If you’ve picked up any of the issues of Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, then the Netflix title sequence will definitely delight you.
Although it’s not hewing exactly to the comic series that inspired it, Chilling Adventures of Sabrina also isn’t going full Riverdale and only alluding to the comics when it needs a weird dream sequence. There’s no better evidence for this than the titles for the show, which call in horror’s old buddy, the theremin, in accompaniment to what’s pretty clearly some of the covers for the comic interspersed with new art in the same style.
(At least it sounds like a theremin. It might not be an actual theremin. We’re writers here, not musical instrument experts.)
Check them out below:
For example, the image where half of Sabrina’s face is replaced by a skull comes from issue 8 of the comic. The final image, where the title also arrives, is actually from issue 2 and later covered the first collected volume. Sabrina’s eyes appearing over Kiernan Shipka’s name is a nod to issue 3. Finally, Sabrina in the house (and the brief shot of her standing ahead of that) are from issues 1 and 5, respectively. Of course, the brief moment of a freckled Sabrina alludes to her classic appearance and not her horror iteration.
The really impressive bit here, though, is that the new art created for the titles — including a rendering of Shipka in character as well as the other members of the cast — fits in perfectly with Robert Hack’s original work. One has to wonder if he contributed to or drew all of the new work on the opening titles for the series. Although Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa did give a shout-out to the artist on Twitter, even he doesn’t specify if Hack did the new stuff, either.
Perhaps the best takeaway from this, though, is another confirmation that this show is going full horror (appropriate for a Netflix and Chills series) with a lot of nods to what’s come before in terms of musical choices and even the fonts used, all of which look more than a little ’60s in inspiration. Fortunately, that’s when the original comics as well as the series itself seem to be set.
We can’t wait for Oct. 26. Stay tuned to Culturess for all the latest.