Tron: Ares Review – Even Gillian Anderson Can't Save This Incredibly Boringly Complex Sci-Fi Movie

The framework of pointlessness is revisited in this tediously complex sci-fi movie, more a screensaver than an actual film. This is a third installment to the original movie Tron from 1982, a movie that was groundbreaking and boldly pioneering for its day in a way that eludes this film and its forerunner Tron Legacy from the previous decade. The new Tron film almost awakens just once – when Evan Peters' character gets a slap in the face from Gillian Anderson playing his mother, in an old-fashioned bit of analogue reality. This is a bit of firm parenting you might want to administering to all the producers engaged in this movie, and it's unfortunate to see the respected Greta Lee and Jodie Turner-Smith's character being made to look so lifeless.

Story Summary of The New Tron Film

The situation 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, originally set up in the 80s arcade-game era by brilliant innovator Kevin Flynn's character, portrayed by Jeff Bridges. This corporation (originally set up by Encom executive Ed Dillinger's role, acted by David Warner) is headed by the founder's annoyingly geeky grandson Julian (Evan Peters), who has a grand plan to design and create profitable things such as indestructible soldiers and armored vehicles in the VR world and then export them into actual reality using a sort of three-dimensional printer.

The issue is that no matter how intimidating, these creations crumble into dust after twenty-nine minutes. But Encom's current CEO Eve Kim (Greta Lee) has discovered the plot-driving “permanence code” which can keep these things alive permanently, and even keeps it on her person on a very low-tech flashdrive. So the dreadful Julian Dillinger deploys his enforcer on her: Ares, the superhuman fighter which can exit the virtual realm for 29 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 portrays Ares's deadpan second-in-command Athena and unfortunate Jeff Bridges has a leaden legacy cameo in wise white robes, like a budget Jor-El on Krypton's setting.

Acting and Roles Analysis

And Ares himself – the hero of the title – is played by Jared Leto with trendy lengthy locks, beard and faintly all-knowing smile, details that were perhaps designed by typing the words “extremely annoying” into an AI human creation programme. No one who remembers the 1990s television classic My So-Called Life will always find it in their hearts to be completely harsh about Jared Leto, and I was incidentally very entertained by his broad (and widely misinterpreted) humorous performance in Ridley Scott's movie House of Gucci. But Leto is consistently, unrelentingly awful here, although he isn't helped by a weak storyline which is intended to allow him to display glimpses of “empathy” for Eve Kim's role and subcontract all the badass wickedness to Athena's character, thus making her marginally more interesting. It is meant to be charming when Ares says how he loves 1980s electronic music and that Depeche Mode band are better than Mozart's compositions.

Series Features and Final Impression

Consistent with the brand-identity of the franchise, there are motorcycles from the VR netherworld which speed around the environment in long straight lines, conforming to the angular layout of antique arcade games (or even nightclubs); one even shoots out a death ray which cuts a cop car in two. But there is zero tension or danger or human interest anywhere. This series currently appears about as urgently contemporary as an automobile CD system.