Something that encapsulates what is wrong with 2010’s Tron: Legacy is the Tron game cabinet in Jeff Bridges’s arcade. First, it is weird that Garrett Hedlund, as Bridges’s now-grown son, finds any of the cabinets still there, as the premises appear to be disused since the events of 1982’s Tron film. Secondly, the place still has power, though the neighborhood appears to now be abandoned. But what gets me is the Tron cabinet appears to be the Bally/Midway original (though rebranded as being made by ENCOM, the company from the 1982 film), complete with the same side art, meaning it has images of David Warner and Bruce Boxleitner on it.
I realize it could be ENCOM made the game after the events of the original movie, and Bridges, now the CEO of the company, could have had a hand in designing the artwork. The images could then be explained as he simply communicated what he had seen in the digital realm. Except, what we see here is the same lightcycle game that was in the first film, so does this mean they re-released a currently popular game and redid the cabinet just to incorporate imagery that wouldn’t make sense to anybody but Bridges?
This may be nitpicking, but the problem is that I was thinking about this at all. I found I was barely paying attention when Hedlund discovers that cabinet can be moved to reveal a secret room behind the arcade where Bridges had his own terminal and, just like in the original Tron, a laser inexplicably pointed at the back of the person seated there. I love how he apparently didn’t learn any lessons from the first journey there, and didn’t point the laser away from the chair from which it is controlled. I would think he could just put it on a timer, but what do I know.
Anyhoo, Hedlund follows dad’s digital footsteps and also gets zapped into the computer world. But it definitely isn’t the world of the 1982 film. All that extra computing power available since then means a world of largely blackness, with only the edges of objects colored, becomes a much visually richer environment, complete with mist. I wondered aloud about that mist, and why would that exist, and my wife said the virtual world is so big that it has its own virtual atmosphere. How I wish I had been sharp enough to come up with that bon mot.
For being able to create whatever he wanted, Bridges created one dour world. “The Grid”, as he calls it, is all a weak whitish green. Since everything also glows, it is a bit like the kingdom of the Nazgul. As much as I loved the look of that, I wouldn’t want a universe where everything has that appearance. Its appearance in Lord of the Rings was stunning because it looked different than everything else.
Like a god, Bridges creates Clu in his image and delegates to his digital doppelganger the actual creation of the world. Bridges also ropes in Bruce Boxleitner’s Tron character from the first picture. There was once a popular anti-gay slogan, “God didn’t create Adam and Steve” but, if we’re going by Biblical analogies here, this world begins with Clu and Tron. Similar to the origins of Lucifer, Clu will feel betrayed by Bridges and become a diabolical figure who will corrupt Tron into a ruthless killer. So, it is already becoming increasing strange this picture is carrying the “Tron” title onward in name only, as he will be far from the central figure. Taking my Bible analogy even further, it would be like if that book, including the New Testament, was titled “Tales of Noah”.
Just like in the initial installment of this series, Hedlund’s fish out of digital water will be forced to play video games. As the years pass, I am increasingly confused by the first movie’s interaction of human players controlling characters versus the apparent free will of those characters in the digital realm. In Legacy, stadiums full of Non-Playable Characters observe what appear to be matches without the involvement of human players, which feels especially pointless. It is like one of those old arcade games if it never got past the attract screen, that stuff which cycled on the screen when nobody was playing.
Admittedly, these are interesting new twists on the events we last saw nearly three decades earlier. The ring and disc games get combined into something in smaller, closed environments where thrown discs can either wipe out combatants or large, hexagonal tiles the floor. It appears gravity is whimsically subject to change, with Hedlund on the underside of the floor of one of these enclosures at one point as he fights the now-evil Tron, who has two discs. Hedlund says, “Aw, c’mon, is that even legal?”, which is amusing, even if that kind of line is boilerplate action dialogue.
The biggest improvement is to the lightcycles. The arena is now multitiered, and cycles can apparently be flipped at points to change which side of a surface a cycle is riding upon. I wonder if this is secretly how Lionel Ritchie ended up dancing on the ceiling. Those cycles also now make very smooth, flowing turns, as opposed to the hard-right angles of those in the original film.
This is something else which is emblematic of how I feel this movie pales to its predecessor. While nothing in the real world is as impressive as the cycles here, and the gelatinous, glowing walls they leave in their wake, the machines still move in a manner comparable to real motorcycles on Earth. But nothing in reality makes completely 90 degree turns without stopping first. That is one of the things which made the world of Tron so astonishingly foreign.
Similarly, the 2010 picture has an even more loosely defined grasp of physics than film by Michael Bay. I was mildly peeved the immense Recognizers now need to be propelled by some sort of thrust engine, when they originally just floated wherever they needed to go. How they used to move was creepy and mysterious. How they move now is still not something possible in our world, but it works by means we use to propel other vehicles.
I almost forgot about the plot, though the movie won’t let you forget it for long. Bridges has been exiled by Clu. Everybody but Bridges is trying to get out of their digital domain and out into the real world, via the portal opened by Hedlund, which is going to close again shortly. Characters sure talk a lot here without actually saying much of anything, giving many passages of the runtime the feel of those cutscenes which were the bane of computer games for many years.
Many of such scenes feature Olivia Wilde. I wish I could say I was adverse to the charms of her big-eyed, skin-tight-latex-clad manic pixie dream girl, but I must concede I was a bit smitten. As an eventual love interest for Hedlund, I like to imagine he later had a surprise, discovering this manic pixel dream girl has nothing below the waist. She appears to be the only person assisting Bridges, and she has read the books he brought in from the outside world, something else I found odd, as he could simply have digital books in the digital world. Anyhoo, she says how much she loves Jules Verne and asks Hedlund if he knows him. Misunderstanding the question, Hedlund says he does, and she excitedly asks, “What’s he like?” That was mildly funny on the first viewing and too cute by additional degrees with each subsequent viewing.
Something which is barely touched upon is this manic pixel dream girl (to be precise) is an “Iso”, one of the great many programs which just mysteriously appear as Bridges and Clu start making their world. In a flashback, we see these shrouded figures in a long procession, and it is easy to imagine them as an analogy to the Jews who wandered in the desert. That the Isos are “purged” by Clu and his thugs then have even more uncomfortable associations. Clu addressing an army in perfect formation looks like a sci-fi spin on Triumph of the Will, complete with his stated intention of purging the world of imperfections.
What I least expected from such an action-heavy picture is how boring it is. There is a scene near the end which is an aerial battle between essentially a flying fortress, complete with tail gunner, versus several smaller planes which leave trails in their wake akin to the lightcycles. That this could fail to be engaging is baffling. That the characters say stock action movie lines like “I don’t think this is such a good idea” doesn’t help. Yet the movie just keeps hitting us with action scenes interspersed with interminable monologues until the audience is numb. Frankly, I was never fully immersed after the lightcycle arena scene is over, as that is the best scene by far. Alas, even that went on too long, proving the similar scene in the original film worked because it left you wanting more.
Another issue with this film is how committed it is to being fan service, almost as much as the recent Ghostbusters sequels. I felt nothing when Hedlund opens the door to ENCOM and echoes his father’s “Now that is a big door…” from the original. Hedlund’s first words in the computer world is “This isn’t happening”, again the same as Bridges says, except dad had appended that with the curious “it only thinks it’s happening”. That the movie can’t think of an equal, or superior, line is telling.
I also find it peculiar the exponentially improved CGI technologies made for a less visually interesting world. There are many reasons nothing looks like the original Tron. For one, there wouldn’t be a reason for anything else to emulate it unless it was a sequel made shortly after. But the universe of Legacy looks similar to other worlds we have seen in an era where most of what we see on the screen in computer generated. Tron, for better or worse, is incredibly distinctive visually. Legacy looks like The Matrix.
One technology which had not advanced enough to be convincing is the de-aging of Bridges so that Clu is forever the actor back in 1982. For all the stink people made over The Polar Express when that was first released, it is astonishing how horrible young Bridges looks. We first see the effect in ’82, on the last night he will see his son. I’m not sure where their house is located, except it is obvious Bridges lives in Uncanny Valley. Also, I was bemused by the info dump delivered by news broadcasts we see on old televisions. I expected one of them to announced we were watching ENN: The Exposition News Network.
If there is one element of the film which stands on its own, it is the score by Daft Punk. It would be difficult to top the previous entry’s score by Wendy Carlos, so they make something which does not reference that in any way except to be largely sparse in its arrangements. The duo even has a cameo in a scene in Michael Sheen’s club, which was a nice touch. On the other hand, I’m still not sure what to make of Sheen’s high-camp act, with him looking like an albino Ziggy Stardust channeling Joel Grey from Cabaret.
The strangest aspect of Tron: Legacy is how much more conventional it is than the original Tron. By striving to produce a more conventional film that would be far more palatable to an audience unreceptive to the first picture, the filmmakers created something that is neither fish nor fowl. When it isn’t straight-up fan service, it is typical action fare of the period and it becomes wearying and dull, to boot. It may be an extension of Tron, but I can’t say it honors any legacy.
Dir: Joseph Kosinski
Starring Jeff Bridges, Garrett Hedlund, Olivia Wilde, Bruce Boxleitner
Watched on Disney 4K UHD blu-ray