Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons
Anderson's darkest supermarionation series, opened by two rings of light moving across a wall.
Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons opens with a main title sequence of 65 seconds.
It arrived on ITV in 1967, when The Sooty Show, World of Sport and Ivor the Engine were also on the network.
The opening titles
Season 1
65sPosted by the official Gerry Anderson channel.
More sci-fi opening titles from the 1960s
10 sequences
Doctor Who
Rebuilt for almost every Doctor, and each rebuild invented its own technique — a camera filming its own monitor, light photographed through moving slots, and finally the first computer-generated titles on British television.
- Seasons 1–3
- Seasons 4–6
- Seasons 7–10
- and 7 more
2 sequences
Star Trek
The one that set the shape of every space-opera opening since: a ship crossing the frame, a captain narrating a mission statement, and a melody built to be hummed. Alexander Courage wrote it as a fanfare and a lounge tune at the same time.
- Season 1
- Seasons 2–3
1 sequenceThe Prisoner
Thunder, a Lotus Seven driven hard past Parliament, a resignation letter slammed onto a desk, and then gas under the door of a man's own flat. Two minutes that explain the entire premise without a narrator, and end with the only line the show ever needed: I am not a number.
- Season 1
1 sequenceThunderbirds
Five, four, three, two, one — the countdown, the launch bays, and Barry Gray's march. Probably the most quoted title sequence Britain has produced.
- Season 1
1 sequenceLost in Space
John Williams, decades before anyone was calling him that, writing a fanfare for a family stranded in a jelly-mould spaceship.
- Season 1
1 sequenceThe Outer Limits
The control-voice narration that takes over your television set — a premise so effective that the sequence is better remembered than most of the episodes.
- Season 1