In 1978, a serial killer, popularly nicknamed the Tooth Fairy, stalks and murders seemingly random families during sequential full moons. He first kills the Jacobi family in Birmingham, Alabama, then the Leeds family in Atlanta, Georgia. Two days after the Leeds murders, FBI agent Jack Crawford seeks out his protégé, Will Graham, a brilliant profiler who captured the serial killer Hannibal Lecter three years earlier, but retired after Lecter almost killed him. Graham is shown to have a remarkable visual memory as well as the ability to empathise with serial killers and had also shot the serial killer Garrett Jacob Hobbs. Crawford goes to Graham's Sugarloaf Key residence and pleads for his assistance; Graham reluctantly agrees. After visiting over the crime scenes with only minimal insight, he realizes that he must visit Lecter and seek his help in capturing the Tooth Fairy.