Animation · 2000s

108 shows109 sequences

Avatar: The Last Airbender

2005–2008NickelodeonAnimation

Four elements demonstrated in turn by four benders, then a narrated history — a world explained completely in about a minute, every week.

Season 1

1 sequence

Phineas and Ferb

2007–2015Disney ChannelAnimation

A theme that lists everything the characters intend to build over the summer, at a tempo that leaves no room to breathe.

Season 1

1 sequence

American Dad!

2005–Fox / TBSAnimation

A CIA agent singing about his morning routine, in a sequence that varies its final line to suit the episode.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Boondocks

2005–2014Adult SwimAnimation

Aaron McGruder's strip animated in an anime register, opened by Asheru's theme over ink-wash stills.

Season 1

1 sequence

Naruto Shippuden

2007–2017TV TokyoAnimation

Twenty distinct openings across a decade, changed roughly every cour — one of the largest rotations of title sequences any series has produced.

Season 1

1 sequence

Bleach

2004–TV TokyoAnimation

Fifteen different openings across its original run, each one a complete restyling — a long-running series that treated its titles as a rotating commission rather than a fixed asset.

Season 1

1 sequence

Archer

2009–2023FXAnimation

Sixties spy-thriller title design executed straight — silhouettes, gun barrels and a brass sting, with the joke being that the show underneath refuses to match it.

Season 1

1 sequence

Star Wars: The Clone Wars

2008–2020Cartoon Network / Disney+Animation

A newsreel rather than a title sequence — a narrator reporting the state of the war, rewritten every episode, preceded by a different aphorism each week.

Season 1

1 sequence

Teen Titans

2003–2006Cartoon NetworkAnimation

A J-pop theme by Puffy AmiYumi, recorded in both Japanese and English and alternated between episodes.

Season 1

1 sequence

Code Geass

2006–2008MBS / TBSAnimation

Mecha and monarchy over a rock track, with the aristocratic cast posed like a fashion shoot.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Fairly OddParents

2001–2017NickelodeonAnimation

A theme that runs through the entire premise as a checklist, revised several times across sixteen years.

Season 1

1 sequence

Robot Chicken

2005–Adult SwimAnimation

A chicken reanimated with machinery and forced to watch television, which is the show's premise and its title sequence at once.

Season 1

1 sequence

Naruto

2002–2007TV TokyoAnimation

Nine openings across five years, each announcing a new arc — and the first is the one an entire generation can still hum.

Season 1

1 sequence

Gurren Lagann

2007TV TokyoAnimation

A mecha series whose opening escalates as fast as the show does, and which by the end is operating at a scale the first episode could not have suggested.

Season 1

1 sequence

Aqua Teen Hunger Force

2000–2015Adult SwimAnimation

A rap theme introducing three fast-food items who do not solve crimes, performed with the conviction of a show that does.

Season 1

1 sequence

Samurai Jack

2001–2017Cartoon Network / Adult SwimAnimation

A villain narrating his own defeat of the hero, over graphic-design animation that owes more to UPA than to Saturday morning.

Season 1

1 sequence

Kim Possible

2002–2007Disney ChannelAnimation

'Call Me, Beep Me' over split-screen spy graphics — a theme so tied to the show that Disney rerecorded it for the live-action film and was widely told not to.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Venture Bros.

2003–2018Adult SwimAnimation

Jonny Quest's adventure-cartoon grammar played straight and then left to rot for fifteen years.

Season 1

1 sequence

Samurai Champloo

2004–2005Fuji TVAnimation

Nujabes and Shing02 over Edo-period swordplay — hip-hop and historical drama treated as obviously compatible, which nobody had assumed before.

Season 1

1 sequence

Codename: Kids Next Door

2002–2008Cartoon NetworkAnimation

A spy-thriller opening for five children fighting adults, played with the seriousness of a much larger programme.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy

2001–2007Cartoon NetworkAnimation

Two children who win the Grim Reaper in a limbo contest and keep him as a friend.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Batman

2004–2008Kids' WBAnimation

The series that had to follow Batman: The Animated Series and chose to look nothing like it.

Season 1

1 sequence

Moral Orel

2005–2008Adult SwimAnimation

Stop-motion in the Davey and Goliath idiom, which by its third season had stopped being a parody at all.

Season 1

1 sequence

Justice League

2001–2006Cartoon NetworkAnimation

An orchestral fanfare and seven heroes introduced in sequence, from the same production team as Batman: The Animated Series and with the same refusal to condescend.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Cleveland Show

2009–2013FoxAnimation

The Family Guy spin-off, moving Cleveland Brown to Virginia and giving him a theme song about it.

Season 1

1 sequence

Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends

2004–2009Cartoon NetworkAnimation

A boarding house for imaginary friends whose children have outgrown them.

Season 1

1 sequence

Ouran High School Host Club

2006Nippon TVAnimation

A scholarship student mistaken for a boy and conscripted into the school's host club.

Season 1

1 sequence

Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex

2002–2005AnimaxAnimation

Yoko Kanno again, this time with Origa singing in Russian over cybernetic bodies being assembled — a sequence that treats the human form as hardware.

Season 2

1 sequence

Clone High

2002–2023MTV / MaxAnimation

A theme that introduces the entire premise as a shouted list of historical figures, which remains the fastest exposition in animation.

Season 1

1 sequence

Invader Zim

2001–2006NickelodeonAnimation

Gothic-industrial design on a children's network, with a theme that sounds like it was made under duress.

Season 1

1 sequence

Total Drama Island

2007–2008TeletoonAnimation

Survivor animated for children, with confessional booths and eliminations played entirely straight.

Season 1

1 sequence

Danny Phantom

2004–2007NickelodeonAnimation

A narrated origin sung over the transformation, in the tradition the network had been running since Doug.

Season 1

1 sequence

Ben 10

2005–2008Cartoon NetworkAnimation

A theme that lists the premise as a countdown, over a boy who becomes ten different aliens.

Seasons 1–2

1 sequence

Cyberchase

2002–PBSAnimation

Three children pulled into a network to stop a villain with mathematics, which is the plot and the curriculum at once.

Season 1

1 sequence

Batman: The Brave and the Bold

2008–2011Cartoon NetworkAnimation

Batman team-ups in the Silver Age idiom, opened with a straight-faced superhero fanfare.

Season 1

1 sequence

Jackie Chan Adventures

2000–2005Kids' WBAnimation

Jackie Chan as an archaeologist hunting talismans, with the real Chan answering fan questions at the end of each episode.

Season 1

1 sequence

Dora the Explorer

2000–2019NickelodeonAnimation

A bilingual preschool series built on asking the audience questions and leaving room for the answer.

Season 1

1 sequence

Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters

2000–2004TV TokyoAnimation

A card game staged as a series of duels to the death, with an opening rebuilt several times inside its first season.

Season 1

1 sequence

Drawn Together

2004–2007Comedy CentralAnimation

A reality-house parody whose cast are each drawn in a different studio's style.

Seasons 1–2

1 sequence

The Proud Family

2001–2005Disney ChannelAnimation

Penny Proud and her family, opened by a theme Solange recorded with Destiny's Child.

Season 1

1 sequence

Metalocalypse

2006–2013Adult SwimAnimation

A death-metal theme written and performed by the show's creator, for a cartoon about a band whose concerts have a body count.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Spectacular Spider-Man

2008–2009The CW / Disney XDAnimation

Web-line geometry and a surf-rock horn chart, widely held to be the best Spider-Man adaptation in any medium.

Season 1

1 sequence

My Life as a Teenage Robot

2003–2009NickelodeonAnimation

A teenage combat robot who would rather be at school, drawn in hard mid-century angles.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius

2002–2006NickelodeonAnimation

One of the first fully CG series made for American television week to week.

Season 1

1 sequence

Static Shock

2000–2004The WBAnimation

A hip-hop theme over a Black teenage superhero in Dakota — from the same DC animation house as Batman and Superman, and tonally nothing like either.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack

2008–2012Cartoon NetworkAnimation

A boy raised by a whale, in a sea-shanty register that got steadily more unsettling.

Season 1

1 sequence

Chowder

2007–2010Cartoon NetworkAnimation

An apprentice cook in Marzipan City, animated over patterned backgrounds that never stop moving.

Season 1

1 sequence

Toradora!

2008–2009TV TokyoAnimation

Two students agreeing to help each other with the wrong crushes, which goes exactly as expected.

Season 1

1 sequence

American Dragon: Jake Long

2005–2007Disney ChannelAnimation

A New York teenager who is also the American Dragon, and the only one.

Season 1

1 sequence

Xiaolin Showdown

2003–2006Kids' WBAnimation

Four apprentice monks collecting artefacts, in a series that borrows its fight grammar from wuxia rather than from superheroes.

Season 1

1 sequence

Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi

2004–2006Cartoon NetworkAnimation

The Japanese pop duo animated as cartoon versions of themselves, with a theme they recorded.

Season 1

1 sequence

As Told by Ginger

2000–2006NickelodeonAnimation

Middle school treated as continuing drama rather than a gag engine, which was unusual for the slot.

Season 1

1 sequence

Camp Lazlo

2005–2008Cartoon NetworkAnimation

A Brazilian spider monkey at a scout camp run by a humourless beetle.

Season 1

1 sequence

6teen

2004–2010TeletoonAnimation

Six sixteen-year-olds working in the same shopping centre, from the Total Drama creators.

Season 1

1 sequence

Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law

2000–2007Adult SwimAnimation

Birdman as a lawyer representing Hanna-Barbera characters, opened in the register of a network legal drama.

Season 1

1 sequence

Back at the Barnyard

2007–2011NickelodeonAnimation

Farm animals who behave like people the moment the farmer leaves.

Season 1

1 sequence

El Tigre: The Adventures of Manny Rivera

2007–2008NickelodeonAnimation

A boy from a family of both superheroes and supervillains, who has not chosen yet.

Season 1

1 sequence

Yu-Gi-Oh! GX

2004–2008TV TokyoAnimation

The Duel Monsters sequel, moved to a boarding school for duellists.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Emperor's New School

2006–2008Disney ChannelAnimation

The Emperor's New Groove continued as a school comedy, with the film's narrator still interrupting.

Season 1

1 sequence

Sealab 2021

2000–2005Adult SwimAnimation

A 1972 Hanna-Barbera series redubbed into something else entirely, keeping the original's animation and none of its intentions.

Season 1

1 sequence

Squidbillies

2005–2021Adult SwimAnimation

Appalachian squids, with a theme song rerecorded by a different artist almost every season — one of the longest-running rotating title sequences on American television.

Season 1

1 sequence

Between the Lions

2000–2010PBSAnimation

A family of lions running a library, in a reading programme built by the people who made Sesame Street.

Season 1

1 sequence

Fanboy & Chum Chum

2009–2014NickelodeonAnimation

Two boys in superhero costumes they never take off, in one of Nickelodeon's first CG series.

Season 1

1 sequence

Ozzy & Drix

2002–2004Kids' WBAnimation

The film Osmosis Jones continued as a series, with a white blood cell and a cold pill policing a teenager's body.

Season 1

1 sequence

Megas XLR

2004–2005Cartoon NetworkAnimation

A New Jersey mechanic who finds a giant robot in a scrapyard and bolts a car to its head.

Season 1

1 sequence

Superjail!

2007–2014Adult SwimAnimation

A prison inside a volcano inside another volcano, animated with more detail per frame than the slot required.

Season 1

1 sequence

ChalkZone

2002–2008NickelodeonAnimation

A world made of everything ever erased from a blackboard.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Zeta Project

2001–2002Kids' WBAnimation

A Batman Beyond spin-off about an assassin robot that refuses to kill and runs from the agency that built it.

Season 1

1 sequence

Yin Yang Yo!

2006–2009Disney XD / Toon DisneyAnimation

Twin rabbits studying woo-foo under a panda, in a series that never once slowed down.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Mighty B!

2008–2011NickelodeonAnimation

Amy Poehler's Honeybee scout collecting every badge in existence.

Season 1

1 sequence

Charlie and Lola

2005–2008CBeebiesAnimation

Lauren Child's collage illustration animated as collage, with children rather than actors doing the voices.

Season 1

1 sequence

Class of 3000

2006–2008Cartoon NetworkAnimation

André 3000's series about an Atlanta music class, with a theme he wrote and performed himself.

Season 1

1 sequence

Time Squad

2001–2003Cartoon NetworkAnimation

Time police correcting history, which keeps going wrong in ways they caused.

Season 1

1 sequence

Brandy & Mr. Whiskers

2004–2006Disney ChannelAnimation

A pampered dog and a manic rabbit stranded together in the Amazon.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Replacements

2006–2009Disney ChannelAnimation

Two orphans with a phone number that replaces any adult in their lives.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Buzz on Maggie

2005–2006Disney ChannelAnimation

A teenage fly in a rubbish dump, which the series treats as an ordinary suburb.

Season 1

1 sequence

Tom Goes to the Mayor

2004–2006Adult SwimAnimation

Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim's first series, animated from photographs of the cast with almost no motion.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Brak Show

2000–2003Adult SwimAnimation

The Space Ghost villain relocated to a 1950s sitcom family, with the sitcom open played completely straight.

Season 1

1 sequence

Gintama

2006–2021TV TokyoAnimation

Samurai comedy in an alien-occupied Edo, and one of the longest lists of distinct opening sequences in television.

Season 1

1 sequence

Krypto the Superdog

2005–2006Cartoon NetworkAnimation

Superman's dog on Earth without him, living with a boy in suburban Metropolis.

Season 1

1 sequence

12 oz. Mouse

2005–2020Adult SwimAnimation

Drawn deliberately badly in flat colour, and the show that pushed hardest at what the block would broadcast.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Life & Times of Tim

2008–2012HBOAnimation

A man in New York whose every conversation makes his situation worse, drawn as simply as possible.

Season 1

1 sequence

Dennis the Menace and Gnasher

2009–2013CBBCAnimation

The Beano strip animated for CBBC, with the comic's line kept largely intact.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Backyardigans

2004–2013Nick Jr.Animation

Five animals whose garden becomes a different world every episode, with a full musical score in a different genre each time.

Season 1

1 sequence

Ben & Holly's Little Kingdom

2009–2013Channel 5 / Nick Jr.Animation

Elves and fairies from the people who made Peppa Pig, drawn in the same flat two dimensions.

Season 1

1 sequence

Clannad

2007–2009TBSAnimation

A Kyoto Animation adaptation that spends a full season setting up what the second season does to you.

Season 1

1 sequence

Dinosaur Train

2009–PBS KidsAnimation

A Tyrannosaurus raised by Pteranodons, riding a train between geological periods.

Season 1

1 sequence

Doraemon (2005)

2005–TV AsahiAnimation

The robot cat from the twenty-second century, remade in 2005 with an entirely new voice cast after twenty-six years of the old one.

Season 1

1 sequence

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

2009–2010MBS / TBSAnimation

Alchemical circles and transmutation, animated at a scale the first adaptation could not afford.

Season 1

1 sequence

Hajime no Ippo

2000–2014Nippon TVAnimation

A bullied shopkeeper's son taken into a boxing gym, and one of the few sports series that gets the training right.

Season 1

1 sequence

Handy Manny

2006–2011Playhouse DisneyAnimation

A bilingual repairman whose tools talk, and the programme that taught a generation of American children their first Spanish.

Season 1

1 sequence

Happy Tree Friends

2000–Mondo MediaAnimation

Woodland animals drawn in the shape of greetings cards and then killed in every episode, made for the web years before television wanted it.

Season 1

1 sequence

Johnny Test

2005–2014Kids' WB / Cartoon NetworkAnimation

A boy who lets his scientist sisters test inventions on him in exchange for whatever he wants that week.

Season 1

1 sequence

Maggie and the Ferocious Beast

2000–2002TeletoonAnimation

A girl, a spotted beast and a pig live on Nowhere Land, where nothing much goes wrong.

Season 1

1 sequence

Max & Ruby

2002–2020Nick Jr. / Treehouse TVAnimation

A rabbit of three and his sister of seven, in a world where no adult ever appears on screen.

Season 1

2 sequences

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya

2006–2009Tokyo MXAnimation

A schoolgirl who can rewrite reality and has not been told, in an adaptation that first broadcast its episodes deliberately out of order.

Season 1
Season 2

1 sequence

Miffy and Friends

2003–2005KRO / CITVAnimation

Dick Bruna's rabbit animated in stop motion, keeping the flat colours and the two-dot face intact.

Season 1

1 sequence

Monster

2004–2005Nippon TVAnimation

Restrained to the point of austerity — portraits, European streets and a single held tone, for a series about a doctor who saved the wrong life.

Season 1

1 sequence

Mr. Bean: The Animated Series

2002–2019ITVAnimation

The character animated, which suits him — he barely spoke in live action either.

Season 1

1 sequence

The Mr. Men Show

2008–2009Cartoon NetworkAnimation

Roger Hargreaves' shapes rebuilt as a sketch show, forty years after the books.

Season 2

1 sequence

Oswald

2001–2003NickelodeonAnimation

A blue octopus and his dachshund in a town drawn without a straight line in it.

Season 1

1 sequence

Peppa Pig

2004–Channel 5Animation

A preschool series drawn in flat two dimensions and sold to a hundred and eighty countries, which is more than almost anything else British television has made.