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The framework of futility is revisited in this tediously complex sci-fi film, closer to a screensaver than an actual film. This is a third installment to the classic Tron film from 1982, a movie that was groundbreaking and boldly pioneering for its time in a way that eludes this film and its predecessor Tron Legacy from the previous decade. The new Tron film almost comes to life just one time – when Evan Peters 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 feel like administering to every producer involved in this film, and it's sad to see the estimable Greta Lee and Jodie Turner-Smith being made to look so uninspired.

Plot Overview of The New Tron Film

The scenario now is that an malicious artificial intelligence company with the unsubtly gangster-ish name of Dillinger has become a rival to the VR company Encom, originally set up in the 1980s gaming period by genius trailblazer Kevin Flynn, portrayed by Jeff Bridges. This corporation (initially founded by Encom's executive Ed Dillinger, played by David Warner) is headed by the founder's odiously nerdish grandson's character Julian Dillinger (Evan Peters), who has a ambitious scheme to design and create lucrative items such as indestructible soldiers and tanks in the VR world and then transfer them into the real world using a sort of three-dimensional printer.

The issue is that however fearsome, these things disintegrate after 29 minutes. But Encom's current CEO Eve Kim (Greta Lee) has uncovered the plot-driving “permanence code” which can maintain these entities permanently, and even stores it on her person on a very low-tech flashdrive. So the dreadful Julian Dillinger deploys his enforcer on her: Ares, the superhuman fighter which can leave the VR world for 29 minutes at a time but which, in the traditional way of androids, is beginning to show signs of not doing what he's told. Jodie Turner-Smith's performance plays Ares's deadpan second-in-command Athena and poor Jeff Bridges has a leaden legacy cameo in sage-like white garments, like a Poundshop Jor-El on Krypton's setting.

Character and Performance Breakdown

Moreover, Ares – the protagonist of the film's name – is played by Jared Leto with trendy lengthy locks, beard and subtly omniscient grin, details that were perhaps designed by inputting the words “incredibly irritating” into an artificial intelligence character generator. No one who remembers the 1990s television classic My So-Called Life will always find it in their hearts to be totally rude about Mr Leto, and I was also quite amused by his broad (and critically misunderstood) humorous performance in Ridley Scott's film House of Gucci. But Jared Leto is unremittingly, persistently terrible here, although he isn't helped by a weak storyline which is supposed to allow him to show flashes of “empathy” for Eve Kim's role and delegate all the badass wickedness to Athena's character, thus rendering her marginally more interesting. It is meant to be charming when Ares says how he loves 80s synth pop and that Depeche Mode band are better than Mozart's compositions.

Series Features and Overall Impact

Consistent with the franchise 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 classic video games (or even dance clubs); one even emits a death ray which cuts a police vehicle in two. But there is zero tension or danger or human interest throughout. This series now looks about as urgently contemporary as an automobile CD system.