10 Best Opening Credits From HBO TV Shows, Ranked

There really is nothing else on television like HBO bringing a clearly visible prestige to the whole medium. That heightened production is apparent right from the start of the platform's original shows with incredibly well-made opening title sequences. From moody songs set to the proceedings to stylized visuals, these credit sequences really do set the mood for a given show. Simply put, nobody in television consistently makes a better first impression for its shows than HBO.

With that in mind, we're highlighting the best opening title sequences produced for HBO original series. These credit sequences subtly capture what the show is all about in less than a minute of screentime. The opening titles we're listing here are the ones that we never skip, no matter how many times we've already seen them. These are the 10 best opening credits from HBO TV shows ranked, each as memorable as the series they're attached to.

Death is a constant presence in the 2001 dramedy "Six Feet Under" and its opening credit sequence makes that connection crystal clear. Starting with a pair of hands suddenly releasing their grip of each other, symbolizing death, the sequence details the journey of a corpse to its eventual grave. This includes shots of the body being prepared at a mortuary before being taken to a cemetery in a hearse. The full cadaver is never revealed, with just enough shown to convey its ordeal before reaching its final resting place.

With a slightly hazy focus and a dreamy theme melody by series composer Thomas Newman, "Six Feet Under" establishes its mission statement from the outset. This is a show about the business of death, or at least its immediate aftermath, but isn't overly grim about how it's handled. If anything, the show's opening captures how inevitable and natural death is, with the unseen morticians going about it matter-of-factly like the regular routine that it is. Borderline whimsical in its delivery, the "Six Feet Under" opening hits all the right notes on introducing the show and its subject matter.

Premiering the year before "The Sopranos," "Sex and the City" is similarly important in establishing HBO as a place for must-watch television. The show's opening credits, composed by Douglas J. Cuomo and Tom Findlay, captures its cheeky sense of humor. In a stylized sequence around Manhattan, Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) is seen walking through the city in a white and pink outfit. Her triumphant walk is cut short when she's splashed on by a passing city bus with an advertisement for Carrie's romantic advice column that the show is named after.

"Sex and the City" is one of the best TV shows set in New York City, and the opening reflects that romanticized depiction of Manhattan. Carrie brings the confident style that would make her a television fashion icon, but also eschews her own image by the end of the sequence. This slapstick moment provides a wink to the audience to not take things too seriously as the episode begins. With its salsa-infused opening title theme, "Sex and the City" keeps things buoyantly flirty, just like its main characters.

Several of the shows we're listing here change up their opening credit sequence every season while maintaining their broader sensibilities. The first one that we're including is "The White Lotus," one of the best anthology TV shows ever made. Each season takes place in a different scenic getaway with a largely new cast of characters embroiled in some heightened drama and intrigue. Reflecting the high society types that populate each season's story, the opening credits sequences take their cues from classical artwork.

The piece of artwork and accompanying musical theme changes every season but the overall aesthetic remains largely intact each time. Done in the style of ornate wallpaper to reflect the titular global resort chain and the setting for a particular season. These images of aristocratic figures and more colorful fauna give way to predatory animals and jealous figures foreshadowing the interpersonal strife to come. With "The White Lotus" Season 4 coming soon, we can't wait to see how the show changes its opening with its upcoming season.

The mean streets of Baltimore serve as the setting for "The Wire," one of the best HBO original series of all time. But more than just providing a backdrop for the crime thriller action, the Maryland city feels like an evolving character itself across the show's five-season run. Just as every season of the series explores different facets of Baltimore, the opening credits change up to reflect the shift in focal points. What is retained is the usage of "Way Down in the Hole" as its opening theme, albeit with a different performer each season.

These changes to the opening credit sequence every season of "The Wire" illustrates what the show is all about. The same characters and overarching plot lines might resurface, like the melody, but the city that they're delving into is far more complex and sprawling than just them alone. The best example of this is Season 4 and its exploration of how the local drug trafficking affects schools, with the opening theme sung by teenagers for the season. A portrait of a city and its denizens in perpetual dire straits, "The Wire" and its opening credits capture the hardscrabble times for its community.

"Westworld" explores cyberpunk dystopia with the veneer of a bright and shiny society, complete with servile synthetic beings, known as hosts. Over the course of the four-season series, the hosts gain self-awareness and turn the tables on humanity, with this reversal in power dynamic reflected by the opening title sequence. These opening credits are altered every season to allude to how the struggle between the hosts and humanity is progressing throughout the overarching story. Season 1 depicts a host's construction, Season 2 features the theme park in chaos, Season 3 showcases the futuristic world, and Season 4 shows humanity subjugated by its creations.

Juxtaposed by a theme song composed by Ramin Djawadi, "Westworld" really captures the high-tech world that the story is set in. Every season's opening credit sequence hints at a growing chaos and conflict under its immaculately maintained facade that gives way to subjugation. Through it all the creation of a host evokes Leonardo Da Vinci's classic drawing "Vitruvian Man," complete with its circular display. Beautifully rendered, teasing the dangers under the artificial imitation of life it's created, "Westworld" may look ordered in its presentation but hints at something more violently alive.

When "True Detective" premiered in 2014, it set a new standard for neo-noir storytelling on television, powered by lead actors Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson. Reflecting the season's Southern Gothic-tinged Louisiana setting, the opening credits are set to the song "Far From Any Road" by The Handsome Family. A more ominously toned country song, the tune plays over stylized images of the two actors and the bayous that are part of their jurisdiction. These visuals subtly hint at how much the season's central mystery will consume both police detectives over the course of their lives.

In contrast to other shows on this list, we're really just highlighting the opening credits for the first season of "True Detective." The subsequent seasons have their own stylized sequences set to different songs, but the mood established by that first season's opening credits can't quite be matched. The opening theme's dueling vocals and shots of McConaughey and Harrelson's characters in a mystery over their heads sets the tone beautifully. Just like ranking the "True Detective" seasons themselves, the first season's opening credits are better than the rest of the series by a considerable margin.

When it comes to stories revolving around highly entertaining family drama, few shows do it better than "Succession." The sharp-tongued dramedy premiered in 2018 and quickly became one of the best TV shows streaming on HBO Max. That focus on family is highlighted right from the opening credits which features home movies of the affluent Roy family. This is gradually intercut with images of the Manhattan skyline and the Roys' media empire which inform the stakes of the series.

While music plays a big role in all the opening credit sequences that we're mentioning here, it really elevates "Succession." Composed by Nicholas Britell, the theme blends a classical piano melody with lofi hip-hop overlays to set the mood. Combined with the opening credits' visuals, this establishes that this particular story is all about neo-American opulence and the bickering that it entails. "Succession" thrives on the old axiom that familiarity breeds contempt and its opening dives deep into the family history that will fuel its conflicts.

"Peacemaker" is an HBO Max original rather than produced for HBO's television broadcast channel, but is no less impressive in its own right. Providing a gleefully violent and vulgar take on the DC Universe's gun-toting antihero Peacemaker (John Cena), the show features a stylized dance number for its opening credits sequence. Arranged like something out of an '80s musical show like "Solid Gold," the cast all dance stoically to choreographed sequences. Season 1 is set to "Do Ya Wanna Taste It?" by Wig Wam while "Peacemaker" Season 2 has a new opening dance number set to "Oh Lord" by Foxy Shazam.

No matter how serious and gruesome things can get on "Peacemaker," the opening title sequence always brings a smile to our face. The unflappably serious expressions on the cast's face as they dance, the glamor rock-inspired sets, and rigid dance moves all set the goofy mood. If we had to pick, Season 1 has the better opening dance number but Season 2's opening credits are thoroughly enjoyable too. "Peacemaker" is one of the best superhero TV shows of all time and its opening credits always effectively set the tone.

One of the shows that firmly established HBO as a vanguard in prestige television, "The Sopranos" is among the best crime dramas of all time. Providing a suburban family perspective on the lives of mobsters, the show is centered around crime boss Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini) and his New Jersey household. That juxtaposition between daily suburban routine and crime-infused undertones informs the show's opening title sequence set to a remixed version of "Woke Up This Morning" by Alabama 3. Titled the "Chosen One Mix," the song provides a propulsively steady rhythm as Tony is seen driving his SUV from New York City to his New Jersey home.

"The Sopranos" is one of the most rewatchable shows ever and every time we hear "Woke Up This Morning," we're back in the mood for the organized crime drama. The driving tour of New Jersey establishes the Garden State setting of the show culminating in Tony arriving back in suburbia. There is also an understated menace to this version of the song, something that reflects the facade that Tony puts on for his family. A driving sequence that delves into the criminal stakes hiding within an unassuming neighborhood, "The Sopranos" sets its stage masterfully.

As soon as that winding clockwork device bearing the "Game of Thrones" title card appears on screen, it's accompanied by a rousing theme composed by Ramin Djawadi. Immediately exhilarating, the music draws audiences in before it cuts to a three-dimensional map of the fantasy realm of Westeros. Reflecting the shifting balance between the various kingdoms and houses, different structures and terrain features are added to the map. This is all done with a clockwork-style animation as if the entire sweeping map was some sort of elaborate contraption.

"Game of Thrones" is easily one of the best fantasy TV shows ever made and that esteemed quality is apparent instantly. Djawadi's score is something that's undeniably catchy and we can't help but hum along every time the familiar theme kicks in. With the music accompanying the evolving map of Westeros, the opening title sequence gives the show a sense of scale before the actual episode even begins. Operatically grandiose in all the right ways, "Game of Thrones" captures our rapt attention once those opening credits begin.