There is no graphic that makes me as happy as the title screen for the HBO show Girls. After each episode's raunchy/funny opening scene, the title, which spells out G-I-R-L-S and nothing more in giant Sans Serif letters, fills the screen for about five seconds… and then the show goes on. Each week the letters are rendered in a different color across a different background, sometimes solid and sometimes patterned. For special episodes there are special graphics. For a first season show set at a buzzy, druggy party in a Bushwick garage, the letters were drawn in little light bulbs that blinked crazily like an old-fashioned Las Vegas casino marquee.
The graphics are crafted by Los Angeles design office Grand Jet'e, following Girls writer and creator Lena Dunham’s request for an elegant, Art Deco-like font. The simple forms are reminiscent of the iconic modern alphabet Helvetica, but with swelling eccentricities. The thickness of line in each letter remains consistent but takes odd turns. Look how low the return on the G dips, and how the big, proud belly of the R squashes its legs. And look at the swan-like poise of the S, perfectly balanced on its perfectly round base. The most powerful feature of the graphic is the way the letters crowd the screen so that there’s nothing else to contemplate when it appears; there’s no escape from G-I-R-L-S. Like the show’s four protagonists, its title is innocent, brassy and bright, and awfully hard to look away from.