In
Lapland, playboy physicist
Jerry Cornelius attends the funeral of his father, a
Nobel Prize–winning scientist who has developed the "Final Programme"—a design for a perfect,
self-replicating human being. He is questioned by Dr Smiles, who wants to retrieve
microfilm which he knows is in the Cornelius family home in England. Cornelius, a conspicuous counter-culture dandy with a fondness for chocolate biscuits and alcohol, threatens to blow up the family house. Flashbacks to Jerry's conversations with Professor Hira about the
Kali Yuga inform the narrative, providing a philosophical background of the world in its final days. In various scenes we learn that the
Vatican no longer exists and that
Amsterdam has been razed to ash, and we see
Trafalgar Square in a post-apocalyptic scenario of wrecked cars piled atop one another. Back in Great Britain, a group of scientists led by Dr Smiles and the formidable Miss Brunner (who consumes her lovers) try to persuade Cornelius to locate the microfilm. Jerry learns from his family servant that his sister Catherine has been imprisoned by his evil, drug-addicted brother, Frank, and has addicted her to drugs for unspecified reasons. Jerry, whose relationship with Catherine is implied to be
incestuous, instructs his servant John to smuggle Catherine to the lodge on the property's grounds; he will "take care of Frank". He consults Major Wrongway Lindbergh, who supplies him with a high-powered jet aircraft, and his old friend "Shades" who can supply him with
napalm. The attack on the old house commences. The house is protected by a sound system that induces pseudo-
epilepsy, but Jerry and the others get inside unharmed. They fight their way past many traps, including poison gas and a lethal chessboard. Jerry finds John fatally wounded by Frank. John confesses before dying that Catherine has not been freed and that Frank has returned her to the bedroom. Jerry finds and confronts Frank, and a fight ensues. In the confusion, Catherine is accidentally killed by Jerry. Jerry is wounded, and Frank falls into the hands of Miss Brunner. She forces him to open the vaults, but he outsmarts her and escapes with the microfilm. After Jerry recuperates, he meets with Miss Brunner. She introduces him to her new lover, Jenny and they plot to recapture Frank. Jenny is induced to play piano naked in Jerry's flat, where she is subsequently absorbed by Miss Brunner. Frank has set up a meeting to sell the microfilm to Dr Baxter; Jerry and Miss Brunner track them down and then Miss Brunner consumes Baxter. Another fight with Frank ensues and Frank is killed. Miss Brunner and Jerry return to Lapland by hot-air balloon with the recovered microfilm. The scientists put the Final Programme into operation; the process requires that Miss Brunner be combined with another person to form a
hermaphroditic being. Brunner chooses Jerry over the scientists' intended subject, Dmitri, and she traps Dmitri in a lethal steambath. Dmitri escapes Brunner's trap and fights Jerry, who is severely wounded. Brunner intervenes at the last moment, shooting Dmitri but not killing him. The scientists re-calibrate their experiment for Jerry, who is placed inside a large chamber with Brunner. As the process reaches its climax, the two subjects are bathed by solar radiation and blur into each other. The barely controlled process heats the equipment outside to destruction and the scientists are left either dead or insensible. A single being emerges from the chamber. Dmitri confronts the creature. Unseen at first, the being speaks with Jerry's voice. The creature does not know if it is a
Messiah but is sure that its creation means the end of an age. When seen from the onlookers' perspective, the being is Jerry Cornelius, his body now altered to appear as a hunched, pre-modern
hominid. The creature leaves Brunner's hidden base and observes that it is "a very tasty world". ==Cast==