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Based on a novel by Tom Willis, the made-for-TV Maneaters Are Loose! also bears a surface resemblance to the 1973 TV film Maneater. On the verge of bankruptcy, suicidal animal trainer David Birk (Steve Forrest) releases his "pets" -- two ferocious Bengal tigers -- into the woods near the small California mountain town of Whitford. It isn't long before several locals have been chewed up by the marauding felines -- and add to this a myriad of local scandals and dirty secrets (including a porno ring masterminded by the town deacon) and a climactic forest fire, and one has all the ingredients for a typical "life's a bowl of rotten cherries" movie of the week. Maneaters are Loose! debuted May 3, 1978, on CBS.