Tron: Ares Review – Despite Gillian Anderson's Efforts Fails to Rescue This Boringly Complex Sci-Fi Film

The framework of futility is reloaded in this mind-bendingly dull science fiction movie, closer to a screensaver than an real cinematic experience. It's a threequel to the original movie Tron from the early 80s, a movie that was mould-breaking and boldly pioneering for its day in a way that eludes this film and its forerunner Tron Legacy from the previous decade. Tron: Ares almost awakens just once – when Evan Peters gets a slap in the face from Gillian Anderson playing his mother, in an old-fashioned bit of analogue reality. This is a piece of tough love you might want to administering to every producer involved in this movie, and it's sad to see the respected Greta Lee's role and Jodie Turner-Smith's character being made to look so lifeless.

Plot Overview of The New Tron Film

The situation currently is that an malicious artificial intelligence company with the obviously criminal name of Dillinger Corp has become a rival to the VR company Encom, first established in the 80s arcade-game era by genius trailblazer Kevin Flynn, portrayed by Jeff Bridges. This Dillinger (initially founded by Encom executive Ed Dillinger's role, acted by David Warner) is led by the founder’s odiously nerdish grandson Julian Dillinger (Evan Peters), who has a ambitious scheme to develop and produce profitable things such as invincible troops and tanks in the virtual reality grid and then export them into actual reality using a kind of 3D printer.

The problem is that however fearsome, these creations disintegrate after 29 minutes. But Encom's current CEO Eve Kim's character (Greta Lee) has uncovered the MacGuffin-y “permanence code” which can maintain these entities permanently, and even stores it on her person on a extremely basic USB drive. So the dreadful Julian sets his attack dog on her: Ares the warrior, the humanoid uber-warrior which can leave the VR world for 29 minutes at a time but which, in the traditional way of robots, is beginning to show signs of disobeying what he is commanded. Jodie Turner-Smith's performance plays Ares's deadpan second-in-command Athena's role and unfortunate Jeff Bridges has a wooden legacy appearance in sage-like white garments, like a budget Jor-El on Krypton.

Acting and Roles Analysis

And Ares himself – the hero of the title – is acted by Jared Leto with trendy lengthy locks, beard and subtly omniscient grin, touches that were possibly created by typing the words “incredibly irritating” into an AI human creation programme. Nobody who remembers the 90s TV classic My So-Called Life will ever find it in their hearts to be totally rude about Jared Leto, and I was incidentally quite amused by his broad (and widely misinterpreted) comic turn in Ridley Scott's movie House of Gucci. But Jared Leto is unremittingly, persistently awful in this film, although he isn't helped by a weak storyline which is supposed to allow him to display glimpses of “compassion” for Greta Lee's character and delegate all the villainous actions to Athena's character, thus rendering her slightly more engaging. It is supposed to be charming when Ares says how he loves 1980s electronic music and that Depeche Mode are better than Mozart's compositions.

Franchise Elements and Final Impression

Consistent with the brand-identity of the franchise, there are motorbikes from the virtual underworld which whizz about the place in linear paths, adhering to the angular layout of antique arcade games (or indeed dance clubs); one even emits a death ray which cuts a police vehicle in half. But there is zero tension or danger or human interest throughout. This series now looks as relevant as an automobile CD system.