. Underwood faced a similar problem when his opponent, Heather Dunbar did the same thing. In both instances, the more moderate establishment figure ultimately won. Both primaries also featured a third candidate that never really gained traction. In "House of Cards", California Congresswoman Jackie Sharpe also ran but pulled out of the race after losing soundly in Iowa. In real life, this exact occurrence happened to the campaign of former Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley.

3. The Republican candidate

True, Donald Trump is a more brash and unpredictable candidate than the show's young, charismatic Republican nominee, Will Conway, but there are quite a few similarities between the two. For one, they're both New Yorkers. They also both have foreign wives, Conway's wife, Hannah, is British, and Melania Trump is Slovenian. The two also place a high premium on national security. Conway goes so far as to name a general as his running mate to supplement his national security credentials. Trump nearly did the same thing when reports surfaced this summer that he was considering former Lieutenant General Michael Flynn as his VP pick. The two also build much of their platform on defeating foreign terrorist organizations. Conway uses the spread of the terror group ICO (clearly a parallel to real life ISIS) to illustrate that Underwood cannot keep the nation safe. Trump uses similar news to say the same thing about Clinton. Another point worth mentioning, Trump's campaign manager also bears the last name of Conway.

4. Russia's role in the Middle East

Much of Season three focuses on the unrest in the Jordan valley between Israel and Palestine. Underwood and Russian President Viktor Petrov (who bears a strong resemblance to actual Russian President, Vladimir Putin) must work together to solve the crisis. The partnership later unravels as both begin to not trust each other and the violence continues to escalate. In reality, the U.S. and Russia are facing a similar trust gap in Syria. Both sides accuse the other of working against the ultimate goal of peace. The U.S. accuses Russia of bombing Syrian rebels instead of ISIS terrorists, while Russia accuses the U.S. of using ISIS as an excuse to remove Syria's anti-American president from power. In both cases, hostilities increase and the partnership weakens.

5. Jobs

In Season three, Underwood pushes a new jobs program known as AmeriWorks in order to get the economy moving again. He places a large amount of his work in trying to restore jobs in the country again. In 2016, jobs have become a large part of a real-life presidential candidate, Donald Trump. Trump has spent most of his campaign railing against Mexico and China for taking American manufacturing jobs. While Trump's plans to combat this are a little unclear, 2016, in both reality and in the show, was a year where job creation was a major campaign theme.

6. Assassination conspiracies

Throughout the show, Underwood has murdered two of his associates in order to keep them quiet. He is ruthless and unwilling to let his secret machinations be revealed to the public. Journalist Lucas Goodwin learns the truth and tries to reveal it to a skeptical series of critics. Underwood is not the only president to be accused of murder. Both the Clintons and the Bushes have been the subject of conspiracy theories involving the murders of former colleagues. In 2016, the "Clinton Body Count" theory has been brought back into the spotlight. The conspiracy theory focuses on the strange circumstances surrounding the deaths of multiple Clinton allies. Hillary Clinton is also thought by many on the far right to be involved in the death of four Americans, including the Libyan ambassador, in the Benghazi terror attacks in 2012. Underwood manages to survive these attacks due to lack of hard evidence. There is a similar lack of evidence for the conspiracy theories surrounding the Clintons.

7. Running mates

Presidential nominees pick their running mates for a variety of reasons. At the beginning of the series, President Garrett Walker selects Pennsylvania Governor Jim Matthews as his VP due to his longevity of service to the Democratic party, Underwood refers to this as "putting him out to pasture". Walker later selects Underwood as his VP in the Season one finale. Walker trusts Underwood and wants him as his partner. In the real 2016, Hillary Clinton selected long-time Democratic fixture Senator Tim Kaine as her running mate. Kaine is known for his loyalty to the Clinton family and his record with them goes back decades. Clinton also is described as having a lot of trust in Kaine. It would appear that Clinton and Walker have quite a bit in common when it comes to picking their running mate. In Season four, the Republican nominee, Conway, picks a general as his running mate to make up for his naivety in foreign policy and national security affairs. Real-life Republican nominee, Donald Trump, made a similar move. Understanding the concern over a president with no elected office experience, Trump selected policy-smart Indiana Governor Mike Pence to balance out the ticket.

8. Some pretty disturbing sex scandals

In Season one, Underwood uses Pennsylvania Congressman Peter Russo as a pawn in his ultimate goal of achieving power. Russo is an alcoholic and has a penchant for picking up call girls. His loose style of living is reminiscent of former New York Congressman Anthony Weiner. The married congressman was forced to resign from Congress in 2011 after he accidentally tweeted a sexually-suggestive picture of himself that he was sending to multiple women. Weiner later ran for mayor of New York City in 2013 but lost the primary after even more allegations surfaced that he was having racy online chats with a porn star. He surfaced in the news again this year after he exchanged more racy photos (this time with his young son in the room). His wife, Huma Abedin, announced she was separating from him after this year's newest allegations. On the show, Russo's girlfriend, Christine also leaves him after she can no longer tolerate his behavior. When Russo no longer cooperates with Underwood's plans, he uses a call girl to bait him into spiraling his life even further out of control after he tries to sober up. In real life, a Republican operative was catfishing Weiner the whole time.

9. Changing campaign managers

After Underwood's chief of staff, Doug Stamper, is injured, Underwood asks him to leave his campaign. In the real version of 2016, Trump had a similar shakeup in his campaign. Over the summer, he let his controversial campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, go. Like Doug Stamper, Lewandowski was fiercely loyal to his candidate and was a gate keeper of sorts. He was replaced with Republican operative Paul Manafort. Manafort was let go a few months later after reports surfaced that he may have accepted money from the campaign of the oppressive Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych. He has since been replaced with former Ted Cruz advisor, Kellyanne Conway.

10. Secret meetings

Underwood eventually defeats Dunbar in the primaries by leaking evidence that she met with Underwood's would-be-assassin, Lucas Goodwin. She is forced to drop out of the race after her public opinion numbers plummet. In the Republican primaries, Donald Trump makes a similar accusation about the father of Ted Cruz, Rafael. He claims that Rafael Cruz knew the killer of John F. Kennedy, Lee Harvey Oswald. He even cites a tabloid story that they were seen together just days before the infamous assassination of Kennedy at Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas.

Despite "House of Cards" being a television show, it still has made some interesting storylines that ended up having real-life parallels in the actual 2016 elections. It should be interesting to see what events will occur in Season five that may ultimately have a reality basis as well.