10 Best Opening Credits Sequences In Movie History
2. Watchmen
Zack Snyder's Watchmen was facing an impossible task from day one, and it's no surprise that the finished product wasn't as stellar as many had hoped. Frank Miller's original graphic novel is so dense, packed to the brim with tiny details, that it would require an entire TV series to get right, and not a single standalone film.
But for a few short minutes - courtesy of this opening title sequence - we thought Snyder had achieved the impossible. The credits managed to condense years and years of backstory down into a couple of brief moments, showing us the glorious rise of these costumed heroes all the way up to their eventual deaths and falls from grace.
The addition of Bob Dylan's The Times They Are A Changin' leant the piece a sense of inevitable sorrow, with the celebration of the superheroes devastatingly contrasted with all the arguing, death and politics that followed.
The choice of song could be deemed a little heavy-handed (Snyder isn't really known for his subtlety) given that the times were literally changing, but it's not really the lyrics that contribute to the overall effect - it's the mournful tone of the music, and it matched up perfectly with the saddening downfall of these once-heroic costumed crime-fighters.