In 2005, average-in-every-way Private Joe Bowers (Luke Wilson) is selected to take part in a secret military experiment to put him in hibernation for a year along with a woman named Rita (Maya Rudolph). The slumbering duo is forgotten when the base they are stored on is closed down, and the two are left in stasis until 2505. When they finally wake up, they discover the average intelligence of humans has decreased so much that Joe is now the smartest man in the world. From writer-director Mike Judge comes a vision of the future that traces the degeneration of society, as anti-intellectualism and base greed become the exponentially dominant genes in future generations.