🔗 Share this article

The matrix of pointlessness is revisited in this mind-bendingly dull sci-fi film, closer to a screensaver than an real cinematic experience. This is a third installment to the classic Tron film from the early 80s, a film that was groundbreaking and courageously innovative for its time in a way that escapes this one and its predecessor Tron Legacy from 2010. Tron: Ares almost awakens just once – when Evan Peters' character gets a slap in the face from Gillian Anderson's character playing his mother, in an old-fashioned bit of analogue reality. That's a piece of tough love you might want to administering to all the producers involved in this movie, and it's sad to see the estimable Greta Lee and Jodie Turner-Smith being made to look so lifeless.

Plot Overview 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 competitor to the virtual reality firm Encom, originally set up in the 80s arcade-game era by brilliant innovator Kevin Flynn, played by Jeff Bridges. This corporation (originally set up by Encom's executive Ed Dillinger, acted by David Warner) is led by the founder’s annoyingly geeky grandson's character Julian (Evan Peters), who has a ambitious scheme to design and create profitable things such as invincible troops 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 29 minutes. But Encom's present chief executive Eve Kim's character (Greta Lee) has discovered the plot-driving “permanence algorithm” which can maintain these entities for ever, and even stores it on her person on a extremely basic USB drive. So the dreadful Julian Dillinger sets his attack dog on her: Ares the warrior, the humanoid uber-warrior which can exit the virtual realm for twenty-nine minutes at a time but which, in the time-honoured way of androids, is beginning to show signs of not doing what he's told. Jodie Turner-Smith portrays Ares's stoic deputy Athena and poor Bridges has a leaden legacy cameo in sage-like white garments, like a Poundshop Jor-El on Krypton's setting.

Character and Performance Breakdown

And Ares himself – the hero of the title – is acted by Jared Leto with hipsterish long hair, beard and subtly omniscient grin, touches that were perhaps created by inputting the words “extremely annoying” into an AI human creation programme. Nobody who remembers the 90s TV classic My So-Called Life series will always find it in their hearts to be totally rude about Mr Leto, and I was also very entertained by his broad (and widely misinterpreted) comic turn in Ridley Scott's film House of Gucci. But Leto is consistently, persistently awful in this film, although his performance isn't aided by a limp plot point which is intended to allow him to display glimpses of “compassion” for Greta Lee's character and delegate all the villainous actions to Athena, thus rendering her marginally more interesting. It is supposed to be adorable when Ares says how he loves 1980s electronic music and that Depeche Mode band are superior to Mozart's compositions.

Series Features and Overall Impact

And in keeping with the brand-identity of the franchise, there are motorbikes from the VR netherworld which speed around the place in long straight lines, adhering to the rectilinear design of classic video games (or indeed dance clubs); a single bike even emits a lethal beam which cuts a police vehicle in two. But there is no drama or jeopardy or emotional engagement anywhere. This series currently appears about as urgently contemporary as an in-car CD player.