The Happy Science Filmography Ranked
5. The Rebirth of Buddha (2009)
This film is about a high school girl that learns about the truth of the spirit world and uses that truth to help fight a guy claiming to be the reincarnation of Buddha. She joins up with the real reincarnation of Buddha, a surrogate for Okawa, to expose this huckster. You may be asking how we can tell the difference between the real Buddha and the fake one – they both tell you that if you don’t believe you’ll go to hell, and they both promise you great things if you do obey them, and they both have magical powers that lots of people see. The difference is that one is working with aliens and evil spirits, while the other is El Cantare. So that’s how you know. It’s pretty simple.
There are a lot of twists and turns in this film. One moment there’s relationship drama between a girl and her boyfriend, the next moment an Australian guy is getting possessed by a demon. A guy and a kid are trying to catch goldfish, but then some aliens arrive and start blasting Japan with lasers. The bad guy hijacks a TV station to make people think a tsunami is imminent, but the protagonists steal it back so they can make a speech about love and happiness.
The final brawl is a fight between the two Buddhas on a baseball field. They have a magic fight, ending with El Cantare summoning a glowing elephant and giant sword to banish the demon to hell. Afterwards, he converts the false Buddha to Happy Science, there are some bad CGI angels, Buddha tells us we’ll know he’s Buddha because Buddha will be the one telling us the stories from Happy Science, and Buddha and his disciples have a good jolly laugh like the end of a ‘Scooby Doo’ episode. This movie manages to remain entertaining, but could not have a worse magical protagonist.
4. The Mystical Laws (2012)
Taking place in AD 202X, this film follows the journey of El Cantare as he fights against the evil Godom Empire, which appears to be China mixed with Nazis. The Emperor, a genetic creation by scientists, has commissioned a super weapon that can launch six-trillion-degree fireballs. He got this weapon from his scientist that happens to be an alien from the planet Vega, posing as an Asian woman. It turns out that aliens are capable of inhabiting human bodies, so keep a lookout.
The Godom Empire invades Japan, and imposes strict rules. They ban the use of the term “Japan”, make schools teach about the bad things in Japan’s past (Heaven forbid people know about the Nanjing Massacre), and they can’t have religions. Meanwhile, our protagonist meditates to summon an alien from Venus who can take him to the Vegan scientist, and she teaches him about aliens and compares him to Rient Arl Croud.
There’s tons of bad CGI in the final standoff between El Cantare and the Godom Empire, which also happens in a stadium. El Cantare ends this movie with another long sermon, mentioning that we don’t need military or economic power, just belief in invisible magic beings (which isn’t in the Happy Science political platform). If we all just believe in El Cantare, everything will be cool because love and tolerance… and stuff. They’re basically asking you to not pay attention to any of the casual racism where they turn the Vegans from Asians to white, blonde people, or the overt jabs at China. Focus on the dragon fights and extraterrestrials, and the magic that is definitely real because you can see the proof in this movie. Watch out for the rise of the Godom Empire, or the aversion of such a fate because maybe we all prayed hard enough.
3. The Laws of the Universe Part 0 (2015)
Just when you think these movies are running out of steam, you get a whole film about how aliens actually exist and are all around us.
As a project for creation class, five students at the Nazca Academy decide to expose the truth behind UFOs after the abduction of a student by greys.
Don’t be too quick to laugh at the premise (it’s too late for me), because the people who mock the characters in the film turn out to be wrong.
When the principal of the school expresses skepticism, he’s swept aboard the ship of a goat alien that tells him and a protagonist about the Galactic Federation. He shows them their base on the moon, and tells them of the evil reptilians that have infiltrated the American, Russian and Chinese militaries, as well as the academy with the aim of taking over the world. But why haven’t they done it yet? Well, there are technicalities of intergalactic law that they have to work around in order to enslave and eat the human race, you see. Who doesn’t love getting into those sorts of details?
The film shows how humans can communicate with aliens through the laws of attraction; brains that think on the same “wavelength” can communicate, and “good” thoughts attract other “good” thoughts. The reason people go to hell is because they are thinking on the hell wavelength. Eventually, there’s a big showdown with the reptilians, but not the ones working with the American and Russian militaries, they are very clear that this faction works with the Chinese.
The protagonists travel to the dark side universe, and escape on their teacher who is a converted reptilian dragon. The animation quality is the best of all the films, and it’s pretty entertaining all the way through outside of a boring relationship melodrama.
2. The Golden Laws (2003)
The longest ripoff of Back to the Future ever, this film begins in the 25th century. A time traveler from the 30th century arrives, and tries to take the protagonist to 21st century Japan to meet El Cantare. Instead, the time machine malfunctions, and the two travel from one period of history to another trying to get back to the 25th century.
In case you were wondering, time travel works by taking you to the spiritual realm of the fourth dimension. They see Hermes fight a sea monster, they help Moses get the Jews out of Egypt, they visit Buddha, watch Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection and help Hermes defeat Prometheus. Random alien sightings throughout history, like the Nazca Lines and Ezekiel 1:16, are shown to be these time travellers. There’s a monk that tries to kill Buddha with Wile E. Coyote Acme devices.
Throughout the film, the protagonist is reading El Cantare’s book, The Golden Laws. When asked if it mentions time travel, the answer is “yes”. In fact, the book mentions this exact story, and spoils the ending (which is different from what happens, somehow). There are constant allusions to the “mysteries” of the film – like why the time traveler came to visit the protagonist, or why they’re going to 21st century Japan (hint: El Cantare) – that are brushed aside in favor of techno babble or some plot interrupting the exposition. The idea that this story is actually foretelling a future event written within a book that exists in our reality is amazing. The way so many different religions are incorporated is wild. This convoluted time travel film would be the most entertaining, if not for the movie that followed it in the canon.
1. The Laws of Eternity (2006)
I’m sure you were wondering how Thomas Edison factors into this mythology, right? Don’t worry, this film answers that question.
This is by far the most fun of these movies. Imagine Ayn Rand wrote a sci-fi story during a DMT trip, or L. Ron Hubbard wrote the Divine Comedy, you’d have The Laws of Eternity. It’s the story of four friends that invent a spirit phone, leading to an adventure in the spiritual realm that delves into the dimensions of reality beyond the third.
The protagonists are guided by the Incan shaman God Eagle through the fourth dimension (posthumous realm), fifth dimension (realm of the good), sixth dimension (realm of light), seventh dimension (businessman angel realm), eighth dimension (the realm of cosmic beings that don’t comport to the laws of reality), ninth dimension (realm of super gods), and hell (where evil spirits go). You attain each level by being an “advanced soul”, having high goals in fields like science or business and achieving them, caring for sick people in the spirit world, and being super enlightened. People like Thomas Edison, Sakichi Toyoda, Henry Ford and Konosuke Matsushita exist in the higher heavenly dimensions. Nietzsche is a leader in hell, and fights El Cantare and a robot before it’s over.
There’s so much in this movie, and it moves really quickly. We learn a lot of the religion’s details and processes within the afterlife. You must separate yourself from your earthly possessions, you watch a movie of your life in a theater (wonder if Edison is getting a kickback in the eighth dimension) that shows all of your actions and thoughts, and then you use your mental state to choose where you go. Good people advance to the fifth dimension, bad people go to one of the hells depending on your sins. There’s also a crazy discrepancy between the dub and subtitles, which makes everything harder to understand. If you watch nothing else from Happy Science, check out this one.
