Doctor Gulliver is poor, so nothing - not even his charming fiancée Elisabeth - keeps him in the town he lives. He signs on to a ship to India, but in a storm he's washed off the ship and ends up on an island, which is inhibitated by very tiny people. After he managed to convince them he's harmless and is accepted as one of their citizens, their king wants to use him in war against a people of giants. Compared to them, even Gulliver is a gnome.

Due to an accident while swimming in the sea, Francis meets the surfer Moondoggie. She's fascinated with his sport and starts to hang out with his clique. Although they make fun of her at first, they teach her to surf and soon she's accepted and given the nickname "Gidget". But it's hard work to become more than a friend to Moondoggie.

John Considine plays the flamboyant Dr. Death, a thousand-year-old magician who has mastered he art of transferring souls from one body to another and thereby manages to perpetuate himself by jumping from one body to the next. Apparently the Doc is a kindred spirit since his blood is a highly-corrosive acid that can strip flesh from bone

The reclusive Dr. Zorba has died and left his sprawling mansion to his nephew Cyrus and his family. They will need to search the house to find the doctor's fortune, but along with the property itself, they have also inherited the occultist's collection of thirteen ghosts.