A group of illegal immigrants are smuggled across the ocean in a shipping container; only to have their humanity tested as they run out of food, water and air.

Eccentric Frank Carlyle ran a horror shop in small-town Steeple Falls, which takes pride in and profit from its Halloween traditions. Frank's widower grandson Richard grudgingly returns there from Boston with his own kids, bright Ian and bratty Claire, to settle the inheritance. Ian discovers great-grandpa's house is really haunted, and not just, as legend holds, by historic owner Zachariah Kull, who was burned on the stake.

A story of big losses, small triumphs, and moments of grace amid the grind of capitalism — in other words, life itself. Four Hong Kong immigrants are living lives of desperation in Scarborough, Ontario: Dan was a pop singer on the rise before his move to Canada, now he’s barely scraping by; Eva is a lonely woman whose commitment to her aging mother has held her back in life; Fan is a part-time sex worker struggling to break into real estate; Tony is an aging widower whose factory job is at risk.

A top-tier Canadian virologist and his Chinese wife are suddenly arrested by military secret agents in Beijing. He is threatened with the task of stealing a sample of his own work from his former laboratory, and the situation rapidly turns worse when people begin to fall ill.