American Dad!
A CIA agent singing about his morning routine, in a sequence that varies its final line to suit the episode.
American Dad! opens with a main title sequence of 30 seconds.
At 30 seconds, it opens well under the 58-second median for animation sequences in this catalogue.
It arrived on Fox in 2005, when America's Most Wanted, The X-Files and MADtv were also on the network.
The opening titles
Season 1
30sThe sequence on its own, found on a later pass. The copy rejected before had promotional material attached to it.
More animation opening titles from the 2000s
1 sequence
Avatar: The Last Airbender
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 sequencePhineas and Ferb
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 sequenceThe Boondocks
Aaron McGruder's strip animated in an anime register, opened by Asheru's theme over ink-wash stills.
- Season 1
1 sequenceNaruto Shippuden
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 sequenceBleach
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 sequenceArcher
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