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The framework of futility is revisited in this mind-bendingly dull sci-fi film, closer to a screensaver than an actual film. It's a third installment to the classic Tron film from 1982, a movie that was mould-breaking and boldly pioneering for its day in a way that escapes this one and its predecessor Tron: Legacy from the previous decade. The new Tron film almost comes to life just one time – when Evan Peters' character gets a slap in the face from Gillian Anderson portraying his mum, in an traditional bit of analogue reality. That's a bit of firm parenting you might feel like administering to all the producers involved in this movie, and it's sad to see the estimable Greta Lee and Jodie Turner-Smith's character being made to look so lifeless.

Story Summary of Tron: Ares

The situation now is that an malicious artificial intelligence company with the obviously criminal name of Dillinger Corp has become a competitor to the virtual reality firm Encom, first established in the 1980s gaming period by genius trailblazer Kevin Flynn's character, played by Jeff Bridges. This Dillinger (initially founded by Encom's executive Ed Dillinger, played by David Warner) is led by the founder’s annoyingly geeky grandson Julian (Evan Peters), who has a grand plan to develop and produce lucrative items such as invincible troops and tanks in the VR world and then transfer them into the real world using a kind of three-dimensional printer.

The problem is that no matter how intimidating, these things disintegrate after twenty-nine minutes. But Encom's current CEO Eve Kim's character (Greta Lee) has discovered the MacGuffin-y “permanence algorithm” which can maintain these entities permanently, and even keeps it on her person on a extremely basic USB drive. So the dreadful Julian Dillinger deploys his enforcer on her: Ares, the humanoid uber-warrior which can exit the virtual realm for twenty-nine minutes at a time but which, in the traditional way of androids, is starting to exhibit symptoms of disobeying what he's told. Jodie Turner-Smith's performance plays Ares's stoic deputy Athena's role and poor Jeff Bridges has a wooden legacy appearance in wise white robes, like a Poundshop Jor-El on Krypton.

Acting and Roles Analysis

And Ares himself – the protagonist of the title – is played by Jared Leto with hipsterish long hair, beard and subtly omniscient grin, touches that were perhaps designed by inputting the words “extremely annoying” into an AI human creation programme. No one who recalls the 90s TV classic My So-Called Life will always find it in their hearts to be completely harsh about Mr Leto, and I was incidentally quite amused by his expansive (and widely misinterpreted) humorous performance in Ridley Scott's film House of Gucci. But Leto is consistently, unrelentingly awful in this film, although he isn't helped by a limp plot point which is supposed to allow him to display glimpses of “empathy” for Eve Kim's role and delegate all the villainous actions to Athena, thus making her slightly more engaging. It is meant to be adorable when Ares says how he adores 1980s electronic music and that Depeche Mode are superior to Mozart's compositions.

Series Features and Final Impression

And in keeping with the franchise identity of the franchise, there are motorcycles from the VR netherworld which whizz about the place in linear paths, conforming to the angular layout of antique arcade games (or even dance clubs); one even shoots out a death ray which cuts a police vehicle in half. But there is zero tension or danger or emotional engagement throughout. This series now looks about as urgently contemporary as an in-car CD player.