Tron: Ares Film Analysis – Even Gillian Anderson Can't Rescue This Mind-Bendingly Dull Sci-Fi Movie
The matrix of pointlessness is revisited in this mind-bendingly dull sci-fi movie, more a screensaver than an actual film. It's a threequel to the classic Tron film from the early 80s, a movie that was mould-breaking and boldly pioneering for its time in a way that escapes this film and its forerunner Tron Legacy from 2010. Tron: Ares almost comes to life just one time – when Evan Peters' character gets a slap in the face from Gillian Anderson portraying his mother, in an old-fashioned bit of analogue reality. This is a piece of tough love 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 lifeless.
Plot Overview of Tron: Ares
The situation currently is that an malicious artificial intelligence company with the unsubtly gangster-ish name of Dillinger Corp has become a rival to the virtual reality firm Encom Inc, originally set up in the 1980s gaming period by genius trailblazer Kevin Flynn, played by Jeff Bridges. This corporation (initially founded by Encom's executive Ed Dillinger's role, played by David Warner) is headed by the founder’s annoyingly geeky grandson's character Julian Dillinger (Evan Peters), who has a ambitious scheme to develop and produce lucrative items such as indestructible soldiers and armored vehicles in the VR world and then transfer them into the real world using a sort of three-dimensional printer.
The problem is that however fearsome, these things disintegrate after twenty-nine minutes. But Encom's present chief executive Eve Kim's character (Greta Lee) has discovered the plot-driving “permanence code” which can maintain these entities for ever, and even keeps it on her person on a very low-tech flashdrive. So the ghastly Julian deploys his enforcer on her: Ares, the humanoid uber-warrior which can exit the virtual realm for twenty-nine minutes at a time but which, in the traditional way of androids, is starting to exhibit symptoms of not doing what he is commanded. Jodie Turner-Smith plays Ares's stoic deputy Athena's role and poor Jeff Bridges has a wooden legacy appearance in sage-like white garments, like a Poundshop Jor-El on Krypton.
Acting and Roles Analysis
Moreover, Ares – the protagonist of the title – is acted by Jared Leto with trendy lengthy locks, beard and faintly all-knowing smile, details that were possibly created by inputting the words “incredibly irritating” into an AI human creation programme. Nobody who remembers the 1990s television classic My So-Called Life will always find it in their hearts to be completely harsh about Mr Leto, and I was also quite amused by his expansive (and widely misinterpreted) comic turn in Ridley Scott's movie House of Gucci. But Leto is unremittingly, persistently awful in this film, although he isn't helped by a limp plot point which is supposed to allow him to display glimpses of “compassion” for Greta Lee's character and subcontract all the villainous actions to Athena's character, thus rendering her slightly more engaging. It is meant to be adorable when Ares the character says how he adores 1980s electronic music and that Depeche Mode are better than Mozart's compositions.
Franchise Elements and Overall Impact
Consistent with the franchise identity of the franchise, there are motorcycles from the VR netherworld which whizz about the environment in long straight lines, adhering to the rectilinear design of classic video games (or even dance clubs); one even shoots out a death ray which slices a cop car in two. But there is no drama or danger or emotional engagement throughout. This series currently appears about as urgently contemporary as an automobile CD system.
