Creative opening sequences give shows a head start

“Succession” is far from alone these days in drawing us in with an atmospheric opening. Paramount+’s “The Good Fight,” HBO Max’s “The Flight Attendant,” and Apple TV+’s “Severance” and “The Afterparty,” just to name a few, also pull out a few creative stops.

A well-conceived and executed title sequence doesn’t just open a show, but functions as its visual and aural signature. When augmented by memorable theme music, it can conjure atmosphere, story, character, and sometimes all three.

Think of cigar-smoking Tony Soprano (just another commuter!) grimly making his way home at the start of “The Sopranos” as Alabama 3′s brooding “Woke Up This Morning” thumps on the soundtrack.

Or Carrie Bradshaw sauntering fashionably through the streets of Manhattan at the beginning of “Sex and the City,” a jaunty tune matching her mood, only to be engulfed in a spray of water churned up by a passing bus.

That idyll-turned-mortification moment served as a (most likely deliberate) counterpoint to the opening sequence in “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” where Mary Richards jubilantly tossed her hat skyward as her career adventures begin in Minneapolis.

TV history abounds in memorable intros. Some are eerie and entrancing (”The Twilight Zone,” “The Leftovers,” “Westworld,” “The Affair,” “The Good Fight”). Some are trippy in a kitschy way (”The Time Tunnel”) or kitschy, period (“The Brady Bunch.” Some cut to the chase very quickly (”black-ish,” “Seinfeld,” “Billions”), as if aware the viewer wants them to get on with the show.

Others are structured as an elaborate setup/punch line. Boomers still chortle at the memory of hapless Maxwell Smart (Don Adams), in “Get Smart,” confidently striding through metal door after metal door, only to get his nose pinched by the last one.

And of course, for umpteen years now, Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, and Maggie have miraculously survived a series of near-calamities before assembling with speedy synchronicity on the couch in “The Simpsons.”

Speaking of animation: It’s intriguing to note that in the title sequences of both “The Flight Attendant” and “The Afterparty,” the animated style and hot-pursuit motif evoke the famous opening of “The Pink Panther,” crossed with a bit of the even-more-famous opening of the James Bond movies.

One way or another, a lot of creative energy is being spent these days in getting TV sitcoms, dramas, and miniseries off to a good start. What really matters, of course, is what has always mattered: that the show following those clever openings is a good one.

Don Aucoin can be reached at donald.aucoin@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @GlobeAucoin.