A mild-mannered radio executive strives to become the best stepdad to his wife's two children. But complications ensue when their freewheeling and freeloading birth father arrives, forcing him into a heated competition for the affection of the kids. One brings home a dog; the other brings home a pony. And this war only escalates from there.

A disgraced children's puppeteer returns to his dilapidated childhood home and lecherous stepfather, intent on destroying a hideously malformed spider-puppet he carries with him in a brown leather case. His mind flooded with painful half-memories and nightmarish visions, he soon finds himself embroiled in a local investigation for a missing boy, progressively unsure of what's real and what's not. All the while the spider seems to mock his suffering...

A single mother discovers a scheme in her genius son's notebook to rescue the young girl next door from her abusive stepfather and sets out to execute the plan at any cost.