Artificially created by a kind inventor, Edward now lives alone in a large gothic castle/mansion, after the death of the inventor, whom Edward knows as his father. His hands are not completed when Edward's father dies, and Edward is left with scissors for temporary hands, now to be his hands for the rest of his life. Unknown by society, Edward is completely lost in lonliness atop the dark hill, spending his time perfecting his talent for sculpting hedges with his scissorhands. Then one day, an Avon lady, Peg Boggs, comes to the castle in hopes of selling makeup, and meets the lone Edward. Feeling sorry for him, she takes Edward home to live with her and her family in the suburbs below the hill.
Edward soon is accepted by the suburbian residents, except for the younger generation, teenagers, such as Peg's daughter Kim and her friends especially her boyfriend Jim, who consider Edward a freak. However, Edward falls in love with Kim, even though her feelings for him are obviously the opposite at first. Edward goes through a short adventure of trying to open his own beauty salon, mostly persuaded by his friends. Then he is asked to break into Jim's house by an unwilling Kim so that they can get insurance money. Edward agrees, only because he loves Kim. He is caught, and nasty rumors spread around the suburbs about how Edward is a monster. Kim and Jim were not caught, and after this incident, Kim's guilt is mixed with feelings for Edward, and she eventually grows to love him. But by that time, he is chased out of town by the angry residents, and goes back to his lonely castle. Kim follows him, and so does Jim in secret, and after Jim trying to kill Edward, Edward ends up killing Jim in self-defence, and in Kim's defence as well. The townspeople see Jim's dead body lying on the ground (he was pushed out the window of the castle), and Kim and Edward depart, for the last time, as they will never see each other again, and Kim tells the people that Edward is dead, to protect him from the residents. You see guilt flash upon all of their faces as they hear this, for they all realize that they were the cause of this, not Edward, but their rumors who made Edward out to be a monster. So Edward is to once again live atop the dark hill, within the dark gothic castle, all alone.
