Genre: Action/Superhero
Director: Nicolas Winding Refn
Writer: D.R. Cobb
Based on DC Comics characters
Cast: Ryan Gosling, Christina Hendricks, John Malkovich, Kyle Chandler, Hugh Grant, Kevin Pollak
Plot: The head of Hub City's illegal gambling operation, Volk (Peter Stormare), is retiring. He manages to survive an attempt on his life, and tries to make a deal with Mayor Wesley Fermin (John Malkovich), who is surprisingly still in office. Mayor Fermin shows up to the meeting drunk, and Volk refuses to do his business with Myra Connelly Fermin (Christina Hendricks), who is still married to the Mayor. Myra, desperate for help, turns to freelance reporter Vic Sage (Ryan Gosling) to try to get access to Volk. Myra confides in Sage that she's doing everything she can to hold the city together. He asks her about their relationship, and she tells him that her marriage may be a forced sham, but she still respects the vows.
The man who funded the first assassination attempt on Volk plans to do things right the second time, and hires three out-of-town gunmen. Volk refuses to talk to Sage, and threatens him with death if he attempts the interview. Across town, the crime boss who hired the hitmen finds out where Volk is and plans to accompany the hitmen to kill Volk personally. Volk, goes about his business, deciding to spend the day with a prostitute.
This time, Sage shows up as the Question looking for Volk at the Savoy Hotel. He climbs the fire escape and, as he approaches Volk's window, a whip crashes through the glass and grips the Question's throat. The Question assures him that he is not an enemy. Volk grants the Question the interview and gives him the history of his life. His mother was a gypsy traveling through Germany. He was wounded and orphaned, and raised by Bavarian wolves. Volk says he'd planned to inform on his corrupt competitors until he saw that Mayor Fermin was also corrupt, and weak.
The hired killers lurk in the hallways of the hotel. Volk tells the Question to go, but the Question opts to stay and help. Volk takes out one of the hitmen and a henchman with a rope dart, and the Question fights the other who comes in through the fire escape. After knocking the killer's weapon away, the Question watches his opponent lower into a martial arts stance. The Question makes short work of him. The last killer takes a look around at his fallen colleagues, and decides to bail, leaving the crime boss on his own. The crime boss fires into the room with an Uzi, but Volk uses his whip to steal the gun away. As Volk chokes him, the crime boss pulls a pistol from his pocket and fires into Volk's torso. The crime boss falls down dead, and Volk stumbles away injured before dying himself.
The Question checks his watch from a rooftop as he looks down on a drug deal below. A midnight meeting between some drug dealers and Izzy O'Toole (Kyle Chandler), chief of detectives, starts with a briefcase containing $20,000 and a kilo of cocaine. As they make the switch, Izzy pulls his police revolver out and the men's hands go up. One of the men, behind Izzy, brings his own gun up. The Question strips the gun away and takes down the rest of the gang. Izzy wants to know why the Question is following him. The Question states that it's a matter of curiosity. He wanted to know what Izzy was going to do.
Sage talks to Myra at the KBEL station, where she tells him that she plans to run for mayor. They begin a secret affair. While leaving the station after a rendezvous in the editing room with Myra, he hears word that a bridge is about to collapse. He races there. While the cops do nothing, Vic risks his life to save a boy on the edge. In spite of his efforts and receiving help from a stranger, the boy dies.
Myra discovers that a report had been submitted warning that the bridge was unsafe. She tries to fire the bureaucrat who ignored the report, but union rules protect him. After her failure to get the man fired, Myra officially announces her candidacy for mayor. The press rakes her over the coals for the existence of an illegitimate child and her string of past lovers, including Sage.
Izzy O'Toole has gotten the Hub City police department on his back, as he has slowly been cleaning up the department and flushing out dirty cops. The police are not too fond of their buddies getting fired, but the press supports him. The Question asks O'Toole to endorse Myra's mayoral campaign. As the Question, he shadows her political opponent, Royal Dinsmore (Hugh Grant), in the hopes of finding evidence supporting rumors that he has with links to organized crime. He fails to find any concrete evidence.
As Election Day comes, Sage discovers a connection tying Dinsmore to rigged voting machines. He calls a judge to get a court injunction to stop the vote-counting machines from being used, but the judge is in the pay of Dinsmore, and denies Sage's request. After hearing of Sage's discovery, Dinsmore sends a biker gang to kill Sage. The reporter changes into the Question to deal with his attackers.
Myra comes home from work to find Wesley about to shoot himself. She stops him, and later at a press conference disavows any connection to her husband. She is torn apart by the media for the timing. Wesley Fermin watches the conference at home, calling his wife a "commie bitch," before turning off the television in anger. After the conference, Myra tells her make-up artist that she intends to put Fermin in detox and get a divorce after the election.
Dinsmore and his campaign manager send more gang members out to bribe homeless people into voting for Dinsmore, as well as intimidate and beat up potential voters for Myra. Vic hears of people being beaten in the streets and leaves the station mid-broadcast. He is torn between doing his job to tell the truth or acting to prevent Dinsmore from winning the election. As he leaves the station, the weatherman issues a tornado warning on the air. Sage chooses to take action as the Question.
He hospitalizes a few of the thugs out on the streets, then uses the news broadcast to spread the rumor that they overdosed from bad drugs. The gang had been given a drug supply for helping Dinsmore, and when they hear of the overdoses, they turn on their employer, leaving the streets safe for voters. Sage goes to get a statement from the candidate. His first stop is to Dinsmore's campaign headquarters. He arrives just as the gang is about to burn the crooked politician alive. Sage steps in as the Question, but is soon overpowered by the gang and doused in gasoline.
Fermin accuses Myra of being a defeatist and a faithless communist. She gives him an acidic reply, after which Fermin leaves the house with his pistol. The large tornado makes a beeline for Hub City.
The Question and Dinsmore are only saved from being burned alive by the fury of the tornado as it hits Hub City hard. The gang panics as it first touches down, and a motorcycle rips through a window, taking out their leader. While Vic battles the storm, Myra and her staff take refuge in the basement of City Hall. At KBEL, the transmitter quits functioning. The weatherman hysterically steps out into the storm to yell out warnings to the citizens, but is swept away into the telephone wires.
Sage survives the storm and awakens the next morning feeling refreshed. He learns that Myra lost the election by a single vote. He curses himself because he forgot to vote, as his vote could have at least tied the election. Sage goes out to get a statement from the loser, but Myra is unavailable. He then seeks out Dinsmore. He only finds him when Dinsmore's dead body is pulled from river. With Dinsmore dead, Myra becomes the duly elected mayor of Hub City. As she gives her acceptance speech, the former Mayor Wesley Fermin arrives and shoots her in the stomach.
With the devastation left by the tornado and without a mayor, as Myra is in serious condition, Hub City falls into turmoil.
A couple of two-bit street hoods rob a liquor store then flee to the top floor of a building where they take a young couple hostage. In the meantime, Wesley Fermin takes refuge with one of his biggest campaign supporters, Sundert (Kevin Pollack). Sundert offers the drunken former mayor reassurance that he did the right thing by shooting Myra.
Sage leaves the station to sulk and search for Fermin. He tracks down Sundert, but Fermin has already left to the site of the police stand-off with the liquor store robbers. Fermin charges the robbers, killing both, but dying from return fire.
Two days later, Sage goes to the hospital to visit Myra. Her gunshot wounds are healing, but she's in a coma. Hearing a commotion on the roof, he rushes up as the Question to see what's going on. He finds some thugs dangling a man from the edge of the building. He tells them that if they drop the man, they'll follow his body down. Not heeding the warning, the thugs drop their victim. The Question disarms them, but a kick sends one teetering over the edge. The Question considers not helping him back up, but eventually does, telling the thug not to thank him. Upset over the victim’s death and Myra’s condition, Sage takes a picture of Myra to a building top where he meditates on it. While he meditates, she wakes from her coma.
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