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The framework of futility is reloaded in this tediously complex sci-fi film, closer to a screensaver than an real cinematic experience. This is a threequel to the classic Tron film from 1982, a movie that was groundbreaking and courageously innovative for its time in a way that eludes this one and its predecessor Tron: Legacy from 2010. The new Tron film nearly awakens just once – when Evan Peters' character gets a slap in the face from Gillian Anderson's character portraying his mother, in an old-fashioned bit of real-world action. This is a piece of tough love you might want to handing out to all the producers engaged in this film, and it's sad to see the estimable Greta Lee and Jodie Turner-Smith's character being made to look so uninspired.

Plot Overview of The New Tron Film

The situation now is that an malicious artificial intelligence company with the obviously criminal name of Dillinger Corp has become a rival to the virtual reality firm Encom Inc, originally set up in the 80s arcade-game era by brilliant innovator Kevin Flynn's character, played by Jeff Bridges. This corporation (initially founded by Encom's executive Ed Dillinger's role, acted 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 invincible troops and armored vehicles in the VR world and then transfer them into the real world using a sort of three-dimensional printer.

The issue is that no matter how intimidating, these creations disintegrate after 29 minutes. But Encom's present chief executive Eve Kim (Greta Lee) has discovered the MacGuffin-y “permanence code” which can keep these things alive permanently, and even keeps it on her person on a extremely basic flashdrive. So the ghastly Julian Dillinger deploys his enforcer on her: Ares the warrior, the humanoid uber-warrior which can leave the VR world for 29 minutes at a time but which, in the traditional way of robots, is starting to exhibit symptoms of disobeying what he's told. Jodie Turner-Smith portrays Ares's deadpan second-in-command Athena and poor Bridges has a wooden legacy appearance in wise white robes, like a Poundshop Jor-El on Krypton's setting.

Character and Performance Breakdown

And Ares himself – the hero of the title – is acted by Jared Leto with hipsterish long hair, facial hair and faintly all-knowing smile, touches that were possibly created by typing the words “incredibly irritating” into an artificial intelligence character generator. Nobody who remembers the 90s TV classic My So-Called Life will ever find it in their hearts to be totally rude about Jared Leto, and I was also very entertained by his expansive (and critically misunderstood) humorous performance in Ridley Scott's film House of Gucci. But Leto is consistently, unrelentingly terrible here, although his performance isn't aided by a limp plot point which is supposed to allow him to display glimpses of “compassion” for Eve Kim's role and subcontract all the badass wickedness to Athena's character, thus rendering her marginally more interesting. It is supposed to be adorable when Ares says how he loves 1980s electronic music and that Depeche Mode band are better than Mozart.

Franchise Elements and Final Impression

Consistent with the franchise identity of the series, there are motorbikes from the virtual underworld which whizz about the place in long straight lines, adhering to the rectilinear design of classic video games (or indeed nightclubs); one even emits a death ray which slices a cop car in half. But there is zero tension or jeopardy or human interest throughout. This franchise currently appears about as urgently contemporary as an in-car CD player.