Five Sitcoms That Couldn’t Decide What Their Theme Song Was
When it comes to sitcoms and their theme songs, there are a few different categories. First are those that debut with the perfect theme song and never change it — shows like Cheers, The Jeffersons and Welcome Back, Kotter. Then there are those that keep things fresh by using the same song, but with different arrangements, like how The Cosby Show or Frasier changed its opening theme a bit each year or how Growing Pains kept the same theme, but occasionally altered who performed it. Of course, there are also the shows that completely switch themes. Happy Days, for example, began with “Rock Around the Clock” but transitioned to the more remembered “Happy Days” theme in Season Three.
But there is one more category: The shows that never seem to make up their mind about what their theme song is. Every few seasons, a brand new song introduces the show, only to be replaced a few seasons later.
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Here are five shows that changed their theme songs more than once — and not always for the better…
Everybody Loves Raymond
Everybody Loves Raymond, an iconic multi-camera show with sharp writing and hilarious characters, somehow never found an iconic way to open the series. For the first two seasons, Ray Barone (Ray Romano) introduced the show with a pretty boring character-by-character presentation, mostly used to reassure viewers this was not a show “about the kids” and that its strange title was meant to be sarcastic — which is why Brad Garrett (who played Ray's jealous brother Robert) was the one tasked with reciting the title.
After a couple of years of over-explaining the show, they figured viewers no longer needed the disclaimer, so they switched to a very strong intro — set to Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” — in which Ray, his wife Debra (Patricia Heaton) and the kids hurriedly lock the door and pretend not to be home as his parents and brother come over to visit. This intro would be the closest the show ever got to a truly great opening. The visuals were very funny, but it’s hard to truly stand out when your theme is one of the most well-known pieces of classical music to ever exist.
For Season Six, the open switched yet again — this time to an instrumental version of the song “Drunken Sailor” played over the family playing football together. It might only be remembered for the strange shot in which Doris Roberts (who played Ray’s mom) has a blacked-out tooth. A season later, it was swapped out for “Jungle Love” by the Steve Miller Band set over funny clips from the show. While this final version was a lively way to introduce the series, using such a popular song — although not quite Beethoven level — still didn’t feel all that special.
The Drew Carey Show
The Drew Carey Show was a solidly funny ‘90s show that debuted with a jaunty little theme song featuring a caricature of Drew Carey singing the obscure ditty “Moon Over Parma” by Cleveland Polka Hall-of-Famer Bob McGuire, which referenced several Cleveland suburbs. It was unlike anything else on TV at the time and a bit of a throwback to the animated introductions of shows like I Love Lucy and Bewitched.
Despite the charm of the original, the song was replaced in Season Two with “Five O’Clock World” by The Vogues, a great ‘60s rock song that suited The Drew Carey Show’s office setting. That said, considering how well known “Five O’Clock World” already was, many people would never associate it with the show, which is what every sitcom theme should strive for — even with a pre-existing song (Curb Your Enthusiasm and The Golden Girls both used existing songs that still became iconic themes).
For its third theme song, The Drew Carey Show finally struck paydirt by using the Ian Hunter song “Cleveland Rocks” as sung by The Presidents of the United States of America. Like the “Five O’Clock World” opening, it consisted of a new sequence that mostly included clips from the show. The difference here was that “Cleveland Rocks” was actually perfect for the series.
If only they’d stopped there…
For the last two seasons, there were nine different openings used in rotation. Each was a new take on one of the three previous theme songs, and each was worse than the last.
Spin City
After getting by with simple bumper music in Season One, Spin City began Season Two with a new, fully instrumental theme song that included a bluesy harmonica component. That was then replaced by an acoustic guitar-heavy instrumental for Season Four and yet another new intro for Season Five, this time heavy on electric guitar. All three songs — or four, including Season One’s bumper music — were equally forgettable, the sitcom equivalent of white noise.
Boy Meets World
Boy Meets World used five different introductory songs — four of which were instrumental — and they pretty much all sucked. The first included an annoying, scrambling synthesizer and featured Ben Savage mugging for the camera in the cringiest way possible. Seasons Two and Three each had new instrumental openings that were more like bumpers than actual theme songs. Season Four had the best of the bunch: a decent electric guitar riff over the four main characters driving in a convertible. It wasn’t great, but at least it was semi-memorable and not annoying.
The final theme arrived in Season Five. Performed by the obscure boy band Twenty Cent Crush, the lyrics were as inane and ear-wormy as possible: “When this boy meets world, boy meeeets world…” Ironically, the theme was written by Phil Rosenthal, creator and showrunner of Everybody Loves Raymond.
For all of Raymond’s problems with finding a memorable opening, we can at least be grateful that Rosenthal never tried to solve the problem by writing his own.
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend
Whereas the rest of these shows appeared to be in search of a perfect theme without ever finding it, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend knew exactly what it was doing when it used a different theme every season. Each of the four distinctly different songs reflected where the character was at in her journey, and while none would become memorable themes, they were all funny without being annoying — which is more than can be said about Phil Rosenthal’s Boy Meets World intro.
