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The framework of pointlessness is reloaded in this mind-bendingly dull science fiction movie, closer to a screensaver than an real cinematic experience. It's a third installment to the original movie Tron from the early 80s, a film 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 comes to life just one time – when Evan Peters' character gets a slap in the face from Gillian Anderson's character playing his mother, in an traditional bit of analogue reality. That's a bit of firm parenting you might want to handing out to all the producers involved in this film, and it's sad to see the respected Greta Lee and Jodie Turner-Smith's character being made to look so uninspired.

Story Summary of The New Tron Film

The scenario currently is that an malicious artificial intelligence company with the obviously criminal name of Dillinger has become a rival to the virtual reality firm Encom Inc, originally set up in the 80s arcade-game era by brilliant innovator Kevin Flynn, portrayed by Jeff Bridges. This corporation (initially founded by Encom executive Ed Dillinger's role, played by David Warner) is led 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 virtual reality grid and then export them into the real world using a sort of three-dimensional printer.

The problem is that no matter how intimidating, these things disintegrate after twenty-nine minutes. But Encom's current CEO Eve Kim's character (Greta Lee) has discovered the plot-driving “permanence algorithm” which can maintain these entities permanently, 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 exit the virtual realm for twenty-nine minutes at a time but which, in the time-honoured way of robots, is starting to exhibit symptoms of not doing what he's told. Jodie Turner-Smith portrays Ares's stoic deputy Athena's role and unfortunate Jeff Bridges has a leaden legacy cameo in wise white robes, like a Poundshop Jor-El on Krypton's setting.

Acting and Roles Breakdown

Moreover, Ares – the protagonist of the title – is played by Jared Leto with hipsterish long hair, facial hair and faintly all-knowing smile, touches that were possibly created by typing the words “extremely annoying” into an AI human creation programme. No one who remembers the 90s TV classic My So-Called Life series will ever find it in their hearts to be completely harsh about Mr Leto, and I was incidentally very entertained by his expansive (and widely misinterpreted) humorous performance in Ridley Scott's film House of Gucci. But Jared Leto is unremittingly, unrelentingly awful here, although he isn't helped by a weak storyline which is intended to allow him to display glimpses of “empathy” for Greta Lee's character and delegate all the villainous actions to Athena, thus making her marginally more interesting. It is meant to be charming when Ares the character says how he loves 1980s electronic music and that Depeche Mode band are better than Mozart.

Franchise Elements and Overall Impact

And in keeping with the brand-identity of the franchise, there are motorbikes from the VR netherworld which whizz about the place in long straight lines, adhering to the angular layout of antique arcade games (or even dance clubs); one even emits a death ray which slices a police vehicle in half. But there is zero tension or jeopardy or emotional engagement throughout. This franchise currently appears about as urgently contemporary as an automobile CD system.