The Savior Of Television Theme Songs

I know that it works in the same way commercial radio does, repetition until it's burned into your brain, but I adore a lot of television theme songs.  You know who hates them?  Corporations.

Or television networks, I mean, one or the other or both.

Old-timey television theme songs could be so cool - some even lasted a minute! - but then the need to cut time for advertising meant that opening credits (with their themes) ate up time for the show, so the theme got shorter - like the one for How I Met Your Mother, which is all of thirteen seconds long - or, worse, became basically a title card, like the one from Lost
, which basically was just a sound with the logo floating toward you.
You know who's going to save television theme songs?  Cable.

How about the Mad Men opening credits?  Or Game Of Thrones?  (Is that one really two minutes long?!?!)  Maybe this was too long ago, because other dramas still had great openings, but there's always The Sopranos to think of.

Some of them are only seconds long, but at least they are there.  Imagine how much fun the theme for The Mindy Project would be if it weren't ten seconds long?  (But don't imagine how awful The New Girl theme would be if it were longer.  They mercifully cut it down to next-to-nothing most of the time.)

I know, some of the themes suck - the Sons Of Anarchy one is pretty unbearable.  But at least they're there.  I sometimes wish they were cool enough to do what The Wire did - five different songs for five different seasons.  All versions of a great Tom Waits song, including his original.

(Weeds did something like that, too.  Weeds was on Showtime.)

I'm just saying.