English Dub Review: Dragon Heart – Adventures Beyond This World

This review is a first for me. I’ve covered lots of unique and strangely made shows and movies made in unorthodox circumstances and sometimes not made with the best of intentions, but I have never, in my near decade of professional animation reviewing, covered a movie made by a cult until now. This film is the tenth animated movie produced by the “new religious movement” Happy Science. If that name is familiar to you, you may have seen the series of videos by Anime Youtuber “Mother’s Basement” when he covered the previous nine anime movies on his channel, and I’m sure he’ll be cooking up one for this soon enough. Though this tenth movie is significant among the rest as it is the first anime movie of theirs released since the death of the cult’s founder, who went by the name “Ryuho Okawa” and claimed he was the reincarnation of some holy deity, as cult leaders tend to do. He still executive produced it and came up with the original story, apparently based on a fantasy book he wrote some time ago, but now that his spirit has returned to its home planet or whatever the fuck, it’s hard to say what the future is for this organization’s illustrious film ambitions.

The movie follows Ryusuke Tagawa (which may be a name based on Ryuho Okawa, as previous movies have done something like that before) as he takes a trip to visit his cousin, Tomomi Sato, after his friends bail from a mountain hiking trip they all planned. While there, the two get swept up in a local river and soon find that they have died, but can get help coming back to life if they explore the spirit world and find their greater purpose in life. On its face, that doesn’t sound like that bad of a premise; having some kids journey through mystical lands to learn more about themselves is the start of plenty of iconic films, like The Never Ending Story and Spirited Away to name a few. But it becomes clear pretty soon into the runtime that this is pretty much just a thin veneer of an excuse to cram in as many sermons about how Happy Science interprets spirituality as possible, as the kids encounter several hells made specifically for people who commit any number of horrible transgressions, such as cyberbullying, sex work, being a climate change activist, and worst of all, being a (gasp) ATHIEST. Though the cherry on top of these backwards beliefs is them trying to throw in what at first sounds like a catchy song, but is actually a sung narration of what is happening on screen, as if that is not a transparent attempt to pad out the movie when there is no dialogue.

This is not even the first time that a Happy Science movie has had a premise like this, though the only possible reason to watch this one would be for a bad movie night with some pals, and even then, you would be better off watching some of the older movies of theirs that get ridiculous moments like a talking Hellen Keller and alien races manipulating the Chinese government. Fortunately (or rather unfortunately) the cast for these movies is often full of good voice talent, in this case having the Ryusuke voiced in English by Zach Aguilar, hot off his appearance as Tanjiro in the recent Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle movie. But voice actors have to take the work where they can get it so I don’t exactly hold it against him for taking this job. Still, as this is the product of a horrible and manipulative cult that also has ties to the US’s Republican Party, I can only tell you to avoid it at all costs. Maybe watch Battlefield Earth and it’ll scratch the same itch as this but with a funny John Travolta performance.