District 9 is the name of a concentration camp which is home to millions of extraterrestrial aliens who were recovered from a disabled space ship twenty years earlier. A private company named Multinational United (MNU) has been awarded the contract to relocate the aliens to a new camp. Wikus van der Merwe (Sharlto Copley) is the MNU employee who needs to issue the eviction notices to the individuals in the camp, but he suffers an accident in which he is sprayed with an unknown substance. As Wikus begins to transform, he finds himself at odds with an employer who has horrible plans for testing him. Wikus escapes and heads back to District 9, where he enlists alien aid in an effort to reverse his transformation.