Tour of Duty
An infantry platoon in Vietnam, and the first American drama series to be set there.
Tour of Duty opens with a main title sequence of 90 seconds.
At 90 seconds, it opens well above the 50-second median for drama sequences in this catalogue.
It arrived on CBS in 1987, when Candid Camera, Guiding Light and As the World Turns were also on the network.
The opening titles
Season 1
90sFan upload of the opening. The sharper copy has Korean name cards burned in under the English ones.
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.
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1 sequenceLonesome Dove
Basil Poledouris scoring a cattle drive from Texas to Montana — the miniseries that proved the western was not finished after all.
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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