I’m a big Tron fan. I love the original movie. Definitely love Tron Legacy and thought it was a pretty good sequel to an iconic film. But after watching Tron Ares… I don’t know what I was watching, I just know that it wasn’t good. That’s right nerds and film fans, I’m calling the third Tron movie what it is…. All style and no substance! It’s a gorgeous movie. Visually it looks great. The soundtrack by Nine Inch Nails is good even if it’s not as good as what Daft Punk did for Tron Legacy, But, in my opinion this movie relies too much on nostalgia and visuals while having lazy storytelling and no real connection to the last two movies. Sure, it mentions Kevin Flynn as the creator of the grid. You get a nice cameo by Jeff Bridges, but this movie does not feel like a sequel to the other two films or even a conclusion to a trilogy and that’s what I am mostly disappointed with. There was a planned sequel to Tron Legacy, a third film that would have completed a trilogy and connected all the storylines, we know there was such a story line, but when Disney took over Star Wars, the third movie was quickly scrapped because they had Star Wars and nobody cared about Tron. From what I understand there are elements of that story in this movie, but I think it’s only the nostalgia factor because Tron Ares doesn’t really answer any question about what happened after Tron Legacy. The only thing we get and yes, this is a bit of a spoiler, Sam Flynn resigned as CEO of Encom at some point for personal reasons which gives us our new main character, the new CEO played by Greta Lee. She’s good in this movie, but not even a good actress can save a bad story… They can make it better, but they can’t fix a bad story and unfortunately that’s the biggest problem with Tron Ares. But we’ll start with what’s actually good in this movie.
The visuals and the action are the best parts of this movie. In many ways it feels like the other Tron films. Even the program of Ares returning to a classic grid and meeting what is a manifestation of Kevin Flynn. Yes that may be a spoiler, but I’ll get into why this adds to bad storytelling. There’s a lot of nice things that they use to try and connect us to the other films, but this doesn’t feel like a Kevin or Sam Flynn story and what made Tron Legacy a really good sequel is the family connection. It was a father and son story. It was a son looking for his father and then finding purpose with his life once he found his dad. One of the major themes is taking something from the grid into the real world, well unfortunately this movie tries to rehash that plot line with a lazy story of AI sort of becoming sentient and coming into the real world. The problem being, we’ve seen that storyline too many times and if we’re going to explore AI characters trying to understand humanity, you’re never going to beat Star Trek and the character of Data or a Terminator learning to be more human so it can fit in. There’s too many storylines about AI and Tron was never about AI. Yes maybe the beginning movie explores how something could become AI from a philosophical standpoint, but it created a concept that was not only brilliant storytelling, it was a smart idea on what it means to be any kind of being. We already have it oversaturated market when it comes to AI stories… Tron didn’t need to add to the problem. Jared Leto is an interesting choice to play Ares. I’ll admit that I’m indifferent to his casting, but could definitely see other actors take on the role and do it better. My biggest problem is his look, can we have a story where he doesn’t look like a Jesus figure. The grid or the digital world seems so clean so when you’re a main character looks like a dirty hippie who doesn’t believe in deodorant, it’s kind of off-putting. Everybody else looks great. But yes, Jared Leto’s look is a problem in this movie. I’m sorry to say that, but it is. Hand Greta Lee offer some good performances that make you emotionally invested in their characters. There seems on the grid are pretty good, but unfortunately doesn’t add much to the story. The action and the visuals and even the music, the filmmakers got that right…even the nostalgia of the original movie grid that Ares goes to was cool.
I’ll admit that I have a lot of problems with this film being a big Tron fan, but my biggest gripe and it should be yours as well if you’re a fan of the Tron stories… it’s like they forgot that there had been a sequel to the original Tron movie. One little mention of a character and a photo and that’s it. What happened with Sam Flynn and Cora? How did they change the world or at least try? Where are they? Is Kevin Flynn still alive on the grid trying to rebuild it after defeating Clu? This movie answers none of these questions and seems to forget the story of Tron Legacy. The story of this movie is really just a hacking story between two CEOs battling each other for the code that can permanently bring something from the grid into the real world. They essentially hack each other. And when you do a hacking movie with all of these great visuals, it really takes me back to one of the best hacking movies ever which is Angelina Jolie in the 1995 movie Hackers. At times it was like I was watching a modern version of that movie. It’s clear that Tron Ares was originally meant to be the third movie in a trilogy, But somewhere along the line they decided to do something completely different and even ignore the lore of the original movies. Sure it’s great to have the grandson of the original antagonist, Ed Dellinger be the villain of this story… He’s like an unhinged psychopath. I like the call back where Dillinger is still competing with Encom, there was no need to have Gillian Anderson play his mother because she’s kind of a useless character in the movie and that’s a complete waste of talent when It comes to her. Her story is not even that interesting. Just a mother trying to control her psychopath of a son. I guess the connection between mother and son is supposed to be on the same emotional level as father and son in Tron Legacy, but it doesn’t work. I came away with too many questions about the grids and Kevin Flynn’s tech and what happened to the other characters from the previous films. How do they connect to this story and how are these characters going to connect to them. What should have been a really good trilogy is two good films with a wasted movie and now you have to make another one just to answer all of the questions that you leave unanswered. I don’t mind introducing new characters, but how do they connect to the other characters within the Tron lore Because this is always been a story centered on Kevin Flynn and his creation of the grid and how his creation almost destroyed him and his family. That’s what this story should be, answering those questions while expanding on new storylines. Plus, we don’t need a glorified cameo of Kevin Flynn that’s not really Kevin Flynn and doesn’t answer the question of he is still alive on the grid. This was one of the most infuriating parts of the movie.
Sadly, Tron Ares is just a huge disappointment. Now I want to know what the original storyline was with Sam, Cora, and Kevin Flynn because I know for a fact that that had to have been a better story than what’s in this movie. Tron Ares can certainly work as a standalone story within the Tron universe if it connects to a bigger story with the legacy characters, but when you leave too many unanswered questions and you don’t give fans a reason to care. Mysteries are meant to be solved And you can’t fix a bad story with fantastic visuals in action, it’s not enough. I’ll give you an example. We had all sorts of standalone movies in the Marvel Universe that led to bigger movies when all the characters came together. This feels like a standalone movie introducing new characters to a bigger story, but the question is will we actually get that story and bring everybody back. At this point probably not so that just leaves us with two really good Tron movies and a half-ass attempt to connect to those movies with a film that’s all style and no substance. I know it’s been 15 years since Tron Legacy, but this is a wasted opportunity and just a typical Disney movie where they throw out something that is visually stunning with some nostalgia, but doesn’t offer anything new… wait did I just describe the sequel trilogy! You may think I’m being too harsh on this movie, and yes, I am Because 43 years ago we had a really great iconic movie about a digital world that was not only visually beautiful but had a great story. Then somebody came up with a sequel that connected to the next generation, and it became a father and son story and using the lessons of the grid to help make the world a better place. We should have gotten to follow up to that story, but Disney didn’t want to do that and here we go again where they try to fool us with gorgeous graphics and nostalgia. Well that shit’s getting old, but that seems to be the Disney brand these days and it doesn’t make their movies worth seeing in the theater. Tron Ares is only worth watching for free on Disney + and even then, you might as well just watch the first two movies because I guarantee you’ll enjoy them more than this one. For me, I’m going to forget this movie even exist in the Tron universe just like the Matrix Resurrections… movies that never needed to be made.
