It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into [[::Cults and new religious movements in literature and popular culture|Cults and new religious movements in literature and popular culture]]. (Discuss)

You must add a |reason= parameter to this Cleanup template – replace it with {{Cleanup|February 2007|reason=<Fill reason here>}}, or remove the Cleanup template.
^{[original research?]} Template:ScientologySeries The following lists specific Scientology references in popular culture along with other cultic references that fans suggest may be, wholely or in part, veiled references to Scientology.

• The Profit [1] (2001). Scientology critic Bob Minton financed a feature-length satire of Scientology. In the film, Scientology terms such as "Auditing" and "Scientology" itself were renamed, but the filmmakers stated that they used Scientology and its founder, L. Ron Hubbard, specifically as role models for the settings, plot, and characters in the film. The film was screened theatrically only once, in Clearwater, Florida. It has not been released on video.

• The Bridge (2006). 18-year-old filmmaker Brett Hanover directed a low-budget feature-length film, a fictionalized story of involvement and disillusionment with Scientology. Unlike The Profit, the film did not shy away from using the name "Scientology" and explicitly used Scientology terms throughout its storyline, going so far as including actual clips from official Scientology promotional and training materials. Rather than release the film theatrically, Hanover premiered The Bridge on the Internet, and made it available for free downloading and viewing at several popular Web video sites, including Google Video and the Internet Archive, where, following Hanover's withdrawal of it, it is no longer available for the stated reasons of "issues with the item's content". On October 5, 2006, Hanover asked the film to be withdrawn from circulation, as he would no longer support it and cited "copyright issues"[2]

• Nip/Tuck. In 2006, season four, the characters Kimber and Matt join the Church, making them the first Scientologist regular characters on a prime-time TV show. [3] In the second episode of the fourth season, Kimber has a hallucination in which Xenu appears to her. Though the Scientology "tech" and details are portrayed in a simplified way, the show is incorporating the Scientology storyline as a serious subplot, rather than a parody or a one-time jab.

• In the "The Parking Garage" episode of the TV series Seinfeld, the characters of Jerry Seinfeld, Elaine Benes, and George Costanza are thrown out of a woman's car after Costanza makes a seemingly critical remark about L. Ron Hubbard.

• In the South Park episode Trapped in the Closet, Stan becomes a Scientologist after being recruited to take a personality test and then becomes their leader after followers start believing he carries Hubbard's thetan. This episode is controversial for a few reasons. It calls Scientology a "worldwide global scam", and makes fun of Tom Cruise's ordeal with the media calling his sexual orientation into question. Soul singer and voice of 'Chef,' Isaac Hayes, quit the show over its treatment of religion. The episode depicts Tom Cruise as denying being 'in the closet' amid several blatant pokes at this. To avoid legal issues all names in the credits are Mr or Mrs Smith.

• Boston Legal aired an episode in which a person sues his previous employer for being fired due to being a Scientologist, entitled: "Whose God Is It, Anyway?".^[1] The show covers Scientology doctrines such as engrams, operating thetans, evolution from clams, leaving the body, and Xenu and the space opera in Scientology doctrines while discussing religious freedom in general and calling attention to the fact that singling out Scientology for special treatment would be bigotry.

• A Very Merry Unauthorized Children's Scientology Pageant (2003) - A tale of the life of L. Ron Hubbard and the Church of Scientology, told from the perspective of fictional children of Scientologists. Won a 2004 Obie Award.

• William S. Burroughs, who briefly dabbled with Scientology, wrote extensively about it during the late 1960s, weaving some of its jargon into his fictional works, as well as authoring non-fiction essays about it. In the end, however, he abandoned Scientology and publicly eschewed it in an editorial for the Los Angeles Free Press in 1970.^[2]

• Many of Chick Corea's songs contain explicit references to Scientology and various works by Hubbard. For example, "What Games Shall We Play Today?" refers to the philosophical concept in Scientology that life consists of "games" in which the objective is to extract joy and satisfaction for oneself. His 2004 album To the Stars is a tone poem based on Hubbard's science fiction novel of the same name. His latest album, The Ultimate Adventure, is also based on a Hubbard novel.

• In Tenacious D's song Kielbasa, Jack Black compares dianetics to Hinduism in the line "Dianetics junior much better than Krishna/ dianetics junior much better indeed." (see Tenacious D)

• Frank Zappa's 1978 concept album/rock opera Joe's Garage lampoons Scientology in the song "A Token of My Extreme." Zappa uses terminology such as "L. Ron Hoover" and "Appliantology," telling the main character 'Joe' that he "must go into the closet" to pursue his latent appliance fetishism.

• Gary Numan had popular songs laced with Scientology references in the 1980s such as "Me, I Disconnect from you", "Praying to the Aliens", and "Only a Downstat", influenced directly by Burroughs' Scientology-based writings. [4] [5]

• Australian rock band Something For Kate released a song titled "All The Things That Aren't Good About Scientology," which includes lyrics such as "too much to see, too much to read, on your bridge to OT."^[3] The album version features the lyrics "tonight in your town, the stars are looking down, on you and me;" however, when played live, lead singer Paul Dempsey alters the lyrics to "...Tom Cruise is looking down, on you and me."

• Maynard James Keenan, lead singer of the progressive rock band Tool, has been a vocal critic of Scientology. Tool song Rosetta Stoned appears to be a direct satire of Scientology founder, L. Ron Hubbard's life. In addition to this the Tool song Ænema contains the lyric "Fuck L. Ron Hubbard, Fuck all his clones".

• Mayfair Games's role playing game Underground from 1993 presented a dystopian view of the year 2021. Elements of this dystopian future included Scientology conquering Europe and ruling as a quasi-fascist dictatorship while sending the Vatican into exile in Central America.

• The d20 Modern role playing game supplement "Menace Manual" depicts the "Neo-Scientologists", the result of a fictional major schism of Scientology. The book describes basic Scientology doctrines like Reactive and Analytical minds and the concept of "Clear", as well as the idea of developing psychic powers at levels above Clear (these cultists exist in the game as foes for the player characters).

• Steven Soderbergh's Schizopolis (1996) parodies cults in the guise of a self-help corporation called Eventualism. Soderbergh acknowledged that he used imagery reminiscent of Scientology in the film, stating "I don't find Scientology any stranger than I find any other religion" and "They happen to be--along with the Mormons, I think--the only religion that advertises on television. If you're going to have one of those guys, you've got to use that imagery, because we all know it."^[4]

• The 1999 satirical film Bowfinger includes an organisation called "Mindhead" that some have speculated was a thinly-veiled parody of the Scientology movement. Steve Martin, however, writer and star of the film, denied that characterization, stating "I don't view it as Scientology. I view it as a pastiche of things I've seen through the years."^[5]

• In 2000, Icon Productions, Mel Gibson's production company, made a movie titled Bless the Child, a pro-Catholic movie which "Citizen Culture Magazine's" editor-in-chief Jonathon Scott Feit and the Journal of Media and Religion claimed portrayed "Scientology's seedy internal operations". [6] In the film, "The New Dawn" – a fictionalized cult that mimics Scientology's symbols and rhetoric – is revealed to be a Satanic cult led by charismatic self-help guru and former child star Eric Stark.

• In The Simpsons episode titled "The Joy of Sect," originally aired on February 8 1998, the family joins a cult called Movementarianism. Fans suggest that the episode parodied a number of alleged cults including Scientology; possible Scientology references include the use of an orientation movie, the extremely litigious nature of the Movementarians, Homer signing a trillion-year contract, and a reddish-haired guru.^[6]

• The "Millennium (TV series)" episode "Jose Chung's Doomsday Defense" (aired November 21, 1997) focuses on an end-of-the-millennium cult, "Selfosophy", which is modelled in various particulars on Scientology. The founder was a bad genre pulp novelist who turned to writing self-help books, which then spawned a profitable "religion" which particularly proliferated in Southern California. Like dianetics, selfosophy is based on learning about yourself, and eliminating negative thoughts (often with the reminder "don't be dark!"). There is a secret progression through the religious levels. Like the Scientologists, the Selfosophists are litigious in their pursuit of ex-members and critics. Selfosophy boasts of its celebrity adherents, who might be intended to refer to John Travolta or possibly Tom Cruise. The Selfosophists also have a machine, the Onan-o-graph, like the Scientologists' E-meter.^[7]

• The TV series The 4400 contains a cult-of-personality organization that promises special powers to people following its course of study, courts celebrities, advances them more quickly than ordinary adherents, encourages its members to disassociate from people opposed to the organization, uses technological devices during therapy-like sessions, and confiscates psychiatric drugs from its members. Also, one former member of the organization accuses it of bankrupting him through payments for endless courses and ejecting him once he no longer had any money to pay.

• On the TV series South Park, the episode "Super Best Friends" featured a cult called "Blainetology" (after David Blaine) that closely resembled Scientology (including a controversial struggle to be legally recognized as a religion, and recruiters claiming that the beliefs of the cult could be practiced alongside any other religion) came to the town.

• The South Park episode "The Return of Chef," marking the character's final episode (in response to the aforementioned departure of Isaac Hayes), finds Chef joining an organization known as the "Super Adventure Club," whose recruiting techniques and history are a direct spoof of Scientology.

• Wild Palms is regarded as containing veiled criticism of Scientology. Senator Anton Kreutzer, leader of a pseudo-fascist organisation called the Fathers, is the founder of a cult, Synthiotics. He lives on a yacht and likes to wear naval uniforms, details which are reminiscent of the Sea Org and the time Hubbard spent cruising the Mediterranean as "Commodore" of a Scientology fleet. Kreutzer's business interests include drug rehabilitation (a possible allusion to Scientology's Narconon).

• In the Law & Order: Criminal Intent episode titled "Con-Text" (season 2, episode 10), Douglas Morgan (Sean Dugan) kills his father Mickey Connelly (Graeme Malcolm) and his brother Jimmy Connelly (Gibson Frazier) after torturing them to gain access to their bank accounts. Morgan gives the stolen money to a self-help group called "Grace Note", run by Randall Fuller (John Benjamin Hickey). Mickey, Jimmy, and Douglas Morgan's "handler" Lena Caruso (Julie Lauren) are all found with symptoms of dehydration, starvation, and sleep deprivation. The story was "ripped from the headlines" of the Lisa McPherson case. "Grace Note" is clearly modeled after the Church of Scientology (at one point, Morgan even tells Det. Goren, "You're not clear.") Ironically, Karen Black, a long-time member of the Church of Scientology, plays Douglas Morgan's mother.

• Television show Scrubs in the episode "My Friend With Money" included the following line from character Jordan to Carla regarding postpartum depression: "You can't get rid of this by sheer force of will or positive thinking or taking advice from a big Hollywood movie star and the dead science fiction writer he worships."^[8]

• Norman Spinrad's novel The Mind Game (1980) is a story about a film director whose wife becomes involved in a religion/cult called "Transformationalism" created by a science fiction author. The cult maintains a Celebrity Center, and the Transformational enlightenment uses a process similar to auditing. The protagonist directly refers to Transformationalism as "one of those consciousness-raising cults, like Arica, EST, or Scientology, of which he had a low and jaundiced opinion."^[9]

• Neal Stephenson's cyberpunk novel Snow Crash (1992) includes a major character called L. Bob Rife, who is intent on brainwashing the world's population with an ancient Sumerian mind virus, and who has an ocean-going rag-tag fleet centered around a surplus aircraft carrier.

• Crisscross by F. Paul Wilson involves a corporation/religion/cult called the Dormentalists, which teaches converts how to awake their 'inner, personal Xelton'.

• K.A. Applegate's Animorphs series has a fictional counselling group known as "The Sharing", which is designed as a front for an alien invasion, and operates very much like scientology, at least in terms of recruitments.

• In the LucasArts adventure game Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge, the Phat City Public Library features a book titled "Dynanetics by L. Ron Gilbert", to which Guybrush Threepwood, the main protagonist of the game, quips, "Who does this guy think he is, anyway?" The book is an obvious spoof of both Scientology and the Monkey Island series creator Ron Gilbert. Simarly, in the LucasArts adventure game "Sam and Max Hit the Road", a minor character is shown reading a book called "Dialenics" by Elrod Hubbel. When asked about it by the protagonist, Sam, the character responds, "It's changing my life."

• The computer role-playing game Ultima VII: The Black Gate also contains references to Scientology with its own religion called "The Fellowship." Early on in the game, players are given the option to join the Fellowship and, in order to do so, subjected to a personality test by the leader, Batlin. Of course, any answer to any of the questions posed is interpreted as some character flaw; there are no "correct" answers that do not ultimately lead to the conclusion that the player character needs the Fellowship. The Fellowship also believes in basic tenets, the "Triad of Inner Strength" ("Strive for Unity", "Trust Thy Brother", and "Worthiness Precedes Reward"), which are actually intended to create blind loyalty to the Fellowship. In the end, the Fellowship is shown to be one of the ploys of the Guardian (a powerful, evil red alien creature) to corrupt and destroy Britannia, with Batlin being in on the plan.

• The computer role-playing game Fallout 2 has a religion named "The Hubologists". Much of the Hubologist teachings are similar to Scientology's teachings, and the name of its founder, Jackson Hubbell, is a direct allusion to Hubbard. By and large, actions that hurt the Hubologists are considered good things for the world of Fallout, and those that aid them are considered bad things for the world of Fallout. Being "scanned" and cleansed by Hubologists increases the luck of the protagonist but negatively affects his karma.

• The multi-platform video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas mentions a cult called the Epsilon Program that heavily parodies Scientology's symbols and activities.

• The popular computer real-time strategy game WarCraft III contains several quotes that might be considered to refer to scientology, all of which are given by the characters involved in the fictional "Cult of the Damned". References include Kel'Thuzad, the founder of the cult, saying things like "10000 gold in child-care and they call it a cult" , as well as the Undead Acolyte saying "Do you want to know the secret to eternal happiness? Page 246."(a likely reference to Dianetics: the Modern Science of Mental Health advertising).

• The publishers of the science fiction/fantasy role-playing game Shadowrun released The Universal Brotherhood (pub. 1990) that parodies Scientology's symbols and activities. The cover art depicts a large billboard with an erupting volcano a la Dianetics and betrays the plot, a cult of insect worshippers seeking to resurrect an insect kingdom on Earth.

• The Church of the Subgenius frequently parodies Scientology, especially in their "Pamphlet No.1" and The Book of the SubGenius. Other joke religions also frequently target Scientology.

• Band The Network parodies Scientology with the pseudo-cult "The Church of Lushotology" which claims that to live a totally toxic life is the best way to live. It parodies Scientology in its rating system (the final level is called 'Unclear') and its "founder" the fictional "R. Hal Nardubb"

• A detailed review of The Bridge, Brett Hanover's low-budget movie about Scientology