An Ode To The Unappreciated Art Of TV Opening Credits

I’ve always been a devotee of the humble title sequence — I strongly believe that no show is complete without one. Whether it’s a quick title card or a 2-minute epic, there’s an art to TV intros that should not be lost or skipped.

We live in an age of instant gratification: our Iconic order must have same day delivery, we’re pissed off if our food delivery doesn’t arrive within 20 minutes, and the fact that Frank Ocean made us wait four years was just plain torture.

So, it’s no surprise that we want to consume a whole season of TV without pesky intros getting in the way.

Netflix realised this in 2017, introducing the ‘skip intro’ button — suddenly, opening credits were just this thing that happened when you were too busy licking chip flavouring off your fingers to click.

But what if when we skip the intros, we’re actually missing out on a crucial part of the show?

Is The TV Intro Dead?

In the ye olde days TV intros were used to capture the attention of people flicking between channels and draw them in — but with the dominance of Netflix, everything has changed. House of Cards released an entire season at once, prompting some genius to come up with the term binge-watching and basically we were all doomed from then on.

At this point intros were still safe! The House of Cards intro clocked in at 90 seconds, with its emo time lapse of Washington DC landmarks.

But things are changing, intros are becoming less important — in some cases short title cards have taken their place, so that you can catch up with Riverdale or The Bold Type that little bit faster. Along with the ‘skip intro’ button, Netflix also started the insidious practice of automatically skipping longer intros after you’ve watched a couple of episodes in a row.

But, I believe every episode is best watched with its opening credits intact — they do so much to set you up for the episode you’re about to watch. From setting the tone, to neatly summarising the premise of a show, to just a damn good singalong, the intro is the heart and soul of the TV show.

Singalong With Me

It’s a special moment, realising you know every lyric to a theme song.

It happens slowly, at first maybe you’ve never heard the song, next you start to hum along, until one day you know every word and you need to sing it as loudly as possible to express your love for a show that has found its way deep into your heart.

Remembering these songs makes me feel closer to a show. With every lyric I am tying myself to it — it’s as though the song is the show’s national anthem and I am its most patriotic devotee. Memorising every lyric is like a badge of honour, a symbol of the time I have spent with these characters in their world.

There are so many iconic theme songs: Pokémon’s ‘Gotta Catch ‘Em All’ was the anthem of my childhood, The OC’s ‘California’ was the banger from my adolescence, and you can’t hear ‘I’ll Be There For You’ without picturing the Friends crew frolicking in a fountain.

But the song that means the most to me — my national anthem — is ‘Where You Lead’ by Carole King, the iconic theme song from the Gilmore Girls intro.

It’s a show that has supported me through lonely times, helped me bond with friends in high school and most of all made me feel at home when life felt a little scary. ‘Where You Lead’ is a perfectly emotive theme song, and paired with a sepia toned montage of the Gilmore family, well it’s enough to make a girl tear up.

But unfortunately the theme song doesn’t have the cultural clout it used to! These days theme songs are few and far between and in some cases, they’re literally being killed off. After four seasons of Zooey Deschanel’s twee theme for New Girl, the intro was replaced with a lyric-less version of the song.

But all hope should not be lost, there are some excellent theme songs carrying on the baton in 2018. Netflix revived Queer Eye along with its classic theme, and Charles Bradley’s rendition of ‘Changes’ for Big Mouth is the most sophisticated part of the brilliantly cringeworthy show.

Theme songs play to one of our most basic instincts, to sing– so why the hell would you deprive yourself of something that wholesome?

A Big Mood

Some of the best intros are the ones that put you in the right mood.

When you think of this type of intro you might jump to the really ominous, haunting ones like Stranger Things, Twin Peaks or American Horror Story. There’s nothing like the discordant whirs of the Lost theme song to remind you that no one is safe.

Or maybe you think of so-called Prestige TV — HBO led the pack when it came to title sequences, crafting long moody intros which always evoked the feeling of a show. From the classics: Sopranos, Six Feet Under and Dexter to the more recent Big Little Lies, Westworld and True Detective.

HBO knows how to immerse you in the mood of a show, starting with the opening credits.

But True Blood is the one that sticks out for me. The first time I watched it, my friends and I were crammed around a TV we had relocated to my parents’ garage for the occasion. Electric guitar opens a dark country song, intercut with vignettes of the south, flashes of sexual misconduct, and maggots eating a fox carcass. It was graphic stuff at 15, but so was the show.

But mood doesn’t have to mean moody, so many comedy intros do a brilliant job setting you up to watch a comedy. From Brooklyn Nine Nine to 30 Rock and Parks and Recreation, these frenetic theme songs put you in exactly the right mood to laugh along with the Nine-Nine or directly at Jerry.

They are 20 seconds of pure unadulterated joy, so don’t skip it, bask in it.

Storytelling

These are the intros that set up the whole premise of the show. Think The Nanny. Fresh Prince of Bel Air. Law and Order SVU!

These intros were especially important in the days of linear TV. People might have only picked up an episode here and there, so the intro had to include all the context you needed to enjoy the show. With the advent of streaming services, this type of intro seems totally superfluous, but damnit I love them! I couldn’t imagine writing about TV intros without paying homage to this classic technique.

There are a couple of gems that have boldly brought this trope into the 21st Century. Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt for one with its viral video style news mash-up, recapping how Kimmy got out of the bunker and into NYC.

And it only makes sense that the musical sitcom, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend crafted a catchy theme song that doubles as an explainer. Crazy Ex-Girlfriend even goes one step further and updates the theme song for each season to map the changes in Rachel’s quest for love.

Whether they’re necessary or not, there is an art to condensing a shows premise into a bite-sized intro.

It may be a losing battle, but I think opening credits are worth the fight. I hope shows are able to keep creating quirky and inventive opening credits: they enhance the way we watch a show. At the very least, they give you a couple more minutes on the sofa.

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Chloe Gillespie works for Junkee and loves dogs and grilled cheese. Her work is featured right here, on FBi Radio and on a Tumblr she used to run about her parents.