An assailant murders millionaire collector, Mr. Loftmore, and steals thirty-six artifacts. Forty years later, Loftmore’s grandson, Mark, lives in his grandfather’s house and attends a nearby college. Fellow students, China and Sarah, are startled to discover the new Waxwork museum on the way to school. The Waxwork owner invites them to a private midnight viewing for six people. At school, Mark is jealous that China went out with Johnathan, a football player, the previous evening. China insists her relationship with Mark is over, and she wants someone more sophisticated. However, she invites Mark to join her and Sarah at the Waxwork, along with fellow students Tony, James, and Gemma. When they arrive, Gemma is spooked and convinces her boyfriend, James, to leave. Mark and the others are greeted by Hans, the midget butler, and “Junior,” a tall servant. They enter the Waxwork showroom and separate while wandering among displays based on various horror stories. As Tony pulls out a cigarette, his lighter falls into the werewolf exhibit. Reaching for it, Tony is pulled through a blue energy field and finds himself dressed as another person and standing in the middle of a forest. He believes it is an elaborate hypnosis stunt, and plays along. When Tony enters a nearby cabin, the inhabitant warns him to leave as the full moon shines in a window. The man transforms into a werewolf and attacks Tony, biting his arm. An elderly man and his assistant rush inside, load a rifle with silver bullets and kill the werewolf. The werewolf’s bite infected Tony and as he transforms into a creature, the man also shoots him with a silver bullet. In the Waxwork, Mark walks past the werewolf exhibit without noticing that Tony is now part of the display. At another exhibit, China leans close to admire a handsome count in his castle and is pulled into the world of Count Dracula. She fends off attacks from Dracula’s son, Stephan, and several vampire girls, but is mesmerized by the count and allows him to bite her neck. Meanwhile, Mark joins Sarah, who is intrigued by the Marquis de Sade exhibit. Mark wants to leave, believing that China already left with Tony. He walks Sarah home and they almost kiss, but the virginal Sarah refuses, claiming she likes him, but is looking for something else. Meanwhile, Johnathan calls China’s home and learns she went to the Waxwork. He goes there to find her, and meets the owner, who pushes him into the Phantom of the Opera display. Within seconds, Johnathan reappears as a dead police officer in the exhibit. The next day, Mark worries that China and Tony never made it home. He no longer believes they left together and fears something happened at the Waxwork. Mark meets with Inspector Roberts and learns that thirteen people have disappeared in the last two weeks. Roberts is skeptical, but agrees to check out the Waxwork with Mark. They are greeted by the owner, who insists the museum is not yet open, so Mark and his friends could not have been inside unless they broke in. Roberts orders Mark to stay in the waiting room while he accompanies the owner into the showroom. He is intrigued by the Egyptian display, but leaves before the owner can push him into it. Roberts tells Mark that his friends are probably already at home. However, the detective returns to the station, goes through his missing persons files, and realizes he saw them all in the Waxwork displays. He sneaks into the museum to determine if he is imagining things. Roberts steps into the Dracula display and peels wax off China’s face to reveal skin and cartilage beneath it. He removes a piece of her cheek and bags it as evidence. As he leaves, Roberts passes too close to the Egyptian display and is pulled into the tomb, where a mummy kills him. Meanwhile, Mark pulls Sarah out of class to tell her that he met the Waxwork owner and recognizes him. They rush to Mark’s house and he gets a newspaper article about his grandfather’s murder and the missing artifacts. The only clue was the disappearance of an employee, David Lincoln. Mark and Sarah recognize Lincoln as the Waxwork owner, but he has not aged in the forty years since Loftmore’s murder. They go to Sir Wilfred, a wheelchair bound friend of Mark’s grandfather, and explain the situation. Wilfred tells them he and Loftmore were fascinated by the occult, but did not take it seriously. However, Lincoln did, and has not aged because he sold his soul to the devil. As Satan’s disciple, Lincoln’s wants to destroy the delicate balance between good and evil. Wilfred reveals that Loftmore collected eighteen items that belonged to the most evil men who ever lived. Lincoln believed a voodoo claim that you could bring a person back to life if you create a wax effigy containing a personal belonging, and deliver the soul of a believing victim to the devil. Wilfred now realizes that Lincoln plans to take the voodoo ritual a step further. Loftmore collected artifacts from the dwellings of the evil men, and Lincoln has utilized those artifacts to create a display based on each villain’s life, and in which the entire display comes to life. Once someone has died in each display, the eighteen evil souls will live again and destroy the world with the help of their possessed victims. Wilfred declares their only salvation is to burn the Waxwork and all of the creatures. Mark and Sarah race to the Waxwork as Wilfred calls for back-up. When Mark and Sarah break into the museum, Sarah is once again mesmerized by the Marquis de Sade display and is sucked inside. Junior and Hans push Mark into a zombie world, where he battles a zombie, dismembering its hand and spearing the moving appendage on a fencepost. As other zombies attack, Mark runs away and hits the blue energy field. Remembering Wilfred’s statement that only believers can be sacrificed, Mark convinces himself the zombies do not exist, and dives out of the exhibit. Before Junior can grab him, Mark dives into the Marquis de Sade display to rescue Sarah. However, she is under the Waxwork’s spell and does not want to leave. Mark reminds her the display-world is fake and demonstrates that the Marquis cannot kill him. As Sarah leaves with Mark, the Marquis promises to meet his nemesis soon. When they leap out of the exhibit, Lincoln and his minions grab them and hide as James and Gemma enter. The new arrivals are quickly transported into displays and appear as dead victims. The eighteen exhibits are now complete and come to life. Lincoln laughs that Mark and Sarah have nowhere to run as they are surrounded by reanimated evil. However, the door bursts open and Sir Wilfred arrives with his rag-tag back-up team. During the battle, Mark and Sarah are forced to kill their friends. As Wilfred and his people fight, they pour gasoline and ignite fires. Mark’s duel with the Marquis de Sade leads them into an adjacent workroom where Lincoln watches as the Marquis, a superior swordsman, easily defeats Mark. Lincoln orders him to kill Mark, but Sarah kills the Marquis with an ax. Lincoln aims his gun at Mark and Sarah, but Wilfred wheels in and shoots him. As Lincoln falls into a vat of hot wax, fire engulfs the room. Sarah and Mark rush outside as the building explodes, killing everyone else inside. Moments later, the zombie hand crawls from the flaming rubble and escapes across the lawn.