Tron: Ares

 

This review may contain spoilers!

Tron: Ares is the sequel to Tron: Legacy (2010) and the third film in the Tron franchise. In this feature, the Dillinger Corporation and Encom are engaged in a corporate feud over the acquisition of the 'Permanence Code'. A digital code that allows digital matter to be rendered into organic matter. Master Control program, Ares, must decide if he will be a pawn in this struggle or find a life of his own.

This is a film that doesn't think about its title character very much, but when it does remember Ares? That is the film I liked watching. Tron has always been a grapple between the digital and the real, and Ares' story is right at the core of that. Watching him be treated like this, expendable, disposable soldier in servitude to another, is a great bridge to watching him develop a desire for life. Ares is rather quirky and unconventional; this expressionless program, which develops his own sense of self, is extremely entertaining.

The thing this film does incredibly well is the visual effects. Tron: Ares has elements like light cycle races in the 'real world', which is rather pretty at times, and the Grid is sharp in design and almost an imposing landscape now. Even the downscale to present the classic Grid design from the first Tron film is a nice love letter to the fans.

Jared Leto, who played Ares, appeared to have a decent bit of fun in this leading role; Leto manages to be expressionless as a machine while finding some aloof charisma within that. Jeff Bridges, who played Kevin Flynn, is one of the most seasoned performers of the cast; Bridges is effortlessly cool and sincere in his third Tron.

However, the best performance came from Evan Peters, who played Julian Dillinger. It can be fun to play the villain; there's a little more room there to showboat and ham it up. Peters really takes Julian in a few different places here, but he knows how to play the tech billionaire antagonist with a superiority complex. Peters opens this movie by performing a grandstanding delivery about artificial intelligence, the digital frontier and military applications; he's charismatic but clearly built for profit. This is a character who is narcissistic and lacks empathy for others; he has a sociopathic side when it comes to losing, which has some real bite to it. Julian really actively engages in a willingness to terminate others if it puts him ahead across the film. Yet, Peters also shows the side of Julian that feels the fear at unravelling so completely. The low moments for Julian when he starts losing, when his mother is killed due to his hubris and even when he runs away into the Grid are great moments of desperation played brilliantly by Peters.

This film feels devoid of life, and not just because it's about computer programs. This film has a lot of potential, an interesting protagonist and some killer special effects. But it all tends to get lost in the plot of the corporate human characters who, for some baffling reason, get centre stage. Ares is our heroic other, a computer program who wants to be a little bit human, which I found surprisingly relatable. Yet the story for this movie often forgets or fails to prioritise Ares. Following the human characters feels so dispassionate; they are incapable of expressing authentic emotions or connections with one another. These people are your TED talkers, your corporate execs and computer programmers. People who are fighting for their tech to progress, who are beholden to wars over having the best product. Simply put, most of the characters in Tron feel like hollow business entities with little human quality, very difficult for a movie-going audience to find their heroes in. The film was just a prolonged armwrestle over a code, with the item in question sometimes being made tangible with a thumb drive or a disk from the Grid. Even the bad guys just constantly 3D printing themselves and throwing themselves back at our heroes over and over became quite laborious to watch play out. Overall,  Tron: Ares does something pretty creative with its title character, but it's too little in a script that lacks emotional depth or substance.

I was relatively unimpressed by the way this film was captured. There are a few captivating scenes, but the camera often serves the effect before it tries for a compelling shot. I also didn't really care for Nine Inch Nails' overhyped score. The electro-rock tone had its moments, but overall it felt like my ears were being rammed with a wall of noise, blaring sound with no thought put to crafting themes or character pieces.

Greta Lee, who played Eve Kim, is often the central protagonist of the film but really struggles with the part; Lee doesn't have much emotion to give to her character. Jodie Turner-Smith, who played Athena, is an antagonist with a bit too much screen time; her two-dimensional motive of living and dying by the mission wears thin fast. Gillian Anderson, who played Elisabeth Dillinger, is wasted in this stoic, disapproving mother role; Anderson and Peters feel too distant to be playing actual family members to one another. Hasan Minhaj, who played Ajay Singh, is one character too many in this film; Minhaj trying to play this high-profile CEO of the people fizzles out almost immediately. Arturo Castro, who played Seth Flores, is awkwardly positioned as the comedic relief of the film; sadly, Castro isn't especially funny.

It is disappointing to see a world with as much potential as Tron turn into something like this. I would give Tron: Ares a 2/10.