
Enigmatic Dr. Helen Magnus and her team -- forensic psychiatrist Dr. Will Zimmerman, tech genius Henry and Helen's daughter, Ashley -- study the eerie beings most humans dismiss as the imaginary stuff of nightmares, but who secretly are living and moving about in the modern world in this sci-fi series that is filmed with extensive use of green screens and "virtual sets."
Dr. Helen Magnus fights to save the life of one of the Sanctuary's research scientists who is attacked by a seemingly docile Abnormal; baffled by the creature's behavior, Henry tries to see what, or who, caused the Abnormal to react so violently.
Will goes up against the heads of the Sanctuary Network to defend Magnus who is charged with murder; as the evidence stacks up against her, even Will has trouble finding a way to convincingly defend her innocence.
While transporting a usually docile Abnormal, Magnus's helicopter crashes, leaving her and Will stranded in the shaft of an abandoned oil rig; they soon find they are not alone in the water.
While an old friend of Magnus', a pouched abnormal named Jimmy, is handing over a fire elemental to the Sanctuary team, they are attacked by a gang of criminal abnormals from Chicago; the situation presents a lot of mysteries to be solved quickly.