Creation Sequence

The process of creating a creature or an object, be it mechanically or magically.

Forging Scene, for when it is the creation of a weapon, and A-Team Montage are Sub Tropes. This is one of the primary ways of demonstrating just how Construction Is Awesome. Creation Myth may involve the sequence of the world's creation.

See also Transformation Sequence, Technology Porn, Robotic Assembly Lines, and Forging Scene.

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Examples:

Comic Books

• Usagi Yojimbo:
  • A kite festival story that begins with a description of traditional Japanese kite-making.
  • Another story begins with a detailed description of the steps needed to hammer and forge a katana.
• Walt Simonson's famous run of Marvel's Thor included an arc where several issues in a row would begin with scenes of Surtur forging his Twilight Sword, before he and the sword actually appeared in the storyline proper.

Fan Works

• The Title Sequence for the Star Wars fanfilm Dark Resurrection involves a light saber being constructed. It turns out to be a Jedi apprentice building her own light saber.

Films — Animation

• The Coraline doll in the opening of Coraline is more of a destruction and re-creation sequence.
• The creation of Rodney Copperbottom at the start of Robots, which kinda borders into Does This Remind You of Anything?.
• Right after the opening credits of My Little Pony: Equestria Girls – Friendship Games, we see the human version of Twilight Sparkle building the magic-detecting device that will propulse the whole plot of the movie.
• 9 begins with the Scientist putting the titular character together, whilst narrating about the downfall of humanity.
• Frozen (2013): The song "Let it Go" features Elsa experimenting with her ice powers and creating an impressive ice palace on the mountainside.
• Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse:
  • On the artistic side, we have a lengthy scene of Miles Morales painting an elaborate graffiti on a subway wall with the help of his uncle.
  • On the scientific side, Peni Parker uses the technology of her SP//dr mech to build a second version of the goober (to replace the broken one) in an extended Technology Porn sequence.
• Ghost in the Shell (1995) starts with the sequence of Kusanagi's cyborg body being assembled and covered with synthetic skin.
• A minor example in Toy Story 2 when Geri fixes Woody.

Films — Live-Action

• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory begins with an extended sequence of the Wonka bars being cooked, created, and shipped out.
• The Man Who Knew Too Little begins with a sequence showing the bomb being created and planted inside the Russian nesting doll.
• The Lord of the Rings:
  • The movie opens with the forging of the One Ring.
  • Also the scene where the Narsil is being reforged.
  • The creation of the Uruk-Hai by Saruman from the earth of Orthanc also counts.
• Iron Man: The movie contains some of the most elaborate and memorable examples.
  • First the creation of the Mk. I armor in a cave with a box of... ahem. Quite tense since Tony is under surveillance by his captors, and has to finish it within a day when the bad guy gets impatient and gives him a deadline. Include the obligatory Forging Scene for the iconic helmet.
  • Then the creation of the Mk. II and Mk. III, in safer circumstances, and thus lengthier and more detailed. Start from the conception phase, helped by holographic technology. Then the manufacture of the separate pieces, including several testing sequences, with variable success.
• Small Soldiers opens with the making of the military AI chips due to be installed in the toys.
• Lord of War comes to mind — it starts out following the construction and packaging of a bullet, and then moves on to follow the bullet as it's bought and sold, loaded and readied, and finally fired into the head of some poor African kid.
• Short Circuit: The opening credits show the creation of one of the SAINT model robots. The music gets also more elaborate while more and more parts of the robot come together.
• Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey: Station assembles the Good Robot Usses in the back of a moving van.
• The original Nightmare on Elm Street movie opens with Freddy constructing his iconic razor glove.
• Child's Play 2 opens with Chucky's horrifically burned head from the previous film being spruced up and fitted onto his soon-to-be new doll body.
• Star Trek Beyond ends with a sped up construction of the U.S.S. Enterprise-A.
• A viral ad for Alien: Covenant shows the assembly of a Walter model synthetic.

Literature

• The Wheel of Time: Perrin forges several simple tools in The Dragon Reborn, when he comes across a smithy. He is invited to stay on.

Live-Action TV

• Danger: UXB begins with an intro whose video is entirely Stock Footage, ostensibly from the Second World War. The first few seconds depict the manufacturing of German bombs.
• How It's Made is an entire series of nothing but creation sequences.

Myths & Religion

• Older Than Feudalism: The creation of Earth in The Bible.

Theatre

• The 2013 West End musical Charlie and the Chocolate Factory initially opened with an animated prologue designed by frequent Roald Dahl illustrator Quentin Blake, "Creation Overture", that tongue-in-cheekily explained the making of chocolate from cacao bean to wrapped bar. It became a Deleted Scene with the first major cast turnover in 2014.
• The opening number of the Stephen Schwartz musical Children of Eden depicts God creating the heavens and the Earth.

Toys

• BIONICLE:
  • The formation of the Toa Kaita, which also a Fusion Dance.
  • The creation of the Disk of Time and then the Mask of Time by Vakama.
• Hero Factory TV spots, as well as some episodes of the toyline's Animated Adaptation, also use this.

Video Games

• Most RTS games show your buildings being created with Ridiculously Fast Construction.
• LittleBigPlanet has you scripting your own Creation Sequence via Level Editor, be it recording in Create Mode, Popit Powerup in Play Mode, a scripted assembly line, and more.
• Minecraft lends itself extremely well to these. It's part of the point, really.
• Pokémon Heart Gold and Soul Silver: Arceus performs one in creating Palkia, Dialga, or Giratina, showing real-world photos in the process. Link.
• Obsidian has a few examples.
  • Ceres' nanobots building the game's first dream world, coupled with Astronomic Zoom.
  • One of the mid-game puzzles involves restarting a factory that makes life-size versions of the nanobots...who throw ore into the factory and die to make more nanobots.
• The StarCraft II preview released by Blizzard managed to make the creation of one of the weakest units in the game almost unbearably epic. Can be found here if you haven't seen it.
• The trailers and first-time opening sequence for Portal 2's co-operative mode show the player characters, Atlas and P-body, being assembled.

Web Videos

• One of the promotional shorts made for Halo 3, "Arms Race", is pretty much entirely a Creation Sequence, showing them building weapons, vehicles, even giving soldiers buzz cuts and outfitting them with equipment. The video implies that every time a fleet needs to be resupplied, the required weapons and equipment are mass-produced on the spot.

Western Animation

• Samurai Jack:
  • In "Jack's Sandals", after going through many different types of shoes, Jack finds a Japanese mechanic who makes him new wooden sandals, starting with some measurements, a block of wood, and such.
  • The episode that focuses on his dad's battle with Aku has the creation of the sword by the gods.
  • "Jack vs. The Ultra-Robots" starts with each of the titular robots being built and fitted with their weapons.
• The Simpsons have done this many times. Playing it straight and for laughs simultaneously, whether Homer is helping Bart build a soapbox racer or making Lisa's costume for a school function.
• The construction of the Dinobots in The Transformers.
• Happens on almost every episode of Phineas and Ferb. Lampshaded in an early episode without one.
  Phineas: I can't believe how fast we put this together.
  Ferb: Yes, it usually takes us at least a montage.
• In WordWorld, a PBS Edutainment Show that specializes in spelling, the premise is that letters can be assembled into words, and the word then becomes the thing it represents. The resolution of every episode has the characters sing the "Build a Word" song, creating whatever they need to solve the problem. This also extends to the characters, who are all designed to look like their names. In the opening theme, Dog (somehow already formed), assembles the letters of the other characters and creating them. Spell Dog backwards and you get...

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