While driving in rural Mississppi after their honeymoon, Eli McCreary (Ronny Cox) and Caroline McCreary (Bibi Besch) run off the road when they miss a turn. The car is stuck in the mud, so Eli walks to a nearby service station for help. Before he can return, a mysterious creature kills their dog and rapes Caroline. Caroline is impregnated from the encounter.Seventeen years later, their son Michael (Paul Clemens) suffers from an unknown malady and appears near death. Leaving him in the hospital, Eli and Caroline return to Naiobi, Mississippi, the small town near where the assault had happened; they are convinced the secret to Michael's condiditon lies in the identity of Michael's biological father. The local magistrate, Judge Curwin (Don Gordon), and newspaper editor, Edwin Curwin (Logan Ramsey), are suspicious of their investigation into the horrible murder on the same night as Caroline's rape, in which the victim's remains were partially eaten and his house burned down.Michael continues to have dreams of trying to lock something evil in a cellar. He escapes from the hospital, steals a car and drives to Naiobi. There, he finds himself drawn to Edwin Curwin's house. Curwin lets him in, mistaking him for the local grocery delivery boy. Michael is suddenly overcome with homicidal urges; he kills and partially eats Curwin. He is found a few houses away by Amanda Platt (Katherine Moffett). Concerned about his health, she takes him to the local doctor's office. Dr. Schoonmaker (R.G. Armstrong) contacts Eli and Caroline, but everyone is surprised that Michael seems to be in improving health.Michael visits Amanda. They go for a walk in the woods and admit their attraction to one another. But as they kiss, Amanda's dog digs up a partially eaten human hand. Sheriff Pool (L.Q. Jones) is called in, and he, Judge Curwin and Eli begin to excavate the area to find more remains. Amanda's father Horace (John Dennis Johnston) arrives and drags Amanda away, forbidding her from seeing Michael again. Later that night, Michael sneaks into the mortuary and kills Dexter Ward (Luke Askew), a relative of the Curwins and Platts. He also visits the town drunk, Tom Laws (Ron Soble), and identifies himself as Billy Connors.Michael goes to Amanda's house ostensibly to protect her from the murderer but is chased away by her father. In the hospital, Schoonemaker talks to Eli and Caroline about a mysterious second, subcutaneous layer of body that appears in Michael's x-rays. Later, Michael angrily tells Eli and Caroline that he knows Eli is not his father, but rather that Billy Connors is. When Tom confronts them the next day to tell him that Michael isn't responsible for the murders but rather Billy Connors is, Eli demands answers. Michael kills Tom then goes to Amanda's house. Realizing that his homicidal urges are returning, Michael pleads with Amanda to leave town then throws himself out the window in a suicide attempt.Sheriff Pool and Eli go to the Collins house and find a misshapen skeleton chained in the cellar. Back in the hospital, Michael transforms into a hideous creature in front of Schoonemaker, Caroline, Horace and Judge Curwin. Surviving several gunshots to the chest, Michael kills Horace then escapes into the night. His human skin is found sloughed off outside. Judge Curwin demands protection in the county jail. He reveals that Billy Connors had been imprisoned in his cellar by Lionel Curwin; Lionel, a deranged fundamentalist Christian, chained him there after he found Billy and his wife in bed together. Lionel killed his wife then left her remains for Billy to eat. Lionel, the Curwins and Ward continued to procure cadavers for Billy to eat, which transformed him into a terrible monster.Michael attacks the county jail, breaking through the walls to decapitate Judge Curwin. He then tracks down Amanda, whose car had run off the road. He chases her into the woods near where Caroline had been assaulted. There, he rapes her. When his parents, the sheriff and Schoonemaker arrive, Michael attacks Eli. Caroline grabs a shotgun and shoots Michael in the head, killing him immediately. Schoonemaker (holding Amanda's ravaged body), the McCreadys and Sheriff Pool stand, looking awkwardly at one another.
Output: Question: Who does Michael decapitate?, Answer: Judge Curwin