On 14 March 2006, the last major Hollywood movie to be released on video was released in the UK. The film was David Cronenberg's A History of Violence (2005), and although entirely coincidental, Cronenberg and his film would provide a fitting epitaph to the format that had popularised and commercialised film as a viable form of home entertainment. Not only had video's introduction been a curiously violent and troubled affair, but Cronenberg's seminal work Videodrome (1983) had offered a visceral satirical commentary on the corrupting effects of watching violence and sadomasochism on screen – a narrative that was underpinned by the same concerns as those that had informed the video nasties moral panic. In the US, just a few months after the film's release, Diane Garrett, the features editor for Variety magazine provided a poetic obituary to the failing format entitled ‘An Obituary: VHS Dies of Loneliness at Age 30’ (Garrett 2006). It ran as follows:

While Garrett's obituary to the format was timely, it would ultimately prove to be premature, and while chains like Toys ‘R’ Us did initially carry the last of the dwindling stock, in recent years there has been a rekindled interest in the format with a steady growth in grass-roots movements that are run by an enthusiastic community of collectors.