Review - Tron: Legacy (2010)

       Hey guys, Chuck here, and I thought it might be fun to dive back into the world of Disney's Tron. As years had passed since the release of the 1982 original, Tron had grown into a cult classic with a fandom that was interested in returning to the world of the Grid. Years would pass with rumor after rumor of a sequel to Tron. And finally in 2010, Disney would release their highly anticipated sequel to the 1982 sci-fi classic. Tron: Legacy would be helmed by first time director Joseph Kosinski, and would see series creator Steven Lisberger in a producer role. Original film actors Jeff Bridges and Bruce Boxleitner would return as Kevin Flynn/Clu and Alan Bradley/Tron, and would be joined by newcomers like Garrett Hedlund, Olivia Wilde, Michael Sheen, James Frain, Beau Garrett, Serinda Swan, Yaya DaCosta, Jeffrey Nordling, and Cillian Murphy. 

        So, some years have passed since Kevin Flynn was first brought into the world of the Grid, and he's since become a success as the CEO of ENCOM, creating a successful arcade game based on his time in the Grid called Tron (a reflection on the line of Tron arcade games made after the first movie hot theaters). In addition, Kevin has been secretly building a new Grid with help from Tron, or rather a copy of the original Tron, and Clu, well Clu 2. Anyway, Kevin tells the story of the Grid to his son, Sam, and heads off to the arcade to work. That night, however, he disappears. As the years go on, ENCOM starts to lose profits as Kevin's interim replacement and best friend, Alan Bradley, is adamant on keeping Kevin's legacy alive. Cut to present times, where a now adult Sam Flynn is ENCOM's largest shareholder, and the company is under the thumb of chairman Richard Mackey, who is preparing to roll out a new software called ENCOM OS-12, which was designed by the head of ENCOM's software design team, Edward Dillinger, Jr. Yes, much like Kevin Flynn had a son, Dillinger had a son, as well. Sam, meanwhile, breaks into ENCOM and uploads the OS-12 master file onto the internet, replacing it with a video of his dog, Marvin. 

        After a massive triple Axel off the roof of ENCOM Tower, Sam is arrested and held for a few hours, returning home to find Alan waiting for him. It's in this conversation that we learn Sam chose NOT to become CEO of ENCOM, and he enjoys pulling pranks on the company on a regular basis instead. However, Alan reveals that he received a page from Sam's father's office...at the arcade. This was shocking as the arcade's phone number was disconnected for twenty years. Alan gives S the keys to the arcade, feeling that Sam should be the one to investigate. Sam arrives at Flynn's Arcade, and turns on the power, reactivating the arcade cabinets and even the jukebox, which plays both "Separate Ways (World's Apart)" by Journey and "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)" by Eurythmics. Cool. Anyway, Sam finds a secret passage to the basement behind one of the arcade cabinets. The one for Tron, to be specific. In the basement, Sam finds a secret computer lab, activates the console, and then activates the teleport laser, which sends him to the Grid, where he is picked up amongst other stray Programs and taken via Recognizer to a massive Arena, where Programs are assigned to either be sent to the Rectifier or the Games. 

      Okay, let's break something down here just a minute, because there is definitely an upgrade to the overall visual aesthetic of the Grid in this movie. Everything from the suit designs to the vehicles to the massive city known as Tron City. Everything feels like it belongs in this universe and also feels like time has evolved the Grid into something spectacular. Hell, even director Joseph Kosinski and producer Steven Lisberger described this movie's version of the Grid as a kind-of Digital Galapagos, a world in the computer untouched by man or the Internet, but somehow evolved and self-sustaining. I swear, when I saw this movie in 2010, it was the world of the Grid that truly blew me away. 

       Anyway, Sam is assigned to compete in the Games, and is given a new outfit and an Identity Disk from a quartet of Programs called Sirens. And after getting geared up and told to "survive," Sam heads into the Arena where he competes in a game called "Disk Wars," where he faces a couple of Programs and wins, but unintentionally skips to the final match against a Program called Rinzler. As the match goes on, Sam is cut, and spotting the blood, Rinzler realizes that Sam is a User. Revealing his identity, Sam is taken to the leader of the world of the Grid. Initially believing it to be his father, this turns out to be Clu, who then takes Sam to another arena, the Light Cycle arena. Sam teams up with other Programs to take on Clu and his team. By the time it's down to just Sam and Clu, a masked program arrives to rescue Sam from the Light Cycle arena. This program reveals herself to be Quorra, and she takes Sam to a safe place that is off grid, and thus they won't be followed by Club and his followers. 

       It's here where we see Sam reunite with his father, and Kevin is so relieved to see his now grown up son. And it's here where Sam reveals a few things that have happened to him since Kevin disappeared: he attended Kevin's alma mater of Caltech, his dog Marvin is a rescue, and he only checks in on ENCOM once a year, usually with a prank. Kevin then reveals that, brought a copy of Tron, and also created Clu, to help him work on building the Grid, as he needed partners so he could divide his time between the Grid, the arcade, ENCOM, and raising Sam. However, it was when he discovered a miracle that his entire world view changed. It's here where Kevin tells Sam about the ISOs, short for Isomorphic Algorithms. The ISOs manifested themselves into existence on the Grid, coming into existence based on the right set of conditions. Kevin planned to have the ISOs be his gift to the world, as the knowledge they contained within their coding could unlock so much for humanity. But, unfortunately, Clu saw them as an imperfection, and betrayed Kevin and Tron, seemingly destroying the latter, whilst the former fled into the outlands and was trapped when the portal closed. However, Sam's arrival reopened the portal, and Sam suggests making a beeline for the portal and get Kevin home. Unfortunately, Clu is after Kevin's disk, as it's a master key capable of allowing Programs to be released into the User World. And if Clu gets out, he will do to the User World what he did to the Grid: wipe out any imperfections. This is something that Kevin wouldn't allow. 

        Sam, however, still plans on getting to the portal, as he can still get out and delete Clu from the outside. Quorra sends Sam to a program she once knew, Zuse, to help him get to the portal. Returning to Tron City, Sam meets one of the Sirens from earlier, and she takes him to the End of Line Club. The club's owner, Castor, takes Sam to his private lounge along with the Siren, Gem. Castor reveals himself to be Zuse, and it turns out he's betrayed Sam, as Clu's guards attack the Club. Sam and Quorra join the fight, along with rebel programs, but Quorra loses an arm. The tone changes when Kevin arrives, and he, Sam, and Quorra get away. Unfortunately, a guard nabs Kevin's disk, and Castor takes it for himself with the plan being to deliver it to Clu personally. 

         On board a Solar Sailer, Kevin restores Quorra's arm by accessing her coding, and it's here where we learn that she's the last of the ISOs. Sam also gets Kevin caught up on everything going on at that time in the real world, including the concept of WiFi (which Kevin claims to have thought of back in the '80s), and that Kevin's parents both passed away. Also, San got Kevin's old Ducati out of the garage and started fixing it up. Quorra then reawakens and she and Sam have a bonding moment. 

        Clu heads to the End of Line Club and takes the disk from Castor, destroying the club on his way out. As for the Solar Sailer, it ends up docking with the Rectifier, where Clu takes Kevin's disk. Quorra gets herself caught by Rinzler, whom Kevin recognizes as a reprogrammed Tron. It's during a massive speech to his followers that Clu reveals his master plan: use the disk of Kevin Flynn, the master key to the outside world, and grow their system and rid the outside world of imperfection. Sam sends Kevin to fetch a ride for their escape, whilst Sam himself goes after Kevin's disk. After dispatching some Sentries, Clu's right-hand man Jarvis allows him to take the disk, and Rinzler arrives with Quorra. Sam and Quorra fight him off, and the two make their way to a Light Jet that Kevin commandeered, and the.three make their escape. Clu, after getting rid of Jarvis for his betrayal, takes Rinzler and three Sentries to the sky with single-pilot Light Jets. 

       During the aerial battle that ensues, the Sentries are defeated, Rinzler remembers that he's Tron and fights for the Users, but Clu knocks him into the Sea of Simulation. Kevin, Sam, and Quorra reach the Portal, but Clu is waiting for them. Kevin apologizes to Clu, having failed to realize something when he created Clu: perfection is unknowable and impossible, but also right in front of us all the time. Clu fights him off, Sam tackles Club, and Quorra holds Clu back, pushing Sam towards the Portal. It's revealed, however, that Kevin and Quorra swapped disks, meaning that SHE has the master key, allowing Sam and herself to escape. Kevin, in a Hail Mary move, reintegrates Clu with himself, causing both to be destroyed, along with everything on the Grid that Clu built. 

        Back in the real world, Sam downloads a backup of the Grid onto a data card, shutting the computer down for good. Sam then tells Alan that he's taking ENCOM back, with Alan at the new Chairman of the Board, replacing Mackey. After turning on the neon sign for Flynn's Arcade, Sam heads outside, where he takes Quorra for a ride to experience her first real sunrise, ending the movie. 

       Okay, so I saw this movie twice in the theater, and both times in 3D, and I loved it. The set design was just massive, with the circuitry lines being accentuated with light and it's just incredible. Hell, even the suits were self-lit in this movie with flexible LED strips, which was really cool. The vehicle designs, both practical and digital, were incredible. I know I gushed about the production design in this movie earlier in this review, but seriously, it's absolutely incredible just how far we've come in terms of visual effects, both practical and digital, since the original Tron that we can physically build the world of The Grid. Also, I gotta give a huge shout out to cinematographer Claudio Miranda, who has served as the cinematographer for every Joseph Kosinski film since Tron: Legacy, for his incredible work in framing this movie with absolutely gorgeous shots. 

         Both Jeff Bridges and Bruce Boxleitner, despite not sharing much screen time in this movie, were fantastic as the returning Kevin Flynn and Alan Bradley. Also, briefly seeing a de-aged Bruce Boxleitner as Tron was cool. However, the de-aged Jeff Bridges as younger Flynn and as Clu was a bit jarring and marred in the Uncanny Valley just a bit, but this was new territory for digital filmmaking, so I give it a pass. However, it's really the new cast that makes this movie work, as both Garrett Hedlund and Olivia Wilde are fantastic as Sam and Quorra, and I thoroughly enjoyed seeing them kicking ass on the Grid. Michael Sheen was delightfully over the top as Castor the nightclub owner, and while he isn't the main antagonist, he's definitely an interesting figure playing both sides in this movie, which is cool. 

          Beau Garrett, Serinda Swan, and Yaya DaCosta as three of the four Sirens, with Beau Garrett's character being called Gem, were also interesting, as they had a unique look about them, and they served a single purpose: gear up Programs for the Games. And if you enjoyed James Frain in television series like Gotham or Star Trek: Discovery, then I highly recommend checking him out in this movie as Jarvis, as he was just a lot of fun to see with the little face shield he had on, which made him stand out in this movie. 

       And, of course, it's impossible to talk about Tron: Legacy without talking about the music score by French EDM duo Daft Punk. I can't lie, guys, I love the music in this movie. Heck I loved it so much that I went out and actually bout the soundtrack on CD (back when that was still a thing), and I still have it to this day. I listen to it every now and then, and I absolutely love it. It's a real shame that Daft Punk has retired, because I would have loved to see them return for another Tron. Eh, we'll see who we get for the next movie. 

        Overall, this movie was fantastic, and I definitely enjoyed it. I still love watching this movie to this day, because the world of Tron is just fantastic. Unfortunately, the movie didn't perform particularly strongly at the 2010 box office, raking in $400.1 million, which while a decent profit, was nowhere near the $1 billion plus that Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland made for Disney earlier that same year. And it's a shame, because Disney was really looking to build the Tron franchise off of the success of this movie, with the video game prelude Tron: Evolution, which I played on Xbox 360 and thoroughly enjoyed, the Disney XD animated series Tron: Uprising, which got rave reviews but only lasted one season, a comic book prequel miniseries from Marvel called Tron: Betrayal. Seriously, Disney was really looking to make something out of Tron. But, because Legacy only made a modest profit at the box office, and because of the Marvel acquisition, Disney ultimately began to look away from Tron to focus on acquired properties like Marvel and eventually Star Wars. 

          However, plans were still in motion for a third Tron movie, but those plans were detailed after the box office failure of the Brad Bird film Tomorrowland with George Clooney and Hugh Laurie. Recently, however, there have been rumblings of a third Tron finally in the works with Maleficent: Mistress of Evil director Joachim Ronning taking on directing duties, and Jared Leto set to play a new character called Ares. Now, as much as I'm not the biggest supporter of Jared Leto after Morbius last year, I definitely am interested in seeing this movie if it does happen, Bec I love the world of Tron that much. 

         To wrap up here, Tron: Legacy, much like its predecessor, Ina Disney cult classic that I highly recommend. I'm giving Tron: Legacy a rating of 5/5. Alrighty guys, this is Chuck signing off, and I'll see you guys next time.