Boys from the Blackstuff
Alan Bleasdale on unemployment in Liverpool, and the series most often named when British television argues about its own best work.
One opening sequence is catalogued for Boys from the Blackstuff, covering season 1.
It arrived on BBC Two in 1982, when Great Railway Journeys, The Old Grey Whistle Test and The Morecambe & Wise Show were also on the network.
The opening titles
Season 1
No usable clip found. Searching returns Scully, a different Bleasdale series; searching the character returns the famous scenes. The titles survive in full-episode uploads, which is not something this catalogue can point at.
More drama opening titles from the 1980s
2 sequencesEastEnders
An aerial pull-back over the Thames and the drum that answers it — thirty-two seconds that have barely changed in forty years.
- Season 1
- Season 41
1 sequenceBaywatch
Los Angeles County lifeguards, and at its peak the most-watched television programme on Earth.
- Season 1
1 sequenceLonesome Dove
Basil Poledouris scoring a cattle drive from Texas to Montana — the miniseries that proved the western was not finished after all.
- Season 1
2 sequencesNeighbours
Ramsay Street across forty years, and a theme song that survived every cast, network and cancellation.
- Season 1
- Season 39
2 sequencesThe Bold and the Beautiful
Los Angeles fashion houses, and the most widely watched daytime serial in the world.
- Season 1
- Season 38
1 sequenceKnight Rider
A narrated premise, a scanning red light and a synth arpeggio — the most efficient piece of eighties television branding after the A-Team's.
- Season 1