
After the unsolved murder of his wife, Adrian Monk develops obsessive-compulsive disorder, which includes his terror of germs and contamination. His condition costs him his job as a prominent homicide detective in the San Francisco Police Department, but he continues to solve crimes with the help of his assistant and his former boss.

The father of Monk's late wife enlists his help in probing possible cheating on a television game show in Los Angeles.

Monk takes a new medicine that alleviates symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder but impairs his ability to solve crimes.

Still reeling from the loss of Sharona, Monk probes the slaying of an intruder and gains a new assistant.

Despite supposedly being dead for six years, a kung fu movie star is implicated in the murder of the author of a controversial tell-all biography.