It was the end of an era this week over on G4. Their Attack of the Show! series came to a close after more than 1,700 episodes on the air. The show’s cancellation was announced late last year as part of the plan to rebrand G4 as the Esquire Channel, focusing on programming for “metrosexual viewers.”
Back in March 2005, Attack of the Show! replaced The Screen Savers, a beloved computer and tech help show that started back when the channel was known as TechTV. Over its seven year run, the Screen Savers hosts included Leo Laporte, Patrick Norton, Kate Botello, Kevin Rose, Alex Albrecht, and Sarah Lane.
After it was announced that Attack of the Show! would be ending, producer Joshua Brentano contacted Laporte and Norton about filming a special sketch for the last episode.
Below, you can see the two discussing the finale gag on a December episode Laporte’s This Week in Tech netcast.
Below that, you can see the end of Attack of the Show! and the special finale scene — an homage of sorts to the beloved finale of the Newhart sitcom.
If we can believe the end of the clip, it appears that TechTV will be making a comeback someday in the future.
What do you think? Was this a classy way to end of Attack of the Show! on G4? Were you a fan of the series? How about The Screen Savers?
I really enjoyed techtv, g4tv not so much. I did like lil’ wil and vegas vinnie
Huge fan of Leo Laporte. My gosh, he taught me all I know re pcs..helped me get even more interested in them and loved his tech show, all of them. I would love to see him back on tv, not just oldies but new ones. He is the best, so inspiring..so easy to understand re how to just do things on computers, the net and so on. Thank you Leo..hope you and staff come back soon. For some reason, I am getting your show today on G4 or techtv..it has been a long time. Miss you and team much. Am… Read more »
You probably know this already but Leo makes a lot of shows over on Twit.tv
As a former TechTV employee, it pains me to see that our former network will most likely live on only in the memories of those of us who lived it. By that I mean, the few loyal fans and we, the ex-TechTV alumni who always knew just how sacred and special it was to just to be a part of it all…what now appears to be an obscure flicker in the snow-globe of time. Even as a lowly worker bee there, I will always honor and hold dear my memories of working at TechTV. I ate, drank, walked, slept and… Read more »
Ditto what Angus said. I used to watch 2~3 hrs of Tech TV per day and then very quickly after the forced move and firings ended up watching no more than 2~3 hrs per year … at best … and the last time I watched anything was I think back in 2010. G4 couldn’t get an audience so they bought Tech TV hoping to keep that audience and all they did, IMHO, was lose those eyeballs as well … and the new concept sounds even worse than G4!
AOTS was a daily watch for me. When Kevin Perriera was the host he would have insightful interviews, excellent tech reviews and just horrible comedy sketches. So bad they were good.
A majority of the women that did the show really added great balance as they were also smart and geeky.
I heard that the new network is going to be a GQ-like network. Lame.
Where else (aside from TWiT online) can we now find excellent news and commentary on tech and Internet rights? Nowhere.
Sad to lose a great show and a good network.
Revision 3 (Tekzilla)
twit.tv is more of what Techtv promised. Watch TWiT before you…….bye!
I Loved the Screensavers! I watched G4 for about a week after TechTV died, then quickly gave up on it.
Tech TV coming back is not what I got from the skit they did at the end. The premise is that G4TV never existed because it was all a dream and that it lived on to become a mega success in the future.