Why that HBO static intro makes you feel so excited

Kssshhhzzzztzztzzz, aaaaaaah.

HBO's iconic fade-from-static ident has become so ingrained in us that it's inextricable from the subsequent theme tune you associate it with.

What is it for you?

Boom da dum da dum da dum da (The Sopranos)?

Tun Tun Tun! Tun Tun Tun ta-tun! (Sex and the City)?

Bump bump bump daddle-da-da da-daaaaa da-da da-daaaaaa (Curb Your Enthusiasm?)

A cold open on a frosty Baltimore low rise housing project (The Wire)?

It reminds you not only of your favourite show, but the period of your life in which you were ploughing your way through it, where you were sat in that moment and what you were feeling. It is simultaneously and paradoxically makes you feel excited and calm, anxious and zen.

It's a fantastic piece of branding and works so well not just because HBO tends to land good shows (I'd struggle to describe you AMC and Netflix's idents) but because of the sense of submersion it creates.

"The HBO logo suggests that your television is switching over to a uniquely ‘HBO’ place for the duration of the programme, and hence the logo exemplifies the brand value of providing programmes not found elsewhere on television," Professor Catherine Jones of the University of London wrote in an essay titled "Tele-Branding In TVIII".

"As a representation of a television switching on at the beginning of the programme and off at the end, the HBO logo evokes the impression of an appointment to view with each programme, creating a separate and special place in which its programmes are encountered."

'Encountered' is a good way of putting it, as might 'beckoned' and 'reckoned with'.

HBO knew what it was doing with the sequence, though it never expected it to become so beloved.

"We watch like everybody else does, so we knew that it was an iconic piece," said senior executive vice president of production Bruce Richmond. "But you never set out to do iconic things. [...] This is a piece that supports that programming.

"Did we know that, ‘Oh my god we’re making something that everyone will get conditioned to hearing?’ No, but I think we knew it was Pavlovian when we realized, ‘Oh, the minute that ‘kssshhhzzzztzztzzz’ sound goes away we risk losing something.’

"People have been conditioned to know that their HBO program is literally going to start in the next second."

I really hope HBO never changes the intro as its impact will only get bigger – in the digital age it's now about the only time we see and hear static anymore.

(H/T Konbini / Playboy)