A television network cynically exploits a deranged former anchor's ravings and revelations about mass media for its own profit, but finds that his message may be difficult to control.

A sheltered Amish child is the sole witness of a brutal murder in a restroom at a Philadelphia train station, and he must be protected. The assignment falls to a taciturn detective who goes undercover in a Pennsylvania Dutch community. On the farm, he slowly assimilates despite his urban grit and forges a romantic bond with the child's beautiful mother.

A bookish CIA researcher finds all his co-workers dead, and must outwit those responsible until he figures out who he can really trust.

An ex professor offers Adam $1,000,000 to "get" some plasma from a high tech company's lab. Adam asks his criminal grandpa for help. Can they convince Adam's now honest dad to join?

In the 1970s, terrorist violence is the stuff of networks' nightly news programming and the corporate structure of the UBS Television Network is changing. Meanwhile, Howard Beale, the aging UBS news anchor, has lost his once strong ratings share and so the network fires him. Beale reacts in an unexpected way. We then see how this affects the fortunes of Beale, his coworkers (Max Schumacher and Diana Christensen), and the network.