10 Most Remarkable Sci-Fi Movie Opening Scenes

We all know the story by now. A long time ago in a galaxy far, far, away, Star Wars was born and a generation of science-fiction nerds and Luke Skywalker diehards were allowed to flourish in the wake of some death-star destroying, lightsaber wielding, droid hunting fun - and A New Hope's opening scene has since gone down in history because of it.

Star Wars is one of the few films that can actually get away with a massive exposition dump in the form of a scrolling paragraph, if only for the excellent soundtracking and stylistic choices that defined the film as something that had never been done before.

Setting up this crawl allows for the movie to then move into a spaceship populated with bizarre robots and laser battling clones as the big bad Darth Vader gets a spot of power walking in without even such a hint of unnecessary dialogue - showing us everything we need to see rather than clunkily going through the motions to set up the Star Wars universe.

It's one of the most instantaneously world-building moments in science fiction. A gold tin man and hair that's like two bread rolls strapped to Leia's ears, and history was made.