Skip to content
TVTitles

Star Trek

1966–1969NBCSci-Fi

Rate it

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.

Star Trek rebuilt its titles: two distinct opening sequences are catalogued here across seasons 1–3, running between 50 and 60 seconds.

It arrived on NBC in 1966, when Truth or Consequences, Another World and Search for Tomorrow were also on the network.

Only 139 of the 2,618 shows catalogued here changed their titles at all; Star Trek did so once.

2 sequences11th most looked up of 99 in the 1960sIMDb ↗Official site ↗
XFacebookPinterest

All 2 opening title sequences

Season 1

50s

The first version, with Loulie Jean Norman's wordless soprano floating over Alexander Courage's theme and Shatner's narration ending on 'no man has gone before'. Only Shatner and Nimoy are named in the main titles.

Seasons 2–3

60s

Re-recorded for season 2 — the soprano vocal is dropped in favour of a punchier brass and organ arrangement, and DeForest Kelley finally joins Shatner and Nimoy in the main title cards.

More sci-fi opening titles from the 1960s

Still from the opening titles of Doctor Who10 sequences

Doctor Who

1963–1989BBC OneSci-Fi

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
Still from the opening titles of The Prisoner1 sequence

The Prisoner

1967–1968ITVSci-Fi

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
Still from the opening titles of Thunderbirds1 sequence

Thunderbirds

1965–1966ITVSci-Fi

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
Still from the opening titles of Lost in Space1 sequence

Lost in Space

1965–1968CBSSci-Fi

John Williams, decades before anyone was calling him that, writing a fanfare for a family stranded in a jelly-mould spaceship.

  • Season 1
Still from the opening titles of The Outer Limits1 sequence

The Outer Limits

1963–1965ABCSci-Fi

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
Still from the opening titles of The Invaders1 sequence

The Invaders

1967–1968ABCSci-Fi

A Quinn Martin series about one man who knows and cannot prove it, narrated in the second person.

  • Season 1