Buffy the Vampire Slayer title sequence

Title Credits ("Buffy the Vampire Slayer")
The following is a picture gallery of each season's title cards for the main actors, for Buffy the Vampire Slayer. This is to show who was credited in the main title credits for each season, and to highlight significant cast changes that occured throughout the series. The only actors to be credited for all 7 seasons in the opening credits were Sarah Michelle Gellar, Nicholas Brendon and Alyson Hannigan.

Season 1
Season 1 consisted of Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers, Nicholas Brendon as Xander Harris, Alyson Hannigan as Willow Rosenberg, Charisma Carpentar as Cordelia Chase, and Anthony Stewart Head as Rupert Giles.

Season 2
Season 2 had largely the same cast, and indeed the same title credits, with the addition of David Boreanaz as Angel/Angelus.

Season 3
Season 3, like Season 2, had the same cast carry over from the previous season with one new addition, this time being Seth Green as Oz.

Season 4
Season 4 featured the first major change in casting, with David Boreanaz and Charisma Carpenter leaving the show to work on Angel. Seth Green stays on for 8 episodes, before leaving the cast. James Marsters (Spike) joins the cast after Green's departure and replaces Green's title card in the credits. Similarly, Marc Blucas (Riley Finn) joins the main cast, and is added onto the credits on episode 11, staying for the rest of the season.

Season 5
Season 5 stayed consistent with Season 4, with the addition of Emma Caufield (Anya Jenkins) and Michelle Trachtenberg (Dawn Summers). Although Trachtenberg appeared in every episode, she was left off the title credits in the premiere episode, to keep her appearance a surprise. Also, Marc Blucas stays a regular for the first 10 episodes until his departure, after which he is removed from the title credits for the rest of the series.

Season 6
Season 6 marked a major change in the title credits, with the departure of Anthony Stewart Head (although he would appear fairly consistently as a guest star throughout the remainder of the series). Alyson Hannigan takes the "as (character name)" credit for the remainder of the series. Amber Benson (Tara) is credited in the titles for only one episode of the season, "Seeing Red", in which her character is killed.

Season 7
Season 7 was the first season to stay consistent with its title credits throughout the entire run since Season 3. All the same actors from the previous season, with the exception of Amber Benson's single episode credit, are included in the title credits.

Notable Exceptions
The Season 4 episode "Superstar" featured an altered opening credit sequence, with a good percentage of the clips featured showed the character Jonathan in various heroic situations, in tune with the episode's theme. However, despite his character appearing so frequently, the actor Danny Strong is not credited in the main title sequence. Similarly, the Season 6 episode "Once More With Feeling" has an alternate opening credit sequence, and is the only episode to have a different composition of the main theme, though again, all the same actors are credited therein.