Special Edition Title

aka: Special Edition Theme Song

Supernatural's normal season 4 title card and "Monster Movie"'s throwback title card.

A variation on a show's usual Title Sequence for a special event. Does not cover the regular evolution of a title sequence from season to season. Likely to occur in conjunction with Formula-Breaking Episode. Can also be applied to the ending sequence, if the show has one (e.g. Anime).

Title-Only Opening, Silent Credits, Finale Credits and Variations on a Theme Song are sub-tropes of this.

When this trope is done with company logos, see Logo Joke. When this trope occurs on a regular basis, see Couch Gag.

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Example Subpages:

• Anime & Manga
• Live-Action TV
• Western Animation

Other Examples:

Comic Books

• DC Comics:
  • DC did a crossover event called Forever Evil (2013) in September 2013, which had a "Villains Month" comic for a third of the series ongoing at that time (complete with a villain-specific comic title).
  • When DC released a special Green Lantern issue to commemorate the hero's 80th anniversary in 2020, the DC Comics logo was in the Green Lantern power battery, as seen here.
• Marvel Comics has used custom corner-box art on its comic covers to reflect special events, special comics, or just for a laugh:
  • "Assistant Editors' Month" (September 1983, issues cover dated January 1984) was chock full of these, given its premise of having the books' assitant editors given free reign while their superiors were busy at San Diego Comic-Con. Among the more notable gags:
    • Ann Nocenti's titles (The New Defenders #127^note Featuring a one-page story where Nocenti lets her newfound editorial powers get to her head., The Incredible Hulk #291^note The Hulk visits the Marvel offices and talks to the In-Universe Nocenti, wondering whether he should expose General Ross' deal with M.O.D.O.K., The Thing #7^note The Thing raises hell at the Marvel offices after reading their grossly-exaggerated account of his encounter with a one-off criminal., and Marvel Fanfare #12^note Featuring a back-up story where Nocenti finds herself overwhelmed with her recent "promotion", the opposite of the Defenders back-up.) had a caricature of Nocenti either take the place of the usual corner box portrait (the former three) or outright shoving the usual editor out of the way (Fanfare).
    • The Avengers #239^note The one where the Avengers appear on Late Night with David Letterman., Captain America #289^note Featuring a back-up story where Cap's girlfriend Bernie dreams a scenario where she and Steve swap places., Iron Man #178^note Mockingly billed as "The All-New Iron Man, Shame of the City", reflecting Tony's alcoholism at the time., and Conan the Barbarian #154 had checkerboard trade dresses resembling the one used by DC Comics during The Silver Age, with the former three titles having the corner box portraits turned away from the reader.
    • Fantastic Four #262, "The Trial of Reed Richards"^note Reed is put on trial by the Galactic Tribunal for sparing Galactus' life, with John Byrne himself serving as the stenographer., includes a hand-written note from John Byrne in the corner box asking the editors not to do anything too crazy with the cover.
  • The Amazing Spider-Man #250^note Billed as a "Special Normal-Sized 250th Issue." had the Hobgoblin shout out to the reader "It's great! Steal it!" At least one person confessed to taking him up on that advice.
  • Captain America #332, which had Steve Rogers decide to resign the mantle, has corner-box art of Abraham Lincoln's portrait shedding a tear.
  • Fantastic Four #348 had corner-box art of Spider-Man, Wolverine, the Hulk and Ghost Rider, who had been recruited as the New Fantatic Four to replace and investigate the kidnapping of the original Four. The next issue, #349, had corner-box art of the Hulk and the Thing, reflecting the two teams uniting to take on the kidnappers.
  • Tom Scioli's Fantastic Four miniseries "Grand Design" had corner-box art of the Fantastic Four using their powers, as seen here.
  • Marvel Fanfare #15 paid tribute to the April Fool's Day theme of the main story with a corner-box image of Archie Goodwin's cigar having exploded as a practical joke, seen here.
  • The Mighty Thor #381, where Thor was trapped in the body of the Destroyer armor, had corner-box art of the Destroyer armor, as seen here.
  • The Transformers #80, the last issue of the original Marvel run, replaced◊ the usual faction leader corner box portrait with a beveled Decepticon insignia (to match the beveled Autobot insignia on the title logo), and was billed as "#80 in a four-issue limited series."^note Lampshading how the book didn't reset its numbering in the transition from miniseries to ongoing, unlike most titles.
    • The last issue of IDW Publishing's Regeneration One follow-up (which ignores Generation 2 and thus starts at #81) similarly billed itself as "#100 in a four-issue limited series".
• 2000 AD #157, which introduced the Comic Rock feature (stories inspired by rock music, in this case a Nemesis the Warlock strip based on "Going Underground" by The Jam) had a unique logo in which the zeroes were all records.

Comic Strips

• The Wacky Adventures of Pedro:
  • The comic becomes The Wacky Adventures of Pedrobot during Pedro's term as a robot slave on the Ruby Moon of Doom, with the title box having Pedrobot's name written on a bar apparently bolted over Pedro's.
  • The comic becomes The Wacky Adventures of Pedramoeba after Ordep shrinks Pedro to microscopic size.
• In The Beano, when the Dennis the Menace (UK) strip was running a story arc about Gnasher being missing, Walter's poodle Foo-Foo took over the strip Gnasher's Tale, renaming it Foo-Foo's Fairy Stories.
• Elvie:
  • The title changes to Elfie when Elvie plays NetHack.
  • The title changes to Elvis in a comic about Elvie's GitHub username.
  • The title changes to Selfie when Elvie draws an SVG self-portrait.

Fan Works

• Audio example: Fobbies Are Borange has had several opening song changes; from a sophisticated theme for the two episodes with a British narrator, to the a cappella theme for the Moonside episode, to the epic song for the final episode.
• Calvin & Hobbes: The Series:
  • This Script Fic has one for season 3 premiere "Dr. Brain Chill"; the credits are overlaid on various shots of space.
  • Same with "Tracer Bullet in Color!", taking after film noir opening credits.
• Pokémon Reset Bloodlines uses in the covers for its main and side stories the traditional yellow and blue of the Pokémon franchise logo, save for two particular instances:
  • The sidestories "Agatha & Sam Gaiden" and "Shadows of the Jungle", being Halloween Episodes dealing with horror themes, change the title to red and black.
  • The second Holiday Special has the title in red and green, and also adds some golden letters in the subtitle for good measure.
• Naru-Hina Chronicles Mini-sodes: The logo for the Mini-sodes consists of Naruto and Hinata's heads surrounding "NHC Mini-sodes", as shown here. In the Christmas Episode, as shown here, the NHC letters have snow on top of them, with some Christmas decorations on their side. Also, Naruto is wearing a Santa hat and a Santa beard, while Hinata is wearing an elf hat and has elf-like pointy ears.
• Excluding the first four episodes, which didn't have an established intro yet, a few episodes of Yu-Gi-Oh! The Abridged Series had different opening credits:
  • "Both Of You Duel Like You Want To Win" features a montage of various Yu-Gi-Oh clips while "A Cruel Angel's Thesis" plays, complete with a (completely inaccurate) translation of the song's lyrics.
  • "Busted Rhymes" featured the same footage as the regular intro, but with "YMCA" playing instead of "Kawaita Sakebi".
  • "Duel Of Fates" featured a parody of the opening crawl from Star Wars.
  • "Sore" had the Pharaoh singing a parody of the opening theme of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.
  • "Dork Side Of The Moon" once again had the same footage as the intro, but the theme tune was instead "sung" by series creator LittleKuriboh, complete with beat boxing in the background.
  • "Bakuhazard" featured an intro for "The Bakura Show", with "Ave Satani" playing and overlayed with ridiculous English lyrics.
  • "They Saved Tristan's Brain" had Marik singing to the tune of "Cha-la Head Cha-La!"

Films — Animated

• Laika
  • Kubo and the Two Strings: The Laika Entertainment logo features homages to its previous films.
  • Missing Link uses the same logo, but includes Mr Link.
• Disney
  • Tangled appears with a "50th animated motion picture" commemoration.
  • Encanto appears with a "60th animated motion picture" commemoration.
• DreamWorks Animation
  • Some Chinese releases use an Oriental DreamWorks logo, where the moon is formed from a paintstroke and a panda (inspired by Po the Kung Fu Panda) sits on the moon.
  • Penguins of Madagascar: The logo appears with a 20 Years commemoration tag.
  • Trolls World Tour: The logo appears with a 25 Years commemoration tag.
• The Powerpuff Girls Movie had a special Cartoon Network logo designed for the film: all the Hanna-Barbara/Cartoon Network characters sit in a cinema, and as it darkens only their eyes are seen, which form the logo, as seen here.

Films — Live-Action

• Some MGM films have the lion in the logo be calm and tranquil, in contrast to its normal roaring manner:
  • The 1959 adaptation of Ben-Hur was the first to do this, a deliberate move from the director, who felt the roaring lion would be at peace in a film about Christ.
  • Other films where the lion is silent include The Next Voice You Hear... (a 1950 film about God speaking on the radio) and the 1951 adventure film Westward the Women.
• A variation; the films of Yasujiro Ozu often had the film title set against a sackcloth background, to represent a simple middle-class background. His last film, An Autumn Afternoon, had the title set against a background of painted fronds.
• Marvel Cinematic Universe:
  • Spider-Man: Homecoming: Instead of the regular fanfare, the Marvel logo opens with an orchestrated version of the famous Spider-Man theme from the classic animated series. Spider-Man himself is inserted into the live action clips in the logo. (He usually isn't in the logo, the scene he replaces from the normal logo is one of Hulk tearing through Utron's mooks.)
  • Avengers: Infinity War: Unlike most of the previous films' opening Marvel logos, the typical fanfare is replaced by the sounds of a distress call placed by the Asgardian ship seen at the end of Thor: Ragnarok, along with the "I" and "O" in Marvel Studios being replaced with the number 10 to mark the MCU's anniversary. The turning of "I" and "O" into the number 10 is repeated in Ant-Man and the Wasp which came out the same year.
  • Captain Marvel (2019): As this is the first Marvel Cinematic Universe film released after Stan Lee's death, the Marvel logo features images of Lee's cameos and publicity images, and comes with a message: "Thank you, Stan."
  • For Avengers: Endgame, all of the characters who vanished in Infinity War were conspicuously absent from the opening logos.
  • After Chadwick Boseman's death, the Disney+ screening of Black Panther (2018) changed the Marvel Studios logo character montage to footage and artwork of him as the Black Panther starting on what would have been his 44th birthday, November 29, 2020.
    • All copies of its sequel Black Panther: Wakanda Forever feature the same logo, but the usual fanfare is replaced with complete silence.
• James Bond's gunbarrel sequences changes for special occasions:
  • For Dr. No and Casino Royale (2006) the gunbarrrel sequence is part of the animated opening sequence. For Dr No, it was the first film, so there was no prologue, while Casino Royale was a prequel/reboot.
  • On Her Majesty's Secret Service, George Lazenby's only Bond film, had Lazenby drop on one knee in the sequence.
  • Die Another Day has Bond fire a bullet into the gunbarrel itself.
  • Skyfall has a title card commemorating Bond's 50th anniversary.
  • The international release of No Time to Die has the Universal Pictures globe turn all white and shift to the left, starting the gunbarrel sequence.
• On PBS Kids airings of Odd Squad: World Turned Odd, the second half would open up with the usual opening theme, only narrated by Odd Todd and twisted so that it shows all of the odd things he's done. The title card at the end reads "Todd Squad" instead of "Odd Squad", with the creators' names changed as well: "Todd McKeon" and "Adam Peltztodd".

Literature

• Rivers of London:
  • The German editions have Ben Aaronovitch's name on a piece of scrollwork flanked by two skulls (one in a police helmet and one in a top hat) and with the Big Ben clock tower rising from the centre. For the translation of Foxglove Summer, where Peter finds himself in the countryside, the clock is replaced by a medieval church tower (not unlike the Somerset towers). The first novella doesn't have the skulls and tower, and the second, The October Man, about Peter's German counterpart, has no tower but Weimar eagles in place of the skulls.
  • More subtly, most editions of the city-based novels all use a detail of the relevant area from Stephen Walker's incredible "The Island: London Series" artworks. For Foxglove Summer, Patrick Knowles creates a Herefordshire equivalent. Walker himself does one of Trier for The October Man. False Value has London, but with a striking green-on-black design rather than the usual parchment background. The "computery" effect represents that Peter is now working for an IT firm.

Puppet Shows

• The Christmas Episodes of The Furchester Hotel has snow in the bird's-eye view of the city, and the shots of the hotel exterior.
• The Muppet Show:
  • The episode starring Loretta Lynn takes place at a railroad station because the usual theater is being fumigated, so the opening and closing titles take place at the station.
    It's time to meet the Muppets at the railroad track tonight.
    It's time to make up scenery, let's hope we do it right.
  • The episode starring Kaye Ballard had the Electric Mayhem going on strike because they were annoyed by the theme song, so the closing titles run over Rowlf playing it solo on his piano.
• Sesame Street:
  • From season 30 to 32, the intro had a shot of Big Bird walking several girls in tutus across the street. The season 31 premiere had a chroma-keyed Zoe freeze the theme at that particular point to inform the viewers watching that the following episode had dancing as its focus (Zoe is a ballerina herself).
  • In 1975, all but the first of five episodes revolving around a trip to New Mexico had a special, extended title sequence showing Big Bird and the adults driving in a pick-up truck, with a special version of the iconic theme tune to go with it:
    Sunny day,
    Coming to Santa Fe,
    On my way,
    To where the air is sweet.
    We're a long, long, long, long,
    Long, long way from Sesame Street!
    Here we go, off to New Mexico,
    Tacos, burritos, frijoles! Can't be beat!
    We're a long, long, long, long,
    Long, long way from Sesame Street!
    Gonna see the desert flowers,
    Gonna work for hours and hours,
    With happy people like you,
    Happy people like-
    Good-bye care!
    Hurry, we're almost there!
    Smell that air, come on, just 10 more feet!
    We're a long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long way from Sesame Street!
    Long way from Sesame Street!
    Long way from Sesame Street!
• The UK version of the Fraggle Rock episode "Born to Wander", which introduces John Gordon-Sinclair's P.K. as the human character following Fulton Mackay's death, has a title sequence that shows Sprocket alone in the lighthouse, because the opening scene shows P.K. arriving.

Radio

• Talk show host Herman Cain of The Herman Cain Show normally warns any audience members still driving at the start of his show that "there are some nuts on the road", on some holidays, he has warned that there are "even more" nuts on the road.
• The episode of The Archers in which the long-serving and much-loved Phil Archer died didn't play the show's theme tune at the end, instead fading out to Elgar's "Dream of Gerontius", which Phil had been listening to as he passed away peacefully at home.
• The Now Show
  • The opening credits sometimes have some variant on "I'm Steve Punt." "And I'm Hugh Dennis." "With us are [guests], and this is..." "THE NOW SHOOOW!", especially if Hugh is absent from an episode and someone else has to do the last bit. In the fourth episode of Series 56, when the country was in lockdown due to COVID-19 and the cast were all recording remotely, Hugh apparently missed his cue for his introduction, and the shout of the title was preceded by a computer voice announcing "Hugh has joined the group", which became a Running Gag for the first half of the show.
  • The final episode of that series ended with a medley of 1940s song parodies in the style of the Andrews Sisters (referencing the British media's constant use of World War II as an analogy in a crisis). The end credits were then read out like a 1940s American radio show, even including a fake sponsor (Relaxo, the soothing drink for people who can't get their audio software to work properly.)

Video Games

• Elite Beat Agents does this in a few levels for impact.
  • In "You're the Inspiration" for example, they don't count down or wave their arms, and the title appears over a picture of their client, rather than the agents saying "Hey! Mission!" like always.
  • In "Jumping Jack Flash", they only have the countdown, due to it being a continuation of the last level.
  • The Japanese predecessor to Elite Beat Agents (Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan) has a few of these as well. In the original, "Over The Distance" had a much quieter call for help and had their target running down the stairs to Heaven instead of the more Hot-Blooded regaining of spirit and countdown. In the sequel, "Believe" and "Sekai wa Sore wo Ai to Yobun da ze" are similar to "You're The Inspiration" and "Jumping Jack Flash", respectively.
• Everybody Edits often has the logo change during Holiday Mode or when there's an upcoming contest.

Web Animation

• Happy Tree Friends uses Halloween graphics in the opening for Halloween Episodes, complete with the theme song being done in a minor key.

Web Comics

• Gunnerkrigg Court title pages usually have a black background with a picture of something relevant to the chapter in the middle. The title pages for chapters 10 ("Doctor Disaster Versus the Creepy Space Aliens From Outer Space") and 23 ("Terror Castle of the Jupiter Moon Martians"), on the other hand, are in the style of a poster for a '50s sci-fi movie, as both chapters involve Dr. Disaster's retro sci-fi themed simulations.

Web Original

• The webseries Awesome Video Games once had their opening sequence taken over by the Robotic Operating Buddy.
• On anniversaries or other milestone occasions, Atop the Fourth Wall does an extended opening or closing sequence with the full theme song and covers of each and every comic Linkara has reviewed up to that date. The Star Trek #2 (Gold Key) episode, parodying Star Trek's Mirror Universe, had a new title sequence featuring Mirror!Linkara intercut with some of the more violent scenes of AT4W, and "In a Mirror, Darkly"'s opening theme.
• Bishop Barron:
  • The episode "On Bob Dylan" opens without the normal theme music and instead begins with "Blowin' In The Wind," a song Bishop Barron dissects in the rest of the video.
  • To highlight the seriousness of its subject, the episode "On the Charleston Tragedy and Forgiveness" is the only one to open without any theme music.
• Flander's Company: Season 3 episodes 7, 10 and 11 have the usual music and style of opening, except the title isn't "Flander's Company" but "C.C Corporation" instead, and the cast is from the latter society, since the episodes focus on them.
• Game Grumps:
  • When they interview Grant Kirkhope under the name "Guest Grumps", the intro is changed to match, along with the theme being replaced with an arrangement by Kirkhope and the "HEY I'M GRUMP!" "I'M NOT SO GRUMP!" exchange being altered as such:
    Arin: Heydoyouwanttodothatthingwherehecomesonourshow?
    Jon: NO!
    Both: And this is Guest Grumps!
  • Both it and its sister show Steam Train adopted Halloween-themed intros in the last week of October 2013.
    Arin: (dressed as Frankenstein's monster) Hey I'm ghoul!
    Danny: (dressed as a vampire) Bleeeeh!
    Both: And we're the Ghoul Grumps!
    (Backmasked quote that changes for every episode)
    -
    Danny: (as a zombie) We bought too many brains!
    Ross: (unintelligibly, due to his dislocated jaw) Now we gotta eat them all...
    Danny: SO ALL ABOARD THE SCREAM TRAIN!
    (lightning followed by a scream)
  • On the week of Christmas 2013, they both had Christmas-themed intros.
    Arin: (dressed as an elf) I wrap stuff!
    Danny: (dressed as Santa Claus) I deliver that stuff!
    Both: Naughty or nice, it's the Jingle Grumps!
    -
    (In the tune of "Jingle Bells")
    Arin and Ross: (dressed as Rudolph and a snowman respectively) Playing lots of games
    With Christmas type names
    Instead of a train...
    We're on a Steam Sleigh! Choo! Choo! Choo!
  • On Valentine's Day 2014, they both had Valentine-themed intros.
    Arin: Hey I'm Grumps! (Suzy kisses him) I'm not so Grump...
    Arin and Suzy: And this is Date Grumps!
    -
    Danny: We don't have any dames!
    Barry: Now it's another Friday...
    Danny: SO ALL ABOARD THE- (music and singing stops) Ugh, fuck it. We're single on Valentine's Day.
  • On St. Patrick's Day 2014, only Stream Train episodes were put up featuring Ross and Barry playing games while being drunk.
    Barry: (slured) We bought too many beerz!
    Ross: (also slured) Now I gotta drink them all!
    Both: SO ALL ABOARD THE STOUT TRAIN! (Ross burps)
    Barry: I love you, man.
• JonTron: For Halloween and Christmas specials, Jon's intro and theme song will be modified accordingly. The intro of the infamous "Apples and Breaks" short distorts heavily midway through before abruptly cutting off (to reflect Jon's state in the short proper).
• The Game Show Reviewer: In the Family Feud episode it's revealed that Cmd. Sara Stormer is a game show reviewer and is out to destroy the Game Show Reviewer to be the only Game Show Reviewer. This is complete with her own title sequence were she calls the Game Show Reviewer "a renegade."
• The Irate Gamer: I Rate the 80's becomes I Rate the 70's and adopts a St. Patrick's Day theme in the Uncle O'Grimacey episode.
• In Episode 19B of Welcome to Night Vale the regular theme song is replaced by a pleasant guitar tune which is the theme song for the Desert Bluffs community radio channel. It returns in Episodes 47 and 48 when StrexCorp takes over Night Vale and assimilates it into the 'Greater Desert Bluffs Metropolitan Area'. All three shows are hosted by Kevin.
• Similarly to the Star Trek: Enterprise example, Star Trek Continues, a Fan Sequel to the Original Series, had the episode "Fairest of Them All" set entirely in the Mirror Universe. The intro to said episode features a mix of the original theme with snare drums added, mirrored versions of the visuals of the intro, the Terran Empire's "sword through globe" logo added to the Star Trek logo, and a twist on Kirk's "Space... the final frontier..." speech.
  Space... the final conquest. These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise. Its continuing mission: To discover and subjugate strange new worlds. To advance our dominion and vanquish all who stand against us. To conquer the galaxy for the glory of the Empire!
• The Nostalgia Critic: The review for Deadpool 2 has an opening with the usual visuals for Season 11, except it starts out with "Channel Unicorn" ("Now That's an Horny Horse") replacing the Channel Awesome logo, and the credits themselves are replaced by tongue-in-cheek parodies, right in the style of a Deadpool movie.
• The Simpsums: For "The Simpsons Guy", the show is presented as "Fummary Guy", since the crossover was technically a Family Guy episode.
• GameXplain occasionally uses special logo animations when covering major games or events. Special mention goes to the animation made for videos related to the 35th anniversary of Super Mario Bros., first debuting in "Top 10 Hopes for Super Mario 3D All-Stars! (Besides Being Real...)" and occasionally used up until "Mario Is Dead.", which zooms in on the initial scene again to show Mario getting attacked by a Piranha Plant and a Thwomp.
• Brave Wilderness: The episodes focused on marine life will replace the orange and yellow logo in the intro with one that's in shades of blue instead. Also, the episodes themselves are hosted by Mark Vins (who's normally just the cameraman) rather than Coyote Peterson, since sea life is his personal specialty.

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