The Teaser: Difference between revisions

Also known as a [[Cold Opening]] or "[[Cold Open]]." A one to five minute mini-act at the beginning of the show, sometimes before the [[Title Sequence|opening credits]], that is used to set up the episode and catch the audience's attention.

 

 

 

As recently as the early 1990s, the teaser was a relatively unusual phenomenon (although there had been some examples, such as soaps from the early 80s, and Star Trek in the 60s). Today, nearly every American show has a teaser (to get viewers hooked before they can consider changing channels). Many British shows still don't use the technique (what's more, until the 1980s [[The BBC]] would actually re-edit most American shows to put the teaser ''after'' the opening titles), but it is increasing in prominence.

When US shows are broadcast on British commercial channels the first commercial break is not usually placed after the opening title but about 8-12 minutes in. However, some more recent series like ''[[Lost]]'' have such long teasers that the commercial does immediately follow the title (or, more rarely, actually precedes it).

 

 

Subtropes:

* The ''[[Pokémon]]'' anime dub did this starting in the second Johto season. In Diamond and Pearl(when the Japanese version started doing this), sometimes clips from later in the episode would play before the opening.

** The movies also do this.

* Since Shippuuden ''[[Naruto]]'' started using those. They kinda overused it with the very first episode which began with a foreshadowing of episode 30 or so, crucial moment to the plot.

* ''[[Kaiba]]'' had brief recap/prologues in front of episodes for the first few episodes before switching to more standard cold openings, often setting up new locations.

* All of the episodes of ''[[Princess Tutu]]'' open with barely-animated charcoal drawings on the screen while a female narrator grimly tells a fairytale that's somehow related to the episode. After a dramatic music swell, the gentle opening theme starts up.

* ''[[Elfen Lied]]'''s first episode puts a pretty original spin on this. Naked girl killing everyone in sight -- ROLL OPENING -- Guy moving into house. And then they put it all together!

* ''[[Bleach]]'' is using cold opens more and more lately. More often than not, said clips are from the actual episode.

* The second season of ''[[Gunslinger Girl]]'' uses cold openings.

* Every episode of ''[[Berserk]]'' begins with its ominous [[Opening Narration]], usually followed by a recap of the previous episode.

== Film ==

* The ''[[James Bond]]'' movies almost always start with an introductory sequence before the episode itself.

* ''[[The Departed]]'' also had no opening credits. When the title finally appeared ''18 and a half minutes later'', you wonder why they even bothered.

* The opening credits of ''[[Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind]]'' are roughly 15 minutes into the movie.

* The film ''[[Raising Arizona]]'' goes through a 10:43 cold open, setting up the story and introducing us to (nearly) all the characters.

* The opening of ''[[Mystery Team]]'' shows the eponymous trio harassing a comatose man, suspecting him of murder.

* ''[[The Lion King]]'''s title card follows a majestic scene of Simba's parents presenting him to their subjects. In the DVD commentary, the directors recall they feared audiences would not read the simplistic title card after enjoying such an epic song.

* Each ''[[Lord of the Rings]]'' film runs the main title immediately following the [[Vanity Plate]], but the instalment title follows a prologue. The first one gave a few thousand years' worth of [[Backstory]], the other two were more standard [[Flash Back|flashbacks]]. The director deliberately wanted to emulate a James Bond teaser for the first film, which resulted in an epic battle scene that would be called back to in the climaxes of parts two and three.

 

 

 

== [[Live Action TV]] ==

* [[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]] has one every episode, generally setting up the plot and whatnot (some can be a bit deceiving, though). The only episode that lacks one is the season four finale, "Restless", mostly due to the episode being ''that'' [[Mind Screw]]-y.

* The teasers on ''[[The L Word]]'' are usually set anywhere from a year to several decades in the past, featuring characters we've never met before, but they always end up tying in with what goes on in the episode.

* All the ''[[Law and Order]]'' shows use a cold open, with a stock opening title card and narration. The action is either the crime itself or the discovery of a body, and thirty seconds of the detectives opening the investigation. While Jerry Orbach was still with us, almost always ended on a Lenny Briscoe [[One-Liner]].

* ''[[ER]]'s'' cold openers generally focus on interpersonal ties (more than the hustle and bustle of the meat of the show could, anyway). A 12th season episode, "The Gallant Hero & the Tragic Victor", actually kills off a main character in the teaser.

* ''[[The West Wing]]'' always has a few minutes-long opening scene before the credits that can vary greatly in style from episode to episode. Most often, it is a set-up of one or more of the headaches the characters will have to deal with. Other times, it is a self-contained scene that is only loosely attached to the plotline; a humorous episode-related clip that ends on a gag of some kind; or simply a shortened extra act.

* ''[[The Wayans Bros]]'' had a cold open unrelated to the plot every episode.

* ''[[Drake and Josh]]'' has one every episode.

* The first season (at least) of ''[[My Name Is Earl]]'' was a rare live-action primetime non-reality show that did ''not'' use a [[Cold Opening]].

* Nearly every episode of ''[[House MD]]'' starts with a particularly cold opening, which may seem to be other show or movie... until the new patient gets sick, and cut to the opening credits.

** The writers often try to make the patient unexpected by having someone show signs of illness before the ''real'' patient collapses. For example, at the beginning of one episode, Cuddy takes a drink of water and starts to cough; but in the background, another character suddenly ''falls off a roof''.

* ''[[Studio 60 On the Sunset Strip]]'' devoted its second episode to showcase the main characters working against the clock to create an effective cold open, eventually settling on a fourth-wall breaking rendition of "A Modern Major General" from ''[[The Pirates of Penzance]]''.

* ''[[Monty Python's Flying Circus]]'' has the title sequence start after a man walked up to the screen and said "It's...". This was usually only a few seconds but was sometimes stretched out long enough to be considered a [[Cold Opening]]. It also must have set the record for the longest one ever in "Scott of the Antarctic" where the man and the title sequence didn't show up until ''halfway through the episode''. Or perhaps not: In other episodes they waited until the ''very end'' to show the opening credits, and occasionally left them out altogether. Which could technically mean that the title credits in the ''next'' episode mark the end of the cold open...

* ''[[The Wire]]'' usually has cold openings that are not related to the main story as such, but instead work as metaphors or thematic commentaries on the episode or the characters themselves.

* Each episode of ''[[Six Feet Under]]'' begins with the death of someone that the family will be working on in that episode, with a card displaying their name and dates of birth and death.

* ''[[Xena: Warrior Princess]]'' got a bit carried away with 'em sometimes: a teaser could be up to five minutes long.

* ''[[Star Trek]]''. Teasers could run as long as over six minutes ("Ship in a Bottle") to as short as under 20 seconds ("Impulse", "Scorpion").

** The TNG Episode "Cause and Effect" is ''particularly'' notable for having one of the most shocking teasers of all time- it opens with the ''Enterprise'' critically damaged, causing it to explode with all hands aboard 45 seconds into the episode. {{spoiler|The episode is about the ship being stuck in a [[Groundhog Day Loop]] which they eventually escape from alive.}}

* ''[[Power Rangers]]'' had one from Turbo to Time Force. It was dropped starting with Wild Force, but has returned in Samurai.

* The [[Guest Host]] series of ''[[Never Mind the Buzzcocks]]'' featured a cold open for most episodes, introducing this week's guest.

* In ''[[Primeval]]'' it goes like this: [[Red Shirt]] appears, [[Time Portal|Anomaly appears]], [[Monster of the Week]] appears, Standard [[Red Shirt]] Fate, [[Theme Song|Theme Music]].

* ''[[Psych]]'' normally begins with a clip of a young Shawn getting yelled at by his dad.

* ''[[Band of Brothers]]'' mostly avoids the cold opening, except for one or two episodes that start with the interviews of the [[Real Life]] veterans. In most other episodes these interviews came immediately after the [[Title Sequence]].

** So did ''[[Remote Control]]'', ''Singled Out'' and possibly ''[[Trashed]]''.

* ''[[Lexx]]'' only used these in the fourth season.

* 16 out of the first 17 episodes of ''[[Leave It to Beaver]]'' had an opening narration to set up the episode done by Hugh Beaumont. The shortest one, from the episode "New Neighbors", went: "To a growing boy boy there are some emotions you can take in your stride. Love. Anger. But fear can play havoc with your little imagination. And that's our story tonight on Leave It To Beaver."

* The first season of ''[[3-2-1 Contact]]''.

* ''[[Game of Thrones]]'' features a literal [[Incredibly Lame Pun|Cold]] [[Cold Open|Open]] in its pilot, showing three Night's Watchmen encountering the White Walkers.

* ''[[Breaking Bad]]'' uses these to great effect in multiple ways besides as the continuation of the previous episode's cliffhanger. The first two seasons mostly use straight cold opens (though one is a music video about Walt's Heisenberg persona) but seasons 3 and 4 have frequently featured flashbacks that feature a dead character, ad depth to the series' world or shed light on certain themes of that episode.

* ''[[UFO]]'' uses a variation in which the opening theme tune montage plays ''without titles''. This is then followed by the opening scene, which ends with the title logo appearing as an animated overlay. The cast and production credits appear as captions in act one. One reason for this may have been the show's rotating cast, meaning that they couldn't use credits with a fixed cast list.

 

 

== [[Puppet Shows]] ==

 

== [[Video Games]] ==

* The episodic series of ''[[Sam and Max]]'' featured two episodes with cutscenes as cold openings in its first season. In Season 2, every episode but one had a playable cold opening.

** The TV series and original [[Lucas Arts]] game also featured cold openings, before the "Pleasantly Understated Credit Sequence".

* Most of the games in the ''[[Final Fantasy]]'' series open with an action sequence or other story based sequence before the opening credits and logo come up.

** The original has a Cold Open with a plot remarkably similar to some entire games: "Oh, good, the heroes are here. The princess has been kidnapped. Take care of that, would you?" The plot only gets going ''after'' you rescue Her Majesty and acquire the Lute.

** So does ''[[Kingdom Hearts]]'', but that doesn't happen until ''4 to 5 hours into the game.''

*** After the first [[Kingdom Hearts]] the games all following have had a short montage that recapped what happened, and then a scene afterwards that doesn't make much sense unless you know certain things...sometimes you won't discover secrets until you've played different games in the series, and not just the main ones.

** Birth By Sleep shows [[Big Bad|Xehanort]] standing at Destiny Islands, commenting that it was "too small". {{spoiler|whenever this happens, it was after the events of Birth By Sleep, because Xehanort's younger self is not even created until Master Xehanort takes over Terra's body.}} However, that Birth by Sleep has three stories.

** 358/2 Days begins with Saix's quote from Kingdom Hearts II about the Heartless while panning through Where Nothing Gathers, showing every single member of the Organization before settling on Roxas, then cutting to a scene of he and Axel wondering if he really doesn't have heart and playing the themesong...an odd subversion is that instead of a recap montage of Sora and co., they instead do a countdown of the Organization. {{spoiler|Axel is wondering if Roxas has a heart because he seems to genuinely feel emotion. A playthrough of Birth By Sleep will reveal that Roxas inherited the heart of Ventus through Sora because had Ventus' heart as well as his own, and when he became a Heartless, creating Roxas, Ventus' heart became a part of Roxas as well, which is why Roxas looks like him and can wield light despite being a denizen of darkness.}}

** Birth By Sleep is a prequel. It features no recap, but a montage of what they will go through...at one point, Terra's eyes randomly become amber in color... {{spoiler|that was an oh so subtle hint that at the end of this game he was going to go from [http://cosplaymagiccom.x-shops.com/images/T/863-01.gif this], [http://images.wikia.com/kingdomhearts/images/3/3c/Terra_becoming_xehanort.png to] [http://images.wikia.com/kingdomhearts/images/7/74/Terranort_%26_Guardian.PNG this], and then finally [http://images.wikia.com/kingdomhearts/images/4/4d/Ansem_Render_%28Action%29_KHI.png this.]}}

** Going through all of the games' teasers would take a very, very, long time. And ''that's not even getting into the Heart Station Tutorials.''

* The ''[[Metal Gear Solid]]'' games start off with Snake performing an infiltration and then cut to a credit sequence between 5-20 minutes into the game, as a [[Satire, Parody, Pastiche|pastiche]] of the ''[[James Bond]]'' movies which spawned the whole idea of them. In more detail:

** In the first ''[[Metal Gear Solid]]'' you have to wait around in a dock area while the credits play, superimposed on the screen. When they're done you're free to enter the elevator to the next area, where Snake removes his mask and the logo comes up on screen as we see his face for the first time.

** ''[[Metal Gear Solid]] 3'' was the most blatant. There was a very short, fifteen or twenty minute gameplay segment before the game started for real, heralded by a lengthy [[Cutscene]], an offer to save, and the unlocking of the fantastic opening title movie, which played then and there and would now play every time the game was booted. The style of the opening sequence combined with the [[Cold War]] setting and the timing clearly marked it out as a homage to Bond's delayed starts.

* Incredibly, the small-time web RPG [http://armorgames.com/play/2900/sonny-2 Sonny 2] pulls this off quite dramatically. After beginning the game ''in the [[In Medias Res|middle of a battle]]'', it then proceeds with an opening cinematic and [[Title Sequence|title card]] 5 minutes in.

* ''[[Gears of War]] 2'' has a playable section teaching players the ropes and "working out the ginks" before the [[Title Sequence]].

* ''Lock & Key'', an award-winning [[Interactive Fiction]] game by Adam Cadre, uses one of these to establish its premise. What exactly happens is best experienced by playing it yourself.

* ''[[Vagrant Story]]'' begins with a suspenseful infiltration and several battles; only after this does the title appear, with the sunrise in the background.

* Similarly, ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics]]'' begins by asking you to pick your character's name and birthdate, followed by a beautiful [[Scenery Porn]] introduction, with the title appearing midway through the FMV sequence.

* In ''[[X-Men]] 2'' on the [[Sega Genesis]], the gameplay starts ''as soon as you power on the system.'' Only after clearing the first stage do the Sega logo and the title screen show up.

* The first mission and the following cutscenes until the 'ST-Voyager'-intro in [[Star Trek Elite Force|Star Trek Voyager Elite Force]].

 

== Webcomics ==

* [http://www.cowshell.com/cleopatra/ Cleopatra in Spaaace!]: Chapter one and part of chapter two.

 

 

== Web Original ==

* Many [[Youtube Poop|YouTube Poops]] provide an opening sketch, often unrelated to the rest of the video, as an appetizer before the main Poop begins.

* [[SF Debris]] uses cold openings in about 50% of his episodes. About 50% of those are also lead-ins to his [[Catch Phrase]].

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

{{quote| '''Linda:''' Tonight, at 11:00.<br />

'''Morbo:''' [[Doomy Dooms of Doom]]! }}

* Many of the early episodes of ''[[The Life and Times of Juniper Lee]]'' had teasers that didn't relate much to the plot, except for maybe one mention of where the main part of the story starts. One episode, "It Takes a Pillage", had a teaser which appeared to be setting up the [[Monster of the Week]] by showing him and having him monologue, but right at the point the monster's supposed to say his name, June conks him with a stone.

* ''[[Space Ghost Coast to Coast]]'' does this almost every episode. In one particular case, the episode "Joshua" is a super long cold opening promoting "Space Ghost 2000". The actual episode consists of the winners of the "Haikuin' for Space Ghost" contest reading their haikus, and that's about it. "Gallagher"'s cold opening consisted solely of Space Ghost shouting "They've invented the telephone?!", with no lead-up or follow-through, and with no relation to anything in the episode.

* ''[[The Secret Saturdays]]'' have this in every episode, to let the viewer know the current situation of the characters.

* The first season of ''[[All Grown Up]]'' had cold opens, but dropped them from the second season onwards.

* The series ''[[Olivia]]'' does a comedic one.

* ''[[Nu Pogodi]]'' uses these for every episode. Each of these ends with Wolf delivering his [[Catch Phrase]] ("Just you wait, hare!") just before the opening titles blare.

* Here's a rare theatrical example: a lot of late 1950s widescreen CinemaScope shorts from Terrytoons have a teaser before the credits. This was dropped after a while, although the final Heckle & Jeckle cartoon ''Messed Up Movie Makers'' (released in 1966) has a teaser, too.

 

{{reflist}}