Two politically concerned students (Heigl and Smith) build a nuclear device to illustrate the need for a change in national priorities. But when they're betrayed by a fellow student and the bomb ends up in the hands of a terrorist, they have to work with the government in a race against time to prevent the destruction of the San Francisco Bay area.

Originally scheduled to be telecast in the fall of 2001 on NBC, this television film was shelved when its storyline was deemed too close for comfort to the events of September 11, 2001. The film re-emerged under the name Critical Assembly in the summer of 2003.