Shh!! It's Alive opens with a montage of vintage cattle industry footage, including a brief abattoir shot. A classified memo from the FDA is shown in a clip that alludes to a government cover-up regarding dangerous threats resulting from consumption of beef. The significance of the horrors of industrial beef farming unfolds as two very different couples meet their meat. During a casual chili supper, "Tad" begins to fall ill as he experiences a rare but deadly side effect from eating beef. Chaos ensues as "it" attacks.