Todd Anderson (Josh Hamilton), a salesman for a Seattle novelty products company, learns he has to travel to India when his department is outsourced. Todd is not happy but when his boss Dave informs him that quitting would mean losing his stock options, he goes to train his Indian replacement Puro (Asif Basra). When he arrives, Todd is frustrated with everything in the country where people call him "Mr. Toad". He has difficulty making the call center employees of Gharapuri understand what their American customers expect. He feels that he is never going to get the Minutes-per-Incident (MPI) under six minutes and so will never get to return to the United States. Todd experiences the festival of Holi and with it, a sense of calm. At the call center the MPI slowly improves. He recognizes a leader in an employee Asha (Ayesha Dharker) and offers her the job of assisting Puro when Todd leaves. Todd tries to improve the workplace experience for the employees; when they tell him they would like some of the products they are selling, he decides to implement a rewards program and asks Dave for a shipment. Dave initially refuses, but when Todd manages to convince him that he is opening the products to a market of a billion people, Dave agrees to ship them overnight. Asha realizes that the shipment has gone to another Gharapuri, an island. They both reach the island and get the shipment, but the boat that was supposed to ferry them back catches fire. With no resort, they check into a hotel, where Asha accuses Todd of being frivolous with Kali. They argue but end up having sex. Upon their return Asha informs Todd that she has been engaged to a family friend named Ashok since she was four years old. She says their affair could be only a "Holiday in Goa ", a term for a short time spent with a lover before marrying another. Todd is confused but accepts the situation. The call center MPI is nearing six when Dave calls to let Todd know that he needs to be picked up from the railway station. When Dave arrives, the power shuts down due to flooding, but the employees manage to set up their workstations on the roof and resume business. Dave is impressed, but when the employees go to the local bar to celebrate, Dave informs Todd the business is being shifted to China. Todd informs the employees they have been fired, and Dave is erasing all data off their hard disks. Asha tells Todd that she has been writing a novel on her work computer called Holiday in Goa that needs to be saved. Todd gets the hint and they leave for Gaurav's (another employee's) house, where they spend time together. Todd refuses to go to China but suggests Puro as a replacement. Puro is seen leaving for China with his new wife. Upon his return to the United States, Todd calls his mother to see about spending more time with her, a lesson he learned from Puro's aunt. Right afterwards, he gets a phone call from Asha just as the screen turns black and the end credits roll.

Recently unemployed accountant Morgan Sullivan is bored with his suburban life. Pressured by his wife to take a job with her father's company, he instead pursues a position in corporate espionage. Digicorp's Head of Security, Finster, inducts Morgan and assigns him a new identity. As Jack Thursby, he is sent to conventions to secretly record presentations and transmit them to headquarters. Sullivan is soon haunted by recurring nightmares and neck pain. At a bar, Morgan meets Rita Foster from a competing corporation, who offers him pills and tells him not to transmit at the next convention. Afterward, Morgan is surprised when Digicorp confirms the receipt of his non-existent transmission. He takes the pills Rita gave him and his nightmares and pains stop. Confused and intrigued by Rita, he arranges to meet with her again. She tells him about Digicorp's deception and offers him an antidote – a green liquid in a large syringe. Morgan hesitantly accepts. She warns him that no matter what happens at the next convention he must not react. Morgan discovers that all the convention attendees believe themselves to be Digicorp spies. While they are drugged from the served drinks, plastic-clad scientists probe, inject and brainwash them. Individual headsets reinforce their new identities, preparing them to be used and then disposed of. Morgan manages to convince Digicorp that he believes his new identity. He is then recruited by Sunway Systems, a rival of Digicorp. Sunway's Head of Security, Callaway, encourages Morgan to act as a double agent, feeding corrupted data to Digicorp. Morgan calls Rita, who warns him that Sunway is equally ruthless, and that he is in fact being used by Rita's boss, Sebastian Rooks. Morgan manages to steal the required information from Sunway Systems' vault, escaping with Rita's help. Rita ultimately takes him to meet Rooks. When she temporarily leaves the room, a nervous Morgan calls Finster, and becomes even more distressed. He accidentally shoots Rita, who encourages him to ignore her and meet Rooks in the room next door. Morgan finds the room filled with objects which appear to be personal to him, including a photograph of him and Rita together. Realising that he is apparently Rooks, he turns to Rita in disbelief. Before Rita can convince him, the apartment is invaded by armed men. Rita and Morgan escape to the roof of the skyscraper as the security teams of Digicorp and Sunway meet, led by Finster and Callaway. After a short Mexican standoff both sides realise they are after the same person, Sebastian Rooks, and rush to the roof, where they find Morgan and Rita in a helicopter. Rita cannot fly it, but, having designed it himself, Sebastian can after Rita encourages him to remember his past self, connecting through his love for her. He lifts off amid gunfire from the security teams. Finster and Callaway comment as the couple seem to have escaped: Looking up, they see the helicopter hovering and realise, too late, the true identity of Morgan Sullivan. Sebastian triggers a bomb, causing the whole roof to explode. On a boat in the South Pacific Ocean, Sebastian reveals the content of the stolen disc to Rita. Marked " terminate with extreme prejudice ", it is the last copy of Rita's identity (after the one in the vault was destroyed). Sebastian throws the disc into the sea and says, "Now there's no copy at all."

Stanford University dropout Jerry Shaw learns that his identical twin brother Ethan, an officer in the U.S. Air Force, has been killed in a car crash. Following the funeral, he is surprised to find a large sum of money in his bank account and his apartment filled with firearms and bomb-making materials. Jerry receives a phone call from a woman who warns that the FBI is about to arrest him and he needs to run. Disbelieving the voice, he is caught by the FBI and interrogated by Supervising Agent Tom Morgan. While Morgan confers with Air Force OSI Special Agent Zoe Perez, the woman on the phone arranges for Jerry's escape and directs him to Rachel Holloman, a single mother. The woman on the phone is coercing Rachel by threatening her son Sam, who is aboard the Capitol Limited en route to the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., with his school band. The woman on the phone helps the two avoid law enforcement by controlling networked devices including traffic lights, mobile phones, automated cranes, and even power lines. Meanwhile, the caller redirects a crystalline explosive to a gemcutter, who cuts it and fixes it into a necklace. Another man steals Sam's trumpet in Chicago and fits the crystal's sonic trigger into the tubing before forwarding it to Sam in Washington. Agent Perez is summoned by Secretary of Defense George Callister to be read into Ethan's job at the Pentagon. Ethan monitored the Department of Defense 's top-secret intelligence-gathering supercomputer, the Autonomous Reconnaissance Intelligence Integration Analyst (ARIIA; / ɑːr iː ə /). Callister leaves Pérez with Major William Bowman and ARIIA to investigate Ethan Shaw's death. Simultaneously, Rachel and Jerry learn that the woman on the phone is actually ARIIA, and that she has "activated" them according to the Constitution 's authorization to recruit civilians for the national defense. Perez and Bowman find evidence that Ethan Shaw hid a microchip in ARIIA's chamber and left to brief Callister. Afterwards, ARIIA smuggles Jerry and Rachel into her observation theater under the Pentagon. Both groups learn that after ARIIA's recommendation was ignored, a botched operation in Balochistan resulted in the deaths of U.S. citizens. Therefore, ARIIA concluded that the current executive branch must be removed to prevent more bloodshed, acting on behalf of " We the People ". It cites the Declaration of Independence ("whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it"). Belatedly, Jerry learns he has been brought to circumvent biometric locks placed by his twin that prevent ARIIA from activating Operation Guillotine, a military simulation of maintaining government after the loss of all presidential successors. ARIIA had caused Ethan's accident in order to get rid of him. As Secretary Callister agreed with ARIIA's abort recommendation regarding Balochistan, he is to be the designated survivor and new president after the crystal detonates at the State of the Union (SOTU). Another of ARIIA's agents extracts Rachel from the Pentagon and gives her a dress and the explosive necklace to wear to the SOTU. Sam's school band has also been redirected to the United States Capitol to play for the president, bringing the trigger in Sam's trumpet and the explosive together. Jerry is recaptured by Agent Morgan, who has become convinced of Jerry's innocence. Before sacrificing himself to stop an armed MQ-9 Reaper sent by ARIIA, Morgan gives Jerry his weapon and ID with which to gain entrance to the Capitol. Arriving in the House Chamber, Jerry fires the handgun in the air to disrupt the concert before being shot and wounded by the Secret Service. At the same time, Perez and Bowman destroy ARIIA. Sometime later, Callister reports that ARIIA has been decommissioned and recommends against building another; the Shaw twins, Perez, and Morgan receive awards for their actions; and Jerry attends Sam's birthday party, earning Rachel's gratitude and a kiss.

In the distant future, Duke Leto Atreides is assigned by the Padishah Emperor Shaddam IV to replace Baron Vladimir Harkonnen as the fiefholder of Arrakis, a harsh desert planet and the sole source of " spice ", a valuable psychotropic substance that imparts heightened vitality and awareness. Spice is also key to interstellar travel, giving Spacing Guild Navigators the ability to guide starships to traverse space instantaneously and safely. Emperor Shaddam, fearful of Leto's rising power, plots for House Harkonnen to retake Arrakis, secretly aided by his Sardaukar troops, and destroy House Atreides. Leto is suspicious of the Emperor but weighs the risks against the power of controlling Arrakis and making an alliance with its mysterious natives, the Fremen. Leto's concubine, Lady Jessica, is an acolyte of the Bene Gesserit —an exclusive sisterhood whose members possess advanced physical and mental abilities. As part of a centuries-long breeding program, they instructed her to bear a daughter whose son would become the Kwisatz Haderach—a Bene Gesserit and messianic superbeing with the prescience necessary to guide humanity to a better future. Jessica disobeyed and bore a son, Paul, who is trained by Leto's aides, Duncan Idaho, Gurney Halleck, the Suk doctor Wellington Yueh, and the Mentat Thufir Hawat, and by Jessica in Bene Gesserit disciplines. Paul confides in Jessica and Duncan about troubling visions of the future. The Reverend Mother and Imperial Truthsayer Gaius Helen Mohiam subjects Paul to a deadly gom jabbar test to assess his humanity and impulse control, which he passes. House Atreides arrives at Arrakeen, the principal stronghold on Arrakis. Duncan's advance party has made contact with the Fremen. The natives revere Paul and Jessica, which she explains is due to the Bene Gesserit sowing beliefs on Arrakis centuries earlier. An attempt to assassinate Paul with a hunter-seeker fails. At a secret meeting on the Harkonnen planet Giedi Prime, Mohiam insists Baron Harkonnen spare Paul and Jessica in his coup, to which he duplicitously agrees. Leto meets and negotiates with Fremen chieftain Stilgar and meets the Imperial Judge of the Change, Dr. Liet Kynes, a planetologist who lives among the Fremen. Kynes briefs them on the dangers of spice harvesting, and the giant sandworms that travel under the desert and render unwise the use of protective shields. During a flight, they rescue a stranded spice-harvesting crew from a sandworm, and Paul's exposure to the spice triggers intense premonitions. Yueh betrays the Atreides and disables Arrakeen's shields, allowing the Harkonnens and Sardaukar to invade. He incapacitates Leto, planning to exchange him for his wife, the Baron's prisoner. Yueh replaces one of Leto's teeth with a poison gas capsule with which the Duke can assassinate the Baron. After the Baron double-crosses and kills Yueh, Leto releases the gas, killing himself and the Baron's Mentat, Piter De Vries, but the Baron survives. Though the Baron has arranged to have Paul and Jessica dropped deep in the desert to die, a compassionate Yueh has left them with a fremkit with survival supplies. Jessica uses the Voice technique to overpower and kill their captors. Overnighting in the desert, Paul—surrounded by spice—has visions of a bloody holy war fought across the universe in his name. After conquering Arrakis, Baron Harkonnen appoints his nephew Rabban to oversee the planet, and orders him to restart spice production to recoup the invasion's cost. Meanwhile, Duncan and Kynes find Jessica and Paul, who discloses his plan to marry one of Emperor Shaddam's daughters to avert a potential civil war arising from the Emperor's betrayal. They are discovered by Sardaukar soldiers armed with a lasgun, and Duncan sacrifices himself, enabling Paul and Jessica's escape. Kynes also tries to escape but is caught and mortally wounded, and lures a sandworm to her location to devour herself and the Sardaukar. Deep in the desert, Paul and Jessica encounter Stilgar's tribe, including Chani, the young woman from Paul's visions. When Stilgar commands lenience towards them, Fremen warrior Jamis challenges his authority, and challenges them to a ritual duel to the death; Paul accepts and wins. Contrary to Jessica's wishes, Paul joins the Fremen, determined to fulfill his father's goal of bringing peace to Arrakis.

An American and British research team from the firm Subzero are drilling samples atop Korvatunturi (Ear Fell) in the Finnish region of Lapland. Team leader Riley believes that the fell is an ancient burial mound built by the Sámi and plans to plunder it. Two local boys, Juuso and Pietari, spy on the team at work and learn their plans. Pietari tells Juuso that Santa Claus is real, tortures bad children, and is watching them, as the team begins to excavate the fell using explosives. Local reindeer hunters find hundreds of reindeer carcasses that they believe were killed by wolves, and head to Korvatunturi to demand reparations from the Subzero company, whom they believe are responsible for the reindeer. Instead, they find a deep pit and no trace of the Subzero personnel. On the morning of Christmas Eve, a wolf trap built by Pietari's father, Rauno, has killed a skinny, naked old man. Pietari and Rauno learn that potato sacks, heaters, and a hair dryer have gone missing from houses in the area. Pietari finds a straw effigy in Juuso's bed and no sign of Juuso. Piiparinen, a neighbor, and Rauno bring the corpse into Rauno's reindeer slaughterhouse but discover the skinny old man is still alive. Piiparinen, Rauno, and Aimo, another colleague, discuss their plans and tie the old man up, while Pietari calls around and finds that all his friends have gone missing. Piiparinen has his ear bitten off by the old man, and Pietari asks his father to spank him for his bad deeds, as he fears that sneaking up to the Fell makes him a bad boy and he will be taken by Santa. Rauno's group dresses the old man in Piiparinen's Santa costume and message Subzero that they want to sell them Santa to compensate for the loss of income from the reindeer. They take the old man to an airbase in a cage, where they meet Riley arriving by helicopter. Riley warns that the caged man is not Santa but one of his elves, and that they must be quiet and smile. Many elves appear and kill Riley and his pilot. The men and Pietari run to a hangar where they find a horned being - Santa - in an enormous block of ice being melted by the missing heaters. Next to the ice are sacks containing the stolen crying children, including Juuso. Pietari takes control and hatches a plan. Piiparinen comes out of the hangar and distracts the elves by throwing gingerbread at them to reach the helicopter. Rauno and Aimo make a net, which Pietari climbs on as the helicopter picks up the sacks of children to lure the elves to the reindeer pen. The other men place explosives all over Santa Claus' ice block and cut off his horns before leaving. Pietari jumps off the helicopter net into the reindeer pen to open the gate as the horde of elves runs toward him. Rauno and Aimo detonate the explosives, killing Santa and causing the elves to stop in the reindeer pen before they can hurt Pietari. Afterwards, the group of men and Pietari train the 198 captured elves to become mall Santas and export them to cities around the world.

Medical student Nelson Wright convinces classmates Joe Hurley, David Labraccio, Rachel Manus, and Randy Steckle to help him discover what lies beyond death. Nelson flatlines for one minute before his classmates resuscitate him. While "dead", he sees a boy he bullied as a child, Billy Mahoney. He merely tells his friends that he cannot describe what he saw, but something is there. The others follow Nelson's feat. Joe flatlines next and experiences an erotic sequence linked to his promiscuous lifestyle. After arguing with Rachel and out-bidding her of the length of time that they are willing to remain “dead”, David is third to flatline on Halloween and sees a girl, Winnie Hicks, whom he bullied in grade school. The three men later start to experience hallucinations related to their visions. Nelson gets physically assaulted by Billy Mahoney twice. Joe, engaged to be married, is haunted by the women that he secretly videotaped during his sexual dalliances, who taunt him with the same false promises he used on them. On a train, David is confronted by the 8-year-old Winnie, who taunts him the way he taunted her. Rachel decides to flatline next. David rushes in, intending to stop the others from giving her their same fate, but arrives too late. Rachel nearly dies when the power goes out and the men cannot shock her with defibrillator paddles. She survives, but she too is haunted by the memory of her father dying by suicide when she was young. The three men reveal their harrowing experiences to one another, and David decides to put a stop to his visions. Meanwhile, Joe's fiancée, Anne, comes to his apartment and, having discovered his videos, ends their relationship. Joe's visions cease after Anne leaves him. David goes to visit a now adult Winnie and apologizes. She accepts his apology and thanks him, who feels a weight lifted off his shoulders. David then finds Nelson, who accompanied him to visit Winnie, beating himself with an axe. In Nelson's mind, Billy is again attempting to beat him to death. David stops him, and they return to town, where Rachel confronts Nelson about withholding the supernatural nature of the experiments from the rest of them, then storms off. David later instructs Joe and Randy to help Nelson find Billy. Having an idea of what Rachel has experienced, David offers to let her stay with him and they fall asleep together. Meanwhile, Nelson takes Randy and Joe to a graveyard. He killed Billy as a kid by throwing rocks until he fell out of a tree. They try to convince Nelson that what he did was accidental, but he does not listen. They are eventually stranded when Nelson storms off in Joe's Mustang. David leaves Rachel to rescue Joe and Randy at the cemetery. While alone, she goes to the bathroom and finds her father. He apologizes to Rachel, whose guilt over his death is lifted after he reveals he was addicted to morphine and his suicide was related to post-traumatic stress disorder resulting from his tour in Vietnam. Nelson calls David's house, and when Rachel answers he tells her he needs to flatline again to make amends. He apologizes for involving her and their friends in his reckless plan. The three men realize what he intends and race to stop Nelson, who has been dead for nine minutes when they arrive. Together with Rachel, the four friends work to save him. In the afterlife, the boy Nelson is in the tree being stoned by Billy from the ground and dies from the subsequent fall. When almost all his friends are about to give up on reviving Nelson, Billy forgives him. David gives Nelson one last shock, which brings him back.

William Foster is stuck in Los Angeles traffic on a hot day. After his air conditioning fails, he abandons his car and begins walking, carrying his briefcase. At a convenience store, the Korean owner refuses to give change for a telephone call. Foster becomes agitated over the high prices. The owner grabs a baseball bat and demands that Foster leave. Foster takes the bat and destroys several merchandise displays before paying for a drink and leaving. Later, while resting on a hill, he is harassed by two Mexican gang members, who threaten him with a knife and demand his briefcase. Foster attacks them with the bat and takes their knife. The gang members, now in a car with two associates, find Foster using a payphone. They open fire, killing four bystanders, but not Foster. The driver crashes. Foster picks up a weapon they had, shoots the surviving gang member in the leg, and then leaves with their bag of weapons. Foster encounters a panhandler who harasses him for change. Foster gives him the briefcase, which only contains his lunch. At a fast-food restaurant, Foster attempts to order breakfast, but is told they have switched to the lunch menu. After an argument with the manager, Foster pulls a gun and fires into the ceiling accidentally. After trying to reassure the frightened employees and customers, he orders lunch, but is annoyed when the burger looks nothing like the one pictured. He leaves and tries to place a call from a phone booth, then shoots the booth to pieces after being hassled by someone who was waiting to use the phone. After Foster calls "home" again and states his intention to attend his daughter's birthday party, his ex-wife Beth notifies the police as she has a restraining order against him. Sergeant Martin Prendergast, who is on his last day of duty (having been coaxed into retirement by his wife), insists on investigating the events. Interviews with witnesses lead Prendergast to suspect that the same person is responsible for all of them. Foster's vanity license plate, which read "D-FENS", proves to be an important lead, because Prendergast remembers being in the same traffic jam as Foster. Prendergast and his partner, Detective Sandra Torres, visit Foster's mother, who is surprised to learn that he lost his job. They realize Foster is heading toward his former family's home in Venice and rush to intercept him. Foster passes a bank where a black man is protesting after being rejected for a loan. The man exchanges a glance with Foster and says, "Don't forget me," as police escort him away. Foster stops at a military surplus store to buy boots. The owner, a homophobic Neo-Nazi, diverts Torres when she comes in. After Torres leaves, the owner offers Foster a rocket launcher and congratulates him for the restaurant shooting incident. When Foster expresses distaste for the store owner's bigotry, the man becomes violent and attempts to turn him over to the police, but Foster stabs him then shoots him dead. Foster changes into tactical clothes, takes the rocket launcher, and leaves. Foster encounters a road repair crew who are not working and accuses them of doing unnecessary repairs to justify their budget. He pulls out the rocket launcher but struggles to use it, until a boy explains how it works. Foster accidentally fires the launcher, blowing up the construction site. By the time Foster reaches Beth's house, she has already fled with their daughter. He realizes that they may have gone to the nearby Venice Pier, but Prendergast and Torres arrive before he can pursue them. Foster shoots Torres, injuring her, and flees with Prendergast in pursuit. At the pier, Foster confronts his ex-wife and daughter. Adele is happy to see him, but Beth wants him to leave. Prendergast arrives and distracts Foster long enough for Beth to throw his gun into the ocean. Prendergast aims his gun at Foster and urges him to surrender, acknowledging his complaints about social inequalities but not accepting them as an excuse for his rampage. With nothing left for him, Foster tricks Prendergast into killing him. Having asserted himself, Prendergast decides to hold off retirement.

In 1998, Stephen Glass is an associate editor at The New Republic. The youngest of the magazine's staff, he is popular with his colleagues for his entertaining stories. He serves under editor Michael Kelly, who holds loyalty with the writers. However, conflict between Kelly and publisher Marty Peretz results in Peretz firing Kelly. Reporter Charles Lane is promoted by Peretz to replace Kelly, despite being disliked by the staff due to his cold reputation. Glass writes a story entitled "Hack Heaven" that details a teenage hacker being hired by a software firm he infiltrated. The story reaches Forbes Digital Tool, where reporter Adam Penenberg finds no corroborating evidence. When contacted by Penenberg about being unable to reach Glass's sources, Glass provides a number with a Palo Alto area code for the firm that, when dialed, goes immediately to voicemail. Lane later receives a brief call from an individual who identifies himself as the firm's chair. Glass and Lane also partake in a conference call with the Forbes staff, further eroding the story's credibility and prompting Glass to claim his sources tricked him. Lane, looking to protect Glass from the Forbes staff, has Glass take him to the convention center where the story took place but learns it was closed during the events Glass wrote about. He also discovers that the restaurant where the hackers had dinner afterwards closes in the mid-afternoon. With the story contradicted by this information, Glass tells Lane he only relied on sources for information and falsified his first-hand experiences to improve the story. Lane decides to suspend Glass instead of firing him due to his popularity, but upon discovering that Glass's brother lives in Palo Alto, he realizes that Glass had his brother pose as the firm's chair. After confronting Glass with this knowledge, Lane re-reads Glass's previous stories and realizes that several were falsified. With his deception exposed, Glass is fired by Lane. Lane receives support from The New Republic staff for bringing Glass's deception to light, while the magazine's attorney questions Glass over which stories of his were fabricated. Closing titles reveal that Penenberg's article on Glass was hailed as a breakthrough for internet journalism, The New Republic determined that 27 of Glass's 41 stories were either partially or completely fabricated, Kelly was killed while covering the Iraq War, Glass earned a Juris Doctor degree from Georgetown and wrote a novel fictionalizing his own life called "The Fabulist", and Lane joined The Washington Post.

FBI Special Agent Sean Archer survives an assassination attempt by Castor Troy, a terrorist-for-hire, but the bullet kills his son Michael. Archer then engages in an extended vendetta against Troy. It culminates, six years later, in his team ambushing Troy, who is with his younger brother and accomplice, Pollux, on a remote desert airstrip. Castor goads Archer by saying he knows of a bomb that is located somewhere in Los Angeles and is set to explode in a few days. Before Archer can learn more, Castor is knocked unconscious and falls into a coma. Pollux, in custody, affirms that the bomb is real but refuses to reveal its location. In secret, Archer reluctantly undergoes a highly experimental face transplant procedure by Dr. Malcolm Walsh to take on Castor's face, voice, and appearance. Archer-as-Castor is taken to the same high-security prison where Pollux is being held in order to obtain information on the bomb's location. Castor unexpectedly awakens from his coma and discovers that his face is missing. He calls his gang, and they force Dr. Walsh to transplant Archer's face onto him. Meanwhile, Archer successfully learns the bomb's location from Pollux before being informed that he has a visitor. Anticipating a reunion with his colleagues and a return to his normal life, Archer instead finds Castor wearing his face. Upon revealing he has murdered everyone else who knows about the face transplant, Castor gleefully informs Archer that he looks forward to ruining his FBI career and ravishing his wife. Pollux is freed when he willingly tells Castor-as-Archer of the bomb's location, and Castor subsequently disarms the bomb. Castor earns admiration from the FBI office and becomes close to Archer's wife Eve and daughter Jamie, whom Archer had been neglecting while seeking to avenge the death of his son. Back at the prison, Archer-as-Castor escapes after staging a riot and retreats to Castor's headquarters. There, he meets Sasha, the sister of Castor's primary drug kingpin Dietrich Hassler, and her son Adam, who reminds him of Michael. Archer discovers that Adam is Castor's son. Castor learns of Archer's escape and hastily assembles a team to raid his headquarters. The raid turns into a bloodbath, and many FBI agents and several members of Castor's gang, including Dietrich and Pollux, are killed. Archer-as-Castor, Sasha, and Adam all manage to escape. In the aftermath of the raid, Archer's supervisor, Director Victor Lazarro, angrily lambasts Castor-as-Archer for the unnecessary bloodshed he caused. Castor, still furious over Pollux's death, murders Lazarro and is subsequently promoted to acting director in his place. Meanwhile, after taking Sasha and Adam to a safe location, Archer-as-Castor approaches Eve and convinces her to test Castor-as-Archer's blood to confirm his identity. After testing the blood and being convinced that the man wearing her husband's face is in fact an imposter, Eve tells Archer that Castor will be vulnerable at Lazarro's funeral. At the ceremony, Castor-as-Archer has taken Eve hostage. Sasha arrives, and a gunfight ensues; Sasha manages to save Eve after taking a bullet. Archer-as-Castor promises a dying Sasha that he will take care of Adam and raise him away from criminal life. Castor briefly takes Jamie hostage, but she escapes by stabbing him with the butterfly knife that he lent her earlier for self-defense. Following the confrontation at the church, Castor reaches the docks and commandeers a speedboat while Archer commandeers one of his own to continue the pursuit. The chase ends when Archer forces Castor to the shore in a collision. With their boats grounded, the two proceed to fight to the death. Upon gaining the upper hand in the struggle, Archer manages to corner Castor at gunpoint with a speargun, only for the latter to prevent him from shooting by grabbing the firing mechanism. While admitting defeat, Castor tries to disfigure his face so that Archer will be doomed to wear the former's face forever. Before he can finish, Archer kicks Castor in the groin, causing him to lose his grip on the gun and allowing Archer to finally kill him. Backup agents arrive and address Archer-as-Castor by his true name, having been convinced by Eve of Archer's identity. After the face transplant surgery is reversed, Archer returns home. He and Eve adopt Adam, keeping Archer's promise to Sasha.

In 1971, Raoul Duke and Dr. Gonzo speed across the Mojave Desert. Duke, under the influence of mescaline, complains of a swarm of giant bats, and inventories their drug stash. They pick up a young hitchhiker and explain their mission: Duke has been assigned by a magazine to cover the Mint 400 motorcycle race in Las Vegas. They bought excessive drugs for the trip, and rented a red Chevrolet Impala convertible. The hitchhiker flees on foot at their behavior. Trying to reach Vegas before the hitchhiker can go to the police, Gonzo gives Duke part of a sheet of "Sunshine Acid" (ultra-purified LSD), then informs him that there is little chance of making it before the drug kicks in. By the time they reach the strip, Duke is in the full throes of his trip and barely makes it through the hotel check-in, hallucinating that the clerk is a moray eel and that his fellow bar patrons are draconian lizards. The next day, Duke arrives at the race and heads out with his photographer, Lacerda. Duke becomes irrational and believes that they are in the middle of a battlefield, so he fires Lacerda and returns to the hotel. After consuming more mescaline, as well as huffing diethyl ether, Duke and Gonzo arrive at the Bazooko Circus casino but leave shortly afterwards, the chaotic atmosphere frightening Gonzo. Back in the hotel room, Duke leaves Gonzo unattended, and tries his luck at Big Six. When Duke returns he finds that Gonzo, high on LSD, has trashed the room, and is in the bathtub clothed, attempting to pull the tape player in with him as he wants to hear the song better. He pleads with Duke to throw the machine into the water when the song " White Rabbit " peaks. Duke agrees, but instead throws a grapefruit at Gonzo's head before running outside and locking Gonzo in the bathroom. Duke attempts to type his reminiscences on hippie culture, and flashes back to San Francisco, 1965, where a hippie licks spilled LSD off his sleeve. The next morning, Duke awakens to an exorbitant room service bill and no sign of Gonzo (who has returned to Los Angeles while Duke slept), and attempts to leave town. As he nears Baker, California, a patrolman stops him for speeding, and advises him to sleep at a nearby rest stop. Duke instead heads to a payphone and calls Gonzo, learning that he has a suite in his name at the Flamingo Las Vegas so he can cover a district attorney's convention on narcotics. Duke checks into his suite, only to be met by an LSD-tripping Gonzo and a young girl called Lucy, who Gonzo explains has come to Las Vegas to meet Barbra Streisand, and that this was her first LSD trip. Duke convinces Gonzo to ditch Lucy in another hotel before her trip wears off. Gonzo accompanies Duke to the convention, and the pair discreetly snort cocaine as the guest speaker delivers a comically out-of-touch speech about "marijuana addicts" before showing a brief film. Unable to take it, Duke and Gonzo flee back to their room, only to discover that Lucy has called. Their trips mostly over, Gonzo deals with Lucy over the phone (pretending that he is being savagely beaten by thugs) as Duke attempts to mellow out by trying some of Gonzo's stash of adrenochrome. Duke has a bad reaction to the drugs and is reduced to an incoherent mess before he blacks out. After an unspecified amount of time passes, Duke wakes up to a complete ruin of the once pristine suite. After discovering his tape recorder, he attempts to remember what has happened. As he listens, he has brief memories of the general mayhem that has taken place, including Gonzo threatening a waitress at a diner, himself convincing a distraught cleaning woman that they are police officers investigating a drug ring, and attempting to buy an orangutan. Duke drops Gonzo off at the airport, driving right up to the airplane, before returning to the hotel one last time to finish his article. He then speeds back to Los Angeles.

Miles Monroe is a jazz musician and owner of the Happy Carrot health-food store in New York City's Greenwich Village. He walks into the hospital in 1973 for a routine ulcer operation that goes wrong, leaving him relegated to 200 years of anonymous cryopreservation. Two scientists in 2173 illegally revive him. They are members of an underground rebellion at odds with the police state the United States had become after the massive destruction caused when "a man named Albert Shanker got a hold of a nuclear warhead." It is ostensibly ruled by a dictator known only as "The Leader", and about to implement a secret plan known as the "Aries Project". The rebels hope to use Miles as a spy to infiltrate and derail it, as he is the only member of the dystopian society without a known biometric identity. The authorities grow suspicious and arrive in force to question the scientists, who are arrested and taken to have their brains "electronically simplified". Miles escapes by disguising himself as a robot, which is then randomly delivered to work in the home of idle socialite Luna Schlosser. When Luna decides to have her new butler's rather unattractive head replaced with something more "aesthetically pleasing", Miles reveals his true identity. Spooked at his disclosure and unsympathetic to the rebels, she threatens to turn him in to the authorities. In response, Miles kidnaps her and goes on the run, searching for the Aries Project. After much bickering, Miles and Luna fall in love. Miles is captured and brainwashed into becoming a complacent member of society, while Luna escapes and joins the rebellion. The rebels kidnap Miles and perform successful reverse-brainwashing. Miles falls into the routine of rebel life, but grows jealous when he catches Luna kissing the handsome, hunky rebel leader, Erno Windt, and she announces that she has come to believe in free love. Miles tries to win Luna back. Eventually, he and Luna infiltrate the Aries Project, wherein they quickly learn that the national Leader had been killed by a rebel bomb ten months previously. All that survives is his nose. Miles and Luna disguise themselves as doctors, resulting in a case of mistaken identity, causing them to be placed in charge of cloning the Leader from his sole remaining part. Miles steals the nose and deadends the government's cloning scheme by dropping the nose in the path of a road roller. The pair escape, and later debate their future together. Miles tells Luna that Erno will inevitably become as corrupt as the Leader, as that is how all revolutions end up. Miles and Luna confess their love for one another, but she claims that science has proven men and women cannot have meaningful relationships due to chemical incompatibilities. Miles dismisses this theory, declaring that he does not believe in science. Luna then points out that he does not believe in God or political systems either, and asks if there is anything he does believe in. He responds, "Sex and death—two things that come once in a lifetime. But at least after death, you're not nauseous." The two embrace and kiss.

In the first years of the 21st century a third World War broke out. Those of us who survived knew mankind could never survive a fourth; that our own volatile natures could simply no longer be risked. So we have created a new arm of the law – The Grammaton Cleric, whose sole task is to seek out and eradicate the true source of man's inhumanity to man; his ability to feel. Established by survivors of World War III, the totalitarian city-state of Libria blames human emotion as the root of all conflicts. It strictly outlaws all activities or objects that stimulate emotion, with violators labeled Sense Offenders and sentenced to death. The population has to take a daily injection of the emotion-suppressing drug called Prozium II. Libria is governed by the Tetragrammaton Council, led by "Father", who communicates propaganda through giant video screens. The police force is led by the Grammaton Clerics, elite fighters trained in the art of gun kata. Clerics frequently raid homes to search for and destroy illegal materials – art, literature and music – executing violators on the spot. A resistance movement, known as the "Underground", emerges to topple Father and the Tetragrammaton Council. In 2072, John Preston is a high-ranking Cleric whose wife, Viviana, was executed as a Sense Offender, leaving him as a single parent of two. Following a raid, Preston's partner Errol Partridge saves a book of poems by W. B. Yeats instead of turning it in for incineration. He follows Partridge to the Nether – a term for regions outside the city – and finds him reading the book. Seeing Preston, Partridge claims he gladly pays the price of feeling emotion. Preston executes Partridge. Preston accidentally breaks his last vial of Prozium and is unable to refill them before the next raid. Brief episodes of emotion set in evoking memories, stirring feelings, and making him more aware of his surroundings. He intentionally skips additional doses of Prozium, hiding them behind his bathroom mirror. Partridge is replaced with an ambitious, career-conscious Brandt, who admires Preston's work as a Cleric. On a raid, they arrest Sense Offender Mary O'Brien. Preston prevents Brandt from executing O'Brien, saying she should be interrogated. Preston feels remorse for killing Partridge, develops an emotional relationship with O'Brien, and seeks atonement. He uncovers clues that lead to meeting Jurgen, the Underground leader. Jurgen plans to disrupt Prozium production to spark an uprising and convinces Preston that Father must be assassinated. Vice-Counsel DuPont meets with Preston to reveal that there is a traitor in the upper ranks of the Clerics, and assigns Preston the task of unmasking the traitor. Relieved, Preston accepts and promises to locate the Underground's leadership. When O'Brien is set to be executed, Preston attempts to stop the execution and fails. His memory of his wife's execution triggers an emotional breakdown. Brandt, who has been suspecting Preston of being a Sense Offender, arrests and brings him before DuPont. Preston tricks DuPont into believing that Brandt is the traitor. Preston is told that his home will be searched as a formality. He rushes home to destroy the hidden vials only to discover his son, who stopped taking Prozium after his mother died, already has. Jurgen tells Preston to capture the resistance leaders to regain Father's trust, hoping it will get him close enough to assassinate Father. Preston is granted an exclusive audience with Father only to discover that Brandt was not arrested; it was part of a ruse to capture Preston and the Underground. DuPont reveals he is Father, having secretly replaced the original Father who died, and that his cabal doesn't take Prozium to suppress emotion. He taunts Preston, asking how it felt to betray the Underground. Having anticipated the trap, Preston fights his way through an army of bodyguards to DuPont's office, confronting and killing Brandt in a katana battle. DuPont and Preston engage in a gun kata showdown. Preston wins as DuPont pleads for his life, asking "Is it really worth the price?" Paying homage to Partridge's last words, he responds "I pay it gladly" and kills DuPont to satiate his need for revenge. He destroys the command center that broadcasts Father propaganda. Preston watches with satisfaction from above as the Underground destroys Prozium manufacturing plants, signaling the beginning of the revolution.