In the Beginning (GTA San Andreas)

Updated 2 November 2026 · Fan site. Not affiliated with Rockstar Games or Take-Two Interactive.

In the Beginning is the introductory sequence of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (2004). Carl Johnson flies home from Liberty City after his mother's death, is stopped by Officer Tenpenny's C.R.A.S.H. unit, robbed, threatened with a murder charge and left in Ballas territory. The player then rides a BMX to Grove Street, where the first real mission waits.

What is In the Beginning in GTA San Andreas?

In the Beginning is the name gta.wiki uses for the opening of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. It is almost entirely a cutscene. It introduces Carl "CJ" Johnson, the corrupt police officers who will push him around for the rest of the story, and his home neighbourhood of Grove Street in Los Santos. It should not be confused with the similarly named opening of Vice City. Our San Andreas missions hub covers everything that follows.

What happens in the opening of San Andreas?

The game begins in 1992 at the Francis International terminal of Liberty City, where CJ checks in his bag after five years on the East Coast. On landing in Los Santos he remembers the call from his brother Sweet telling him their mother is dead, which is why he has come back. He takes a taxi towards Grove Street.

Close to home the taxi is pulled over by a patrol car carrying three officers of C.R.A.S.H., the anti-gang unit of the Los Santos police: Frank Tenpenny with his partners Pulaski and Hernandez. They make CJ lie on the ground, take his cash on the grounds that it must be drug money, put him in their car and send the taxi off with his suitcase still inside.

During the drive Tenpenny makes his intentions plain. He says he can pin the killing of a police officer, Ralph Pendelbury, on CJ, and that CJ will be doing what he is told from now on. gta.wiki adds that the officer was really shot by Hernandez under pressure from Tenpenny and Pulaski. The officers then push CJ out in Jefferson, a district held by the rival Ballas, and drive away.

What do you do after the cutscene?

gta.wiki stresses that the mission itself is over once the cutscene ends. CJ is left in an alley with a BMX nearby, and the game shows how to ride it and asks the player to follow the CJ marker home. Any vehicle will do. At the Johnson house on Grove Street the first true mission, Big Smoke, can be started; it introduces Big Smoke, Sweet and Ryder of the Grove Street Families.

Before that, the player is free to roam. gta.wiki notes that Los Santos and Red County are open, safehouses can be bought and stats can be trained, although clothes shops, barbers and tattoo parlours stay closed until later missions.

Is In the Beginning a real mission?

Why is the opening remembered?

The scene sets out the main conflict of the game in a few minutes: CJ is back for a funeral, broke, and already under the thumb of crooked police. Tenpenny remains the main antagonist until the finale. gta.wiki traces CJ's complaint about being left in Ballas country to a line in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, and also to a scene in Menace II Society in which police leave two young men in rival gang territory.

Other details from gta.wiki: CJ's suitcase carries a Rockstar Games logo, the airport road shown in Los Santos actually reuses the Liberty City airport, and Tenpenny has extra recorded lines after CJ is thrown out that are too distant to be heard.