The framework of futility is reloaded in this tediously complex sci-fi movie, closer to a screensaver than an real cinematic experience. This is a threequel to the original movie Tron from the early 80s, a movie that was mould-breaking and courageously innovative for its day in a way that eludes this one and its predecessor Tron Legacy from the previous decade. Tron: Ares almost comes to life just once – when Evan Peters gets a smack in the face from Gillian Anderson's character playing his mum, in an traditional bit of analogue reality. That's a piece of tough love you might want to administering to all the producers engaged in this film, and it's sad to see the estimable Greta Lee and Jodie Turner-Smith being made to look so uninspired.
The scenario now is that an evil AI corporation with the obviously criminal name of Dillinger Corp has become a rival to the virtual reality firm Encom, first established in the 1980s gaming period by brilliant innovator Kevin Flynn's character, played by Jeff Bridges. This corporation (initially founded by Encom's executive Ed Dillinger's role, played by David Warner) is headed by the founder’s annoyingly geeky grandson's character Julian (Evan Peters), who has a ambitious scheme to develop and produce profitable things such as invincible troops and tanks in the virtual reality grid 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 discovered the plot-driving “permanence code” which can maintain these entities permanently, and even keeps it on her person on a very low-tech USB drive. So the dreadful Julian sets his attack dog on her: Ares the warrior, the humanoid uber-warrior which can leave the VR world for twenty-nine minutes at a time but which, in the time-honoured way of robots, is starting to exhibit symptoms of not doing what he's told. Jodie Turner-Smith's performance plays Ares's deadpan second-in-command Athena's role and poor Jeff Bridges has a leaden legacy cameo in wise white robes, like a budget Jor-El on Krypton.
And Ares himself – the protagonist of the film's name – is acted by Jared Leto with hipsterish long hair, facial hair and subtly omniscient grin, details that were perhaps created by typing the words “extremely annoying” into an AI human creation programme. Nobody who recalls the 90s TV classic My So-Called Life series will always find it in their hearts to be totally rude about Mr Leto, and I was incidentally very entertained by his expansive (and critically misunderstood) humorous performance in Ridley Scott's film House of Gucci. But Leto is consistently, unrelentingly awful here, although he isn't helped by a limp plot point which is intended to allow him to show flashes of “empathy” for Greta Lee's character and delegate all the badass wickedness to Athena, thus making her marginally more interesting. It is supposed to be charming when Ares the character says how he loves 1980s electronic music and that Depeche Mode are superior to Mozart's compositions.
And in keeping with the brand-identity of the franchise, 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 even nightclubs); a single bike even emits a lethal beam which slices a police vehicle in two. But there is zero tension or jeopardy or human interest anywhere. This franchise now looks as relevant as an automobile CD system.
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