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Special Edition Title / Live-Action TV

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Special Edition Titles in Live-Action TV.

  • For the two versions of 30 Rock's Live Episode, Jenna (east coast) and Danny (west coast) performed a version of the normally-instrumental Theme Tune With Lyrics at the Saturday Night Live TGS studio, with the regular opening shown on an adjacent widescreen monitor.
  • The Granada TV version of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes episode "The Final Problem" replaced the opening violin tune with a slower, sadder version.
  • A few episodes of ALF, which have him sing a song, have the normal ending credits replaced with a clip of Alf singing that song (notably "Looking for Lucky" and "Don't It Make Your Brown Eyes Blue?").
  • Arrowverse:
    • Arrow:
      • In the episodes "Draw Back Your Bow" and "Broken Hearts", the arrow behind the title is one of Cupid's heart-shaped ones.
      • In the episodes "The Brave and the Bold" and "Legends of Yesterday" (the crossovers with The Flash (2014)), the arrow is replaced by the lightning bolt from the Flash titles.
      • The episode "The Return" (in season 3) uses the distinctly less high-tech looking arrowhead from the season 1 titles.
      • The episodes "Al Sah-Him" and "This is Your Sword", when Oliver joins the League of Assassins have a different "My name is Oliver Queen..." monologue from the other season 3 episodes, beginning "My name was Oliver Queen..."
      • The 100th episode cycles between every version of the logo.
      • One that's only visible in retrospect: Season 6 has a new title sequence with all of Team Arrow's logos appearing, similar to Legends. After Diggle becomes the new Green Arrow, it turns out the version with Spartan's helmet was a Special Edition Title. (It then gets used as the regular title between Ollie taking the mantle back and Ollie going solo, at which point it's back to just an arrowhead.)
      • For the Villain Episode "The Dragon", the arrow is replaced by Diaz's dragon tattoo with a roar instead of the arrow sound.
      • The 150th episode replaces the title with that of the in-universe documentary The Emerald Archer: The Hood and the Rise of Vigilantism.
      • "Lost Canary" replaces the arrow with Black Canary's logo.
      • "Green Arrow and the Canaries" ends with what is most likely the official logo for a new spinoff series - a futuristic arrowhead flanked by two canaries.
      • The series finale, "Fadeout", shows all seven arrows from the past seasons, with seasons 1-3 being on the left, seasons 4-6 on the right, and a lighter green version for season 7 in the middle.
    • The Flash (2014):
      • In the episodes "Flash vs. Arrow" and "Legends of Today" (the crossovers with Arrow), the lightning bolt running through the title is replaced by an arrow, and the one behind it is green instead of yellow.
      • In the first Season Finale, "Fast Enough", the lightning bolt is red and backwards, the symbol of Reverse Flash.
      • The season 2 and 3 Christmas episodes, "Running to Stand Still" and "The Present", include snowflakes behind the lightning bolt.
      • The first episode of season 5, "Nora", and the episode giving her backstory, "Godspeed", has the background as a mix of red and purple, purple being the colour of Nora's XS costume and lightning effects.
      • The end card of "The Last Temptation of Barry Allen" Part One and the opening sequence of Part Two, both show the logo being covered in Bloodwork's blood.
      • "Armageddon Part 4" has Thawne-as-Flash in Barry's place during the clips of Team Flash.
    • Legends of Tomorrow:
      • The Villain Episode "Legion of Doom" gives the title a reddish light, has cinders floating in front of it, and replaces the heroes' logos with those of Damien, Merlyn and Reverse Flash. The same title sequence is used for "Doomworld". Both episodes also have a member of the Legion give the opening monologue.
      • "Helen Hunt", set in the Golden Age of Hollywood, replaces the sequence with a Retraux title card.
      • The Crossover episode with Constantine "Daddy Darhkest", has the normal Legends intro mixed with the Constantine logo. A variant of this becomes the standard logo in season 4, when Constantine becomes a main character.
      • The Rent-a-Zilla episode "Tagumo Attacks!!!" has the title in Japanese.
      • The 100th episode, "<wvrdr_error_100_not_found>", has all the previous title logos.
      • "Paranoid Android" has an over-the-top action title sequence featuring the Robot Legends.
    • Supergirl (2015): The episodes "House of L" and "Red Dawn", which feature a Soviet version of Supergirl, open with a Kaznian hammer-and-sickle version of the S-shield and the title replaced with Cryllic script reading "Krasnaya Doch" (Russian for "Red Daughter").
    • Crisis Crossovers:
      • All three parts of the Invasion! (2016) crossover arc (excluding Supergirl) had special title cards. The Flash and Legends of Tomorrow combined all four series' logos, while Arrow celebrated its 100th episode by having each season's title card blend into the next.
      • All four parts of Crisis on Earth-X (including Supergirl) have the same title sequence, which features all the heroes, but not their own logos, treating Crisis on Earth-X as the series title. The credits are even in a uniform font not used by any of the individual series. It goes to show that they're treating it as one big miniseries special instead of each episode focusing on the cast of one series like "Invasion!" Only who's under "Starring" and who's under "Guest Starring" provides a clue as to which show is which.
      • All three parts of Elseworlds (2018) (which Legends wasn't part of) had the standard logo appear, and then the Elseworlds logo move in to replace it. In addition, the Arrow opening narration was given by Barry-as-Oliver, and the Supergirl narration by Deegan-as-Superman.
      • All five parts of Crisis on Infinite Earths (2019) have a Crisis logo, similar to Crisis on Earth X. (The side-story in Black Lightning has the regular title.)
  • For its final episode, Ashes to Ashes (2008) skips Alex's narration and the opening titles, instead just showing the words "Ashes to Ashes".
  • To celebrate its 50th anniversary, two 2006 episodes of As the World Turns used the original opening, with a remake of the original opening theme.
  • The Babylon 5 Villain Episode "The Corps Is Mother, The Corps Is Father", centering on Bester, has a credit sequence with Psi Corps insignia in place of the usual Babylon 5 shield.
  • During the "occupation" storyline, Battlestar Galactica (2003) replaced images of the fleet with those of New Caprica under Cylon occupation, and used a different title crawl.
  • Better Call Saul: The Season 6 episode "Nippy" has the intro sequence glitch between the normal colour and monochrome, until it eventually warps out like an old VHS tape, and just says BETTER CALL SAUL on a standard blue screen. This is because this is the first episode sent entirely in the present day of 2010 (which is portrayed as Deliberately Monochrome), rather than being a flashback (which are in colour).
  • The closing credits of the last episode of Blake's 7, "Blake", are completely silent except for gunshots.
  • Buffy the Vampire Slayer:
    • Jonathan, a minor recurring character, takes over the credit sequence of "Superstar", in which a wish he makes turns him into a Black Hole Sue.
    • The Musical Episode "Once More with Feeling" has a mellowed version of the theme song playing over a shot of the night sky, with each actor's face appearing on the moon as they were listed in standard credits order.
    • "Seing Red" has the only opening with Amber Benson credited for Tara because she gets killed.
    • Similarly, a few episodes change the Vanity Plate at the end: "Becoming, Part 2" features the little monster lamenting "I need a hug..." in place of his normal "Grr, argh!", he wears a Santa hat in "Amends", "Graduation Day, Part 2" has him in a mortarboard, and in "Hush", he is silent (not on DVD; perhaps as originally aired?). The above-mentioned OMWF had him sing his grr-argh. Likewise, in "Storyteller", he sing-songs "We are as GOODDDDSSSS", a Running Gag in the preceding episode. In the series finale "Chosen", he looks directly at the viewer.
  • One episode of Clarissa Explains It All has her brother Ferguson take over the role of Breaking the Fourth Wall. The credits change the name of the series to Ferguson Explains It All.
  • Community does this fairly regularly:
  • The 2012 Dallas series did a special title sequence for the episode "JR's Masterpiece", in honor of both the passing of JR Ewing and his actor Larry Hagman.
  • Doctor Who:
    • The opening credits generally only change whenever there's a new Doctor or new production team — otherwise, they remain fairly consistent (theme tune, a version of the Vortex, Doctor's face (or not), logo, episode title, writer's name, episode number). In the 1960s and early 1970s, however, several stories had specially designed opening credits. Some of these included:
      • "The War Machines" included the story's episode title and number done in the same font as the story's Big Bad, WOTAN.
      • "The Tenth Planet" included "computer graphics" that formed the story's name and episode number.
      • "The Ice Warriors" featured a haunting soprano solo over footage of an windswept tundra.
      • In "The Wheel In Space", the usual time tunnel sequence gradually fades out into a shot of the Wheel, while the theme music is still playing; the story title, episode number and writer are displayed over this shot of the Wheel rather than in the time tunnel sequence.
      • "The Seeds of Death" displayed the title and episode number over a specially filmed model shot of the Earth and the Moon, the two locations featured in the story.
      • In "The Space Pirates", the title, writer and episode number screens appear only after the opening scene (Episode 1) or the cliffhanger reprise (Episodes 2-6), in black text over a white void, with the One-Woman Wail over them.
      • "The War Games" featured footage of explosions and sounds of gunfire interspersed with the story's title and episode number.
      • In "The Ambassadors of Death", the opening titles are cut off early, before the story title appears, instead going straight into the opening scene of the episode (Part 1) or the reprise of the previous episode's cliffhanger (Parts 2-7)... then the remainder of the opening titles is shown. Uniquely, the story title does not all appear at once; first "The Ambassadors" appears at the top of the screen, followed seconds later by of "OF DEATH" in a much larger font.
      • "Inferno" featured the name of the story and the episode number over footage of lava flows.
    • Special Edition Cliffhangers and credits appear in some Classic Series episodes:
      • The first cliffhanger of "The Reign of Terror" has licking flames in the end credits, after the Doctor was trapped in a burning building.
      • "The Web of Fear" had footage of the web effect playing over the end credits.
      • The last part of "Meglos" had the ending theme pitched down by about a tone. Allegedly, this is because the episode was underrunning, and so the end titles were stretched out manually.
      • The last part of "Earthshock" had no ending theme tune at all: the credits scrolled past in silence over a still of the broken remains of Adric's star badge on the floor, given that he had just died.
      • The end credits of the 20th anniversary special, "The Five Doctors", features a unique arrangement of the closing theme that mashes up the incumbent 1980 version with the original 1963 one.
    • An unintentional example of this trope was "Carnival of Monsters", which accidentally aired in Australia with a new arrangement of the theme tune (commonly known as the "Delaware theme" after the synthesizer it was made with, a modified EMS Synthi 100 that the BBC Radiophonic Workshop owned). Executive Meddling had rejected the new theme due to disliking it and it was edited out of the UK broadcast, but copies of the tapes had already been sent to Australia.
    • "The Ark in Space", Tom Baker's second serial, had the normally blue title sequence coloured green-brown (having been run through a pink filter). There were plans for every story in Season 12 to feature special edition titles, but the staff hated the resulting colour palette for "The Ark in Space" and immediately dropped the idea from part 2 onwards.
    • In the first half of Series 7, each episode's opening credits were done in progressively darker colors, with flashes of... well, something in the Vortex itself attacking the TARDIS, and the logo for the series itself had some design element relating to the particular episode's story (in "The Angels Take Manhattan", for instance, the logo was redone to look like the Statue of Liberty). This led many to speculate that the titles were suggesting something big and bad just around the corner for the Doctor... although the switch to a new title sequence for Series 7B thoroughly Jossed this.
    • 50th anniversary special "The Day of the Doctor" goes back to the original 1963 opening. Its closing credits are also unique to this special, featuring portraits of every incarnation of the Doctor up to that point.
    • The opening for "Death in Heaven" lists Jenna Coleman's name before Peter Capaldi's and replaces the Doctor's eyes with Clara's, to tie in with her lie to the enemy immediately beforehand of being the Doctor herself.
    • The Twelfth Doctor's first two Christmas specials, "Last Christmas" and "The Husbands of River Song", both have special Christmassy versions of the title sequence. The practice was abandoned for the rest of his Christmas specials, because "The Return of Doctor Mysterio" isn't very Christmassy and "Twice Upon a Time" is a fairly serious regeneration episode.
    • "Before the Flood" features a unique version of the theme music featuring none other than Peter Capaldi accompanying the melody on electric guitar (to tie in with the fourth wall-breaking pre-titles sequence).
    • "Sleep No More", "The Woman Who Fell to Earth" and "Resolution" don't have opening sequences at all. The first has a brief special Title-Only Opening of data at the start of its Found Footage, and the other two employ a Close on Title.
    • The closing titles of "Rosa" play over "Rise Up" by Andra Day.
    • The closing titles of "Demons of the Punjab" have an Indian arrangement of the theme.
    • The closing titles of "Village of the Angels" plays without the distinct four beats at the start. Some fans speculate this reflects the Doctor being turned into a Weeping Angel in that episode.
    • All of series 13 has the series title "Flux" added underneath the main title in smaller type.
  • ER dropped the usage of its iconic opening credits and theme after the 12th season (replacing it with a title card). However, for the show's final episode, they brought back the opening theme and credited all of the regulars appearing in the episode, including cast members who never had the chance to be credited before (Angela Bassett, John Stamos, David Lyons) and former regulars who had come back for guest appearances in the finale (Noah Wyle, Laura Innes, Sherry Stringfield, Alex Kingston, and Eriq La Salle). Additionally, back when the full theme was used, there would usually be a "softer" opening to the credits sequence if the Cold Open was a sad or somber one.
  • When The Drew Carey Show filmed an episode in China, the "Cleveland Rocks" sequence was replaced with a simple Title-Only Opening with the show's title in English and Chinese (accompanied with the drawing of Drew from the "Moon Over Parma" sequence).
  • The season 4 premiere of Eureka, which involves Time Travel back to 1947, has sepia-toned visuals and replaces the whistling in the standard theme tune with a big band. The Christmas episode in the same season has everything covered in snow, with the whistling replaced by a chorus singing "fa la la".
  • The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air: The series actually uses one for its pilot episode, having a longer introduction and ending with it leading into the opening scene, as seen here.
  • Friends:
    • The fifth season premiere, "The One After Ross Says Rachel", features a special cut of the opening credits that only uses footage from the fourth season finale "The One With Ross' Wedding" showing the gang in London. The only non-London footage are the opening and closing shots of the park fountain.
    • The "What If?" episode featured a Title Montage of the "what if" versions of the characters, including Monica still being fat, and this also involves a new version of the classic "dancing in a fountain" opening. These clips were not seen in the episode itself.
    • The first episode after Courteney Cox married David Arquette appended "Arquette" after each cast member's name.
  • Fringe uses this whenever there's a timeshift, flashback or major alteration in reality. As well as the style and images displayed, the list of cutting-edge "Fringe concepts" is often used to suggest the nature of the world.
    • The episodes "Peter" and "Subject 13" mostly take place in The '80s, and looks like as an eighties science program; the credits are revamped with a Synth-Pop version of the opening theme, a more "computery" font (Amelia, more specifically), and namecheck 80s "cutting-edge-at-the-times" science (indcluding "personal computing" and "stealth technology")
    • In episodes set in the parallel universe starting with the season two finale "Over There Part 1 and 2", the usual blue background was now red and several of the sciences shown are different. In the eighth episode of Season 3, which is set in both universes, the title sequence goes back and forth between red and blue.
    • The final episode of Season 3, which takes place in a future that probably won't occur (it makes sense in context...mostly), has a gray background and yet again different "cutting-edge" sciences, such as cryptozoology, chaos structure, and (to underscore how terrible the "prime" universe has become in 15 years) hope and water.
    • The 4th season episode "Letter of Transit" takes place in a futuristic fascist dystopia. As well as images of barbed wire walls and faceless masses, the "Fringe concepts" include "Imagination", "Due Process" and "Freedom". This becomes the standard title for the 5th season, set entirely in the Bad Future.
  • Game of Thrones plays songs over its closing credits for a few specific episodes:
    • "Blackwater", "The Lion and the Rose" and "The Bear and the Maiden Fair" play the main song of House Lannister, "The Rains of Castamere" in commemoration of Lannister-related events.
    • "Walk of Punishment" plays the song "The Bear and the Maiden Fair" in relation to the situation Brienne and Jaime Lannister end up in.
    • "Kissed by Fire" plays Shireen's song "It's Always Sunny Under the Sea". Shireen made her debut in that episode.
    • "Knight of the Seven Kingdoms" plays the ballad "Jenny of Oldstones" over the closing credits. The song is about a royal scion who gave up the throne for the love of his life, which reflects Jon and Dany's relationship.
  • For its 30th anniversary, the Soap Opera General Hospital debuted its so-called "Faces Of The Heart" credits sequence. While the overall tempo was jazzy and upbeat, a much slower and sadder version was used for episodes that had such a Cold Open, such as a character death.
  • Occasionally done with the Glee title card, depending on episodes. More complex ones appeared in season four.
    • Those set on Valentine's day have the title colored pink, and the Halloween Episode colored it orange.
    • A Bat Signal version in the superhero-themed episode "Dynamic Duets".
    • Wrapped in blinking Christmas lights for "Glee, Actually".
    • Projected from an old super 8 camera in "Boys (and Girls) on Film", which was movie music themed.
    • Drawn in crayon and with an added "by Brittany" subtitle, referencing Brittany leaving New Directions for MIT, and consequently leaving the show.
    • The season five episode "The Quarterback" replaces the L in the title with a silhouette of Finn Hudson.
  • Gotham:
    • In the season 4 finale "No Man's Land", after Gotham loses power again and is cut off from the rest of the country, they use the dark version of the ending card, with the addition of a searchlight shining from police headquarters.
  • In a Volume 3 episode of Heroes, the usual title is replaced with an evil-looking 'Villains' (also the title of the episode).
  • Jekyll did this for the finale — changing the title of the show itself.
  • The Just Shoot Me! episode "My Dinner with Woody" had the titles done in the style of the credits of Woody Allen movies (plain white text over black).
  • The Kamen Rider franchise (starting in Kamen Rider Decade), being also a Toei production like Pretty Cure, also promotes its movies by replacing part of its opening sequences with movie scenes. The movie footage is never the same in any two episodes, though. Its sister show Super Sentai, on the other hand, only movie-ifies end titles.
    • Kamen Rider Double also did special openings in a story arc centering on an American Idol-style TV show, replacing half of the standard opening with footage of the theme song's performers (who play judges in those episodes) performing the theme on the "Idol" stage.
  • While most L.A. Law episodes typically started out with a jazzy saxophone intro into the opening credits, episodes with a more ominous Cold Open would have music that corresponded.
  • The season 2 episode of Legacies called "Screw Endgame" has two characters trapped in a labyrinth themed like a videogame from The '80s. As such, the show's title is pixelated and features 80's videogame animation.
  • One of the later episodes in Season 5 of Lost had, rather than its normal opening sequence with the "LOST" logo flying at the camera, a similar sequence on a starfield, and then the Enterprise flew by to promote the 2009 Star Trek film, also released that year.
  • The typical opening to the Soap Opera Loving was replaced with a different, haunting theme during its final major storyline, "The Loving Murders", asking viewers to piece together the clues and figure out who the murderer was.
  • Mad About You once eschewed the cold open-title structure to instead have opening credits where the names passed by action movie-style - reminiscent of Speed, as the episode's name is "Speed Baby", and there's a shared plot element (bus has to keep moving = Mabel stops crying when in movement, whether in a vehicle or an elevator).
  • Marvel Cinematic Universe TV series have done this on a few occasions:
    • Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.:
      • At the end of the episode "Turn, Turn, Turn" after Ward kills Victoria Hand and the guards to release the Clairvoyant, the HYDRA logo appears instead of the SHIELD logo before The Stinger.
      • "4,722 Hours", a Whole Episode Flashback to Jemma Simmons' marooning on an alien planet, forgoes the usual logo to show a wide shot of the planet instead, with the title in a different (and more space-y) font.
      • Season 4 was split into three distinct story "pods", each featuring distinct opening sequences representing the Ghost Rider, the LMDs and the Framework respectively.
      • Season 5 continued with special opening for story arcs, opening on a shot of Earth That Was. Once they return to the present, this is replaced by Earth That Is. Several late-Season 5 episodes overlay the show title over the closing moments of the teaser, a change from the usual format.
      • For the 100th episode Milestone Celebration, every custom logo listed above was used in quick succession.
      • Season 7 is full of Time Travel and intentional Genre Throwback, so each episode imitates the style of opening TV credits for its respective year.
    • The Falcon and the Winter Soldier:
      • The closing credits for episode 4, "The Whole World Is Watching", ditch the jaunty "Louisiana Hero" by Henry Jackman, in favor of a haunting, somber theme tune reflecting the ramifications of Walker murdering a Flag Smasher with his shield in cold blood.
      • The closing credits for episode 5, "Truth" modulate "Louisiana Hero" in the closing credits up a half-key as Sam looks at his Wakandan-made Captain America gear for the first time.
      • The final episode changes the title to "Captain America and the Winter Soldier", reflecting Sam Wilson finally embracing and accepting his role as Steve Rogers's successor..
    • Ms. Marvel (2022):
      • Episodes 4 and 5 both relocate the "animated grafitti of Kamala" closing credits from Jersey to Karachi. The Season Finale alternates between the two.
      • Episode 5 has the title card in Urdu, and with the changing graphic design having a more forties look. It's different every episode anyway, but this one is more different.
    • She-Hulk: Attorney at Law:
      • The second episode "Superhuman Law" changes the subtitle to "Attorny for Hire", as Jennifer was briefly unemployed in that episode.
      • The fifth episode, "Mean, Green, and Straight Poured into These Jeans", turns the title pink and changes the subtitle to "By Titania" to reflect the fact that Titania copyrighted the She-Hulk name and is suing Jennifer over it.
      • The sixth episode, "Just Jen", changes the title to Just Jen: Attorney at Law.
  • For its 100th episode, the 1989 revival of The Mickey Mouse Club did a reunion special with the original '50s version. They mixed footage of the old theme/intro into the newer theme/intro and added the "Donald Duck!" and "High, high, high!" bits from the '50s theme that weren't in the new version. You can watch it here.
  • Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers had a miniseries known as Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers that acted as the last 10 episodes of season 3 of MMPR, wherein the the entire world was age-reversed by 10 years, Rangers included, leaving them as kids without their powers, so reinforcements in the form of the titular Alien Rangers stood in for them until the Power-less Rangers managed to find the Reset Button that could turn everyone back to normal (and give them new, stronger powers.) Because of this, the miniseries had a special intro featuring the kid Rangers as well as a modified theme song; "Go, Go, Alien Rangers!"
  • The horror-themed 13th episode of Discovery's Monster House replaced its usual credits' lighthearted animation with a stark, grim Art Shift variant, and a creepified theme song in which the homeowners all vanish after the renovations rather than love them.
  • Episode 26 of Monty Python's Flying Circus has a Double Subversion of this: an announcer says that The Queen Will Be Watching, but the opening titles will proceed as usual; instead, a uniquely styled "royal" title sequence is shown, with the music changed to "Pomp and Circumstance #1."
    • Episode 22 replaced the title with a banner reading, "How to Recognise Different Parts of the Body". An announcer reads this in a non-Title Scream tone, beginning a Framing Device that recurs intermittently throughout the episode. The banner is, however, squashed by the Giant Foot of Stomping as usual ("Number one: the foot").
    • Episode 30 replaced the show's title with Tony M. Nyphot's Flying Risccu, an anagram of the show's title (the opening sketch involved a man who spoke only in anagrams).
    • In a What Could Have Been example, when Executive Meddling threatened to change the show's title, the Pythons threatened that every week they would rename the show to a different Word Salad Title. (A number of these, such as "Owl-Stretching Time" and "Whither Canada?", were retained for use as individual episode titles, though they were only shown on screen during the end credits of the first season.)
  • Mr. Bean had a few episodes include a post-credits scene where Mr. Bean is beamed up, to serve as a Bookend to the opening credits where he was beamed down.
  • Downplayed in the Murdoch Mysteries episode "Dead on Arrival", which opens with a noir-esque title card after the regular opening titles.
  • A variation: Mystery Science Theater 3000 sometimes had special commercial bumpers and/or ending credits, when prompted by the movie or one of the host segments. The typical version was to put different music over it, especially "the haunting Torgo theme", but other examples exist.
  • At the end of the opening credits for the NCIS episode "Power Down", the lights in DC all go off, and then the video cuts out.
  • Done in the two Formula Breaking Episodes of NewsRadio. The one set in space had Standardized Space Views instead of the usual Establishing Shots of New York City. The Titanic parody had an Irish folk version of the theme over sepia-tone shots of people salvaging artifacts with the actor's pictures on them.
  • Noel's House Party
  • Odd Squad:
    • The opening theme for the Season 2 premiere, "First Day", has Oprah handling the narration in place of Olive, with the Character in the Logo shot featuring both of them, along with Otto and Oscar, absent. The question of "Who do we work for?" is also removed and is instead replaced with Oprah simply saying "We are Odd Squad."
    • For the Season 3 premiere, "Odd Beginnings", Oprah — now the Big O — once again handles narration duties. This time, it's in place of Olympia, who took over her role for the duration of Season 2. Unlike the aforementioned example, however, there's no Couch Gag, and instead, Oprah describes her role in Odd Squad as the Big O.
  • The Office (US) episode "The Michael Scott Paper Company", has all other characters removed except for Michael, Pam, and Ryan — the only employees of the Michael Scott Paper Company, filmed in their office only. The post-Super Bowl episode added specific shots of secondary characters in groups of two or three rather than the usual text only credit.
    • In the first episode after Michael Scott's departure, the last shot of the opening montage (Michael adjusting the Dundee Award on his desk) is replaced with a similar shot with his replacement, Deangelo, adjusting one of his kachina dolls.
  • The second season premiere of Pee-wee's Playhouse starts out normally, but when we actually get to the playhouse, it looks all messy. After the theme song suddenly stops (by Letting the Air out of the Band), Pee-Wee then remembers something important:
    Pee-Wee: Oh, I totally forgot! We're redecorating the Playhouse!note  (gives wink; the show then goes to commercial)
  • Person of Interest is fond of these, usually in conjunction with a Wham Episode. In order:
    • Season 2, episode 16, Relevance: Finch's opening narration crashes with a blue screen of death, and lands at a command line.
      [!]:./condition.ANOMALY.DETECTED
      [!]:./action.SWITCH.HEURISTIC
      deprecate.process.irrelevant
      source.RELEVANT
      execute...
    • Season 2, episode 21, Zero Day: the opening narration crashes and reboots, then crashes again, complete with Ominous Visual Glitches and THREAT TO SYSTEM dialog box spam.
    • Season 3, episode 16, RAM: a whole flashback episode, it begins with the opening sequence from season 1, which freezes and rewinds to the beginning halfway through.
    • Season 3, episode 17, /: Root co-opts the opening narration from Harold, signifying that she is the character of focus in this episode.
    [!]:./switching.TERTIARY_OPERATIONS
    • Season 4, episode 12, "Control-Alt-Delete": It begins with Finch's usual introduction, but then the screen glitches and Control's voice takes over the narration, and the episode proceeds to follow her viewpoint.
  • Police, Camera, Action!:
    • The 1996 Two-Part Episode The Man Who Shot OJ skips the usual opening titles for a Montage of footage in Los Angeles shot by Zoey Tur (then Bob Tur) and in Arial font, "THE MAN WHO SHOT OJ PROGRAMME 1", "THE MAN WHO SHOT OJ PROGRAMME 2", and the lower-thirds (names on-screen) are in ITC Franklin Gothic Demi instead of the show's usual Futura Condensed Bold Italic font.
    • The 1998 episode "Coat Hanger Man" has occasionally had its title sequence cut off in Edited for Syndication versions aired 2006-2009, making the runtime 23 minutes instead of the usual 24 minutes. However, these are rarely aired, and the Title Sequence is restored.
    • The 2000 specials "Crash Test Racers" and "Highway of Tomorrow" have the usual 1999-2000 title sequence, but the episode names are not on the Episode Title Card, with the words "SPECIAL" in Charles Wright font. In the 2005 Re-Cut versions, the Episode Title Card is skipped over, and OCR-8 font with the episode title on-screen is used.
  • The Prisoner (1967):
    • The episode "Living In Harmony", a Western Elseworld, replaces the opening with an equivalent sequence in which the character rides into town and turns in his sheriff's badge. The actual title The Prisoner isn't shown on screen (at least in the unaltered version of the episode; some UK broadcasters insisted on adding it to the opening anyway). Patrick McGoohan does not receive his starring credit as a result of this change, though he is credited for playing Number 6 in the slightly revised closing credits sequence (unlike "Fall Out", see below, for which he receives no actor credit).
    • The final episode, "Fall Out", has (mostly) the normal end credits, but the opening credits replace the famous normal opening with a recap of the preceding episode with the series title overlaid, then a long helicopter shot over the Village, accompanied by a different arrangement of the theme music (only broadcast once before, as part of the incidental music in "Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My Darling"). This was probably because it was the second half of the show's only two-part story. It was also the first time that it was publicly revealed that the show was filmed at Portmeirion, which had previously been kept secret to heighten the in-show mystery of the Village's location - although ironically the Portmeirion location was not featured in the last four episodes except for minor shots. The closing credits are changed slightly to eliminate the iconic animated sequence of bars closing across Number 6's face, and the closing image of Rover emerging from the water. As a result of the changes to the opening, star Patrick McGoohan does not actually receive screen credit for playing Number 6 in this episode (though he is credited for producing, writing and directing it).
  • Psych:
    • The series is fond of doing this in "theme" episodes, usually remixing or completely changing the theme tune as well. The Christmas special featured the same lyrics and melody as the normal song, but with sleighbells and over-the-top "Christmas-y" instrumentation, while in episode 213, "Lights, Camera...Homicidio", the credits are sung in Spanish.
    • Also, in Season 4's "Bollywood Homicide", the song picks up a distinctly Eastern sound; most of the theme song was sung in Hindi, and the actors' names appeared in Hindi text which then switched to English letters.
    • The sixth season episode "The Amazing Psych-Man & Tap Man, Issue #2" is done with the theme redone in a heroic orchestral style and the opening sequence in comic-book panels, specifically an homage to the opening sequence of The Cape.
  • While QI doesn't change its title graphics, it does occasionally alter its theme music. Their annual Christmas Episode incorporates "Jingle Bells" with its regular theme. Episodes 4.5 ("Death") and 7.13 ("Gothic") had moans and other morbid sounds in the background. And episode 6.5 ("France") had an accordion playing the theme tune. The Christmas 2019 episode did change the graphics, adding snow, holly around the handle of the magnifying glass, and replacing some of the images with a snowflake, a reindeer, Ebeneezer Scrooge, Christmas trees, a medieval Father Christmas, Christmas pudding, mince pies and sprouts.
  • Red Dwarf sometimes changed the end credit music, for instance the first appearance of Ace Rimmer had the normal Rimmer play out the theme on a Hammond organ, whilst Gunmen of the Apocalypse had a wild-west version of the music, and "Waxworld" ended with an Elvis impersonator singing it.
  • Done in a minor way in the India-themed episodes of Sanctuary. While the normal title sequence remained unchanged, an Eastern-sounding song was added instead of the usual tune.
  • The Sex and the City movies have a re-orchestrated version of the theme music.
  • The Stargate SG-1 Parody Episode "200" abandons the concept of a minute-long Title Montage used for most of the series' run. When discussing The Movie of the Show Within a Show Wormhole X-Treme!, Cameron Mitchell insists on a "strong opening title sequence", while Martin Lloyd says, "No one does that anymore. You just throw up the title and get on with it." This is immediately followed by a Title-Only Opening for Stargate SG-1.
    • Though this is only borderline "special"; during this part of the show's run, the shorter form was always used when the show was first aired, to leave more time for commercials. However, the full opening had been back for a few episodes.
      • If anything, it was more of a Take That! at the Sci-Fi Channel's much-maligned decision to remove the full-length Title Sequence.
  • Star Trek: Enterprise replaces its usual titles, showing a history of exploration, with a version showing a history of conquest for the Mirror Universe episode "In a Mirror, Darkly". It even goes so far to change the music from a hopeful pop song to an ominous, militaristic theme.
  • The season 1 finale of Star Trek: Discovery ends with the titular starship rendezvousing with the USS Enterprise. The musical fanfare of the event and the end credits are an updated version of the Star Trek: The Original Series theme.
  • Star Trek: Strange New Worlds
    • The episode "Those Old Scientists", a crossover with Star Trek: Lower Decks, has an animated version of the titles, complete with the same weird energy parasite from the Lower Decks titles feeding on the warp nacelle, and a glimpse of the cosmic koala.
    • The Musical Episode "Subspace Rhapsody" has the opening theme being vocalised, and replaces the closing theme with an instrumental medley of the songs from the episode.
  • One episode of The State began with David Wain explaining that all of the group's members have different specialties. His is editing, and though he gets less recognition for it, it is surprisingly good at letting you express yourself. Cut to a version of the opening titles in which Wain's credit is repeated over and over and the other cast members are only featured for a fraction of a second.
  • The Superman & Lois episode "Bizarros in a Bizarro World" inverts the S shield and title.
  • Supernatural has made special opening credit for several episodes:
  • Teen Wolf, "Illuminated" primely taking place at a club, replaces the usual theme with a remix.
  • In the run-up to a general election, the BBC current affairs / politics series This Week replaces its usual credits with the cast performing a spoof of a well-known song ("Is this the way to Amarillo?" for the 2005 election, and "We're off to see the Wizard" for 2010).
  • Torchwood: "Adam", in which a memory-altering entity infiltrated the usual team, added shots of the interloper to the usual opening sequence.
  • Two and a Half Men got one for a "crossover" with, of all series, CSI, when the writers from the latter show decided to swap shows with the "Men" writers for a week.
  • Walker, Texas Ranger did this with the end titles in the episodes "Trial of LaRue" ("Tonight, I'll See You In My Dreams" performed by Geoff Koch) and "Lucas" ("A Rose in December" performed by Gino Vannelli and Anton Vannelli), replacing the usual action-packed end titles performed by Chuck Norris.
  • Warehouse 13
    • The first Christmas Episode makes numerous changes to the title sequence (the longer one from the first two seasons).
      • The titles open with a quick burst of "Joy to the World", before moving into the main theme, which now has a sleigh-bell refrain.
      • The crate in the Sphinx picture is giftwrapped.
      • The scarab sheds red-and-gold sparks
      • The next crate is labelled "Fruitcake".
      • The map is of the North Pole.
      • The Establishing Shot of the warehouse is a snow scene in a pop-up book.
      • Toys, cookies and candy canes are propped up on the Farnsworths the cast appears on.
      • The Tesla is replaced by the snowglobe from the episode "Breakdown".
      • It's snowing over the title.
    • The Noir Episode in Season 4 replaces the usual logo with a flickering neon one.
    • They also sometimes have fun with the Idiosyncratic Wipes to the commercials, which normally feature the scenes disappearing into slamming crates or flickering Farnsworths, the Warehouse airlock closing, or occasionally characters being bronzed. The episode "Endless Terror", for example, in which Paracleus goes back to the 15th century to Make Wrong What Once Went Right, featured one based on the high-tech doors of the alternate Warehouse 13 in the new timeline, and a slamming crate against the Renaissance Muslim background of Warehouse 9 when Pete and Myka went back to Set Right What Once Went Wrong.
    • "Savage Seduction", a Trapped in TV Land episode about a Telenovela, has a Spanish guitar version of the theme, and uses the Show Within a Show's Idiosyncratic Wipes (a burst of flame).
  • The X-Files:
    • "X-Cops" uses a modified version of the title sequence from COPS (1989).
    • Used during the end credits of "The Post-Modern Prometheus" when the traditional Fade to Black is passed over in favor of the final shot of Mulder and Scully captured like a comic book frame, followed by a deformed hand closing the "comic book" to reveal Chris Carter's producer credit on the back cover.
  • The Young Ones did this two weeks on the trot with Nasty - done in the style of a Hammer-Horror film - and Time - the first five minutes, including the titles sequence, parodies Dallas.

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