User Reviews

Who poisoned Cannon? A TOUCH OF VENOM got a lot of promotion on CBS at the time.

There's no question writer Larry Alexander "borrowed" the idea from an early MANNIX episode. Hugh Beaumont played a businessman who hired Joe to look into shady doings within his company. He gets poisoned and nearly dies.

Here, Cannon sips a cup of tea and suffers the same fate... It's horrible. His mission is to locate a defector from a terrorist group. Sondra Locke (as Tracy) returns to the series, playing the young lady in question. She is terrific, filmed not too long before teaming with Clint Eastwood. You feel sorry for Frank Cannon who's health deteriorates quite rapidly. He collapses in the street, and the cop thinks he's drunk. It's no joke.

He's up against some fiends who play for keeps.

Spot on direction by Chris Robinson, who did more acting in his long career, appearing many years on GENERAL HOSPITAL. Veteran Robert F. Simon plays a senator this time, though best remembered for roles as doctors. Oscar nominee Catherine Burns has an excellent part without too much surprise. The lady to watch. Leo Gordon is also in the cast.

Written with style, and very similar to a MOD SQUAD episode with many young supporting actors. Most of the senior actors worked with Bill Conrad at Warner Brothers/ABC. Wait for the Classic Cannon ending.

SEASON 5 EPISODE 7 Remastered color CBS/Paramount dvd box set. 7 dvds. Released 2016.

"DOA" is a dandy film noir classic starring Edmond O'Brien. In this story, a guy is poisoned and only has a short time to live, so he spends what's left of his life looking to find the killer and bring them to justice. In many ways, "A Touch of Venom" is inspired by "DOA". In "A Touch of Venom", a terrorist group poisons Frank Cannon and he's only got 72 hours to live. His only hope is to do EXACTLY what they want and they promise then to give him the antidote.

So, what, exactly, do the terrorists want? One of their members (Sondra Locke) has run away and left them--and they demand Cannon find her and bring her to them. But why is she so important that they'd care? Well, apparently they're planning on blowing up a dam....and her knowledge of this might jeopardize their plan.

While this is a good episode, it lost a point or two simply because the idea was far from original. Still, it is worth seeing...especially id you haven't seen "DOA".