Life on Mars (US)
The American remake of the BBC series, opening on 1973 New York and the Bowie song both versions are named for.
Life on Mars (US) opens with a main title sequence of 24 seconds.
At 24 seconds, it opens well under the 58-second median for sci-fi sequences in this catalogue.
It arrived on ABC in 2008, when One Life to Live, All My Children and Schoolhouse Rock! were also on the network.
The opening titles
Season 1
24sThe American version's titles. Added under its own name because it is what searching for the British original returns.
More sci-fi opening titles from the 2000s
1 sequenceSmallville
Remy Zero's 'Save Me' over a cast that changed almost completely across ten years, with the credits rebuilt around each departure.
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1 sequenceFirefly
A slide guitar and a weary blues vocal over a spaceship. Sonny Rhodes sings words the show's creator wrote, and the argument of the whole series — that this is a western that happens to be in orbit — is settled before a line of dialogue is spoken.
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1 sequenceHeroes
An eclipse and a card, in twelve seconds. The restraint is the point — a superhero show refusing to open like one.
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3 sequencesFringe
Pseudo-scientific terms floating in coloured fog — and the colour is the plot: the palette changes to tell you which universe or era the episode is set in.
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2 sequencesStar Trek: Enterprise
The franchise's most argued-over opening: no orchestra, no starfield, but a montage of real human exploration — sailing ships, biplanes, spacesuits — under a soft-rock ballad. Half the audience never forgave it, which is its own kind of achievement.
- Seasons 1–2
- Seasons 3–4
4 sequencesStargate Atlantis
The same franchise moved to another galaxy, and the titles say so — a city rather than a gate, rising out of water instead of standing in a mountain.
- Season 1
- Seasons 2–3
- Season 4
- and 1 more