In the Opium Fields in Tibet after the First World War, the cruel and feared drug kingpin Ying-Ko is kidnapped by the holy Tulku that offers him to remove evil from his heart. In principle, the reluctant Ying-Ko does not accept the offer and is attacked by Tulku's powerful dagger Phurba. Then he accepts to study with Tulku and learns how to hypnotize and becomes invisible. Seven years later, he returns to New York City with his original name, Lamont Cranston, and becomes a wealthy playboy and the vigilante The Shadow, who fights the criminals. People that he saves become his agents, helping him in his fight against crime. He frequently needs to hypnotize his uncle Police Commissioner Wainwright Barth to forget The Shadow. When he meets the attractive Margo Lane in a restaurant, Cranston becomes afraid of her since she is telepathic and may learn that he is The Shadow. Out of the blue, the New York Art Museum receives a Genghis Khan's silver sarcophagus and inside is his last descendant, Shiwan Khan. He is a powerful former student of the Tulku, but he killed his master and intends to conquer the world. He meets Ying-Ko and invites him to team-up with him, but Lamont Cranston refuses. When Shiwan Khan abducts Margo's father Dr. Reinhardt Lane and his greedy assistant Farley Claymore teams up with him to build a powerful bomb, The Shadow needs the help of his friends to fight the powerful enemy.