🔗 Share this article

The framework of futility is reloaded in this tediously complex sci-fi film, more a screensaver than an real cinematic experience. This is a third installment to the original movie Tron from the early 80s, a movie that was groundbreaking and courageously innovative for its time in a way that eludes this one and its forerunner Tron: Legacy from 2010. Tron: Ares almost awakens just once – when Evan Peters gets a smack in the face from Gillian Anderson portraying his mother, in an traditional bit of real-world action. That's a bit of firm parenting you might want to handing out to every producer involved in this film, and it's sad to see the estimable Greta Lee's role and Jodie Turner-Smith's character being made to look so uninspired.

Plot Overview of The New Tron Film

The scenario currently is that an malicious artificial intelligence company with the unsubtly gangster-ish name of Dillinger has become a competitor to the virtual reality firm Encom Inc, originally set up in the 1980s gaming period by brilliant innovator Kevin Flynn's character, portrayed by Jeff Bridges. This Dillinger (initially founded by Encom's executive Ed Dillinger's role, played by David Warner) is led by the founder’s odiously nerdish grandson's character Julian Dillinger (Evan Peters), who has a grand plan to develop and produce lucrative items such as indestructible soldiers and tanks in the VR world and then transfer them into actual reality using a kind of three-dimensional printer.

The issue is that however fearsome, these things crumble into dust after twenty-nine minutes. But Encom's present chief executive Eve Kim's character (Greta Lee) has discovered the MacGuffin-y “permanence algorithm” which can maintain these entities for ever, and even keeps it on her person on a extremely basic USB drive. So the ghastly Julian Dillinger deploys his enforcer on her: Ares, the superhuman fighter which can leave the VR world for twenty-nine minutes at a time but which, in the traditional way of robots, is starting to exhibit symptoms of disobeying what he's told. Jodie Turner-Smith's performance portrays Ares's stoic deputy Athena's role and poor Jeff Bridges has a wooden legacy appearance in wise white robes, like a budget Jor-El on Krypton.

Acting and Roles Breakdown

Moreover, Ares – the protagonist of the film's name – is acted by Jared Leto with hipsterish long hair, facial hair and subtly omniscient grin, details that were possibly created by inputting the words “incredibly irritating” into an AI human creation programme. Nobody who recalls the 90s TV classic My So-Called Life will always find it in their hearts to be totally rude about Mr Leto, and I was incidentally very entertained by his broad (and critically misunderstood) humorous performance in Ridley Scott's film House of Gucci. But Jared Leto is unremittingly, unrelentingly awful here, although his performance isn't aided by a weak storyline which is intended to allow him to display glimpses of “empathy” for Eve Kim's role and delegate all the villainous actions to Athena's character, thus rendering her slightly more engaging. It is supposed to be adorable when Ares says how he loves 80s synth pop and that Depeche Mode are better than Mozart.

Series Features and Overall Impact

Consistent with the brand-identity of the franchise, there are motorcycles from the virtual underworld which speed around the environment in long straight lines, adhering to the rectilinear design of classic video games (or indeed nightclubs); one even emits a lethal beam which cuts a cop car in two. But there is no drama or jeopardy or emotional engagement throughout. This series currently appears about as urgently contemporary as an automobile CD system.