Actress Ming Shi has arrived on the planet Vladikov to shoot a movie. The movie is going to be a throwback to monster movies made on Earth in the early days of space travel. It's a low-budget project but it's work.

She's pleased that her co-star is the more well-known actress Arianna Cho. She's surprised to learn that she and Cho were once clients of Jake Bonner.

That comes in handy. The crew is too small, and there's other strange things going on with investors in the project. Ming and Arianna join forces to figure out what the "Plodding Menace" really is on this movie shoot.