yes, ‘The Master’ is based on Scientology and L. Ron Hubbard

Officially, ‘the Master’ is not about L.Ron Hubbard as he founded Scientology in the 1950’s. Unofficially, it’s totally about L. Ron Hubbard as he founded Scientology in the 1950’s.

Director Paul Thomas Anderson (‘There Will Be Blood’, ‘Boogie Nights’) won’t confirm it, but Marc Headley, who grew up in Scientology and worked in their headquarters for 15 years, read a copy of the script for the Daily Beast, and he found 22 similarities between Hubbard and the character played by Philip Seymour Hoffman in just the first 10 pages.

Even here, in the first full length trailer that was released today, we hear Hoffman ask this series of questions:

– Are you thoughtless in your remarks?
– Do your past failures bother you?
– Is your life a struggle?
– Is your behavior erratic?

Which are remarkably similar to these questions Hubbard wrote for the Scientology personalty test:

– Do you make thoughtless remarks or accusations which later you regret?
– Do your past failures still worry you?
– Is your life a constant struggle for survival?
– Are you often impulsive in your behavior?

So obviously Scientology is gonna go all apeshit over this; they’re not exactly “water under the bridge” kinda people. Anderson should add a song to the closing credits from Willow Smith about not letting haters get you down and maybe they’ll be like, “you know what, Willow Smith is right.”