Jiefang is a boy who has a peculiar fascination with gunpowder and is gifted with a nose that can find it from miles away. Trouble follows when his father paints a picture of a war hero bomber below the portrait of Chairman Mao and is quickly labelled a Counter-Revolutionary. Despite his loyal devotion to the Party, his father is taken away and Jiefang faces bullying from a clique of classmates. As the feud between them escalates, Jiefang's unexpected discovery of a bomb leads him to continue exploring his unusual affinity for gunpowder, and what it means to truly be a 'hero.'