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The framework of pointlessness is reloaded in this tediously complex science fiction movie, closer to a screensaver than an real cinematic experience. This is a third installment to the original movie Tron from the early 80s, a movie that was mould-breaking and boldly pioneering for its time in a way that eludes this one and its predecessor Tron Legacy from the previous decade. The new Tron film almost comes to life just once – when Evan Peters gets a smack in the face from Gillian Anderson's character playing his mother, in an old-fashioned bit of analogue reality. This is a piece of tough love you might feel like administering 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 lifeless.

Story Summary of Tron: Ares

The situation currently is that an malicious artificial intelligence company with the unsubtly gangster-ish name of Dillinger has become a rival to the virtual reality firm Encom, originally set up in the 1980s gaming period by brilliant innovator Kevin Flynn's character, portrayed 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 Dillinger (Evan Peters), who has a grand plan to design and create profitable things such as indestructible soldiers and tanks in the VR world and then export them into the real world using a kind of 3D printer.

The issue is that however fearsome, these things disintegrate after twenty-nine minutes. But Encom's present chief executive Eve Kim's character (Greta Lee) has uncovered the MacGuffin-y “permanence code” which can maintain these entities for ever, and even stores it on her person on a extremely basic USB drive. So the ghastly 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 robots, is starting to exhibit symptoms of disobeying what he is commanded. Jodie Turner-Smith portrays Ares's deadpan second-in-command Athena's role and unfortunate Jeff Bridges has a wooden legacy appearance in wise white robes, like a budget Jor-El on Krypton.

Acting and Roles Breakdown

And Ares himself – the hero of the title – is acted by Jared Leto with trendy lengthy locks, beard and subtly omniscient grin, details that were perhaps designed by inputting the words “extremely annoying” into an AI human creation programme. No one who recalls the 1990s television classic My So-Called Life series will always find it in their hearts to be completely harsh about Mr Leto, and I was incidentally quite amused by his broad (and widely misinterpreted) comic turn in Ridley Scott's movie House of Gucci. But Leto is consistently, unrelentingly terrible in this film, although his performance isn't aided by a weak storyline 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 marginally more interesting. It is meant to be charming when Ares says how he loves 80s synth pop and that Depeche Mode are better than Mozart's compositions.

Series Features and Final Impression

Consistent with the franchise identity of the series, there are motorcycles from the VR netherworld which speed around the place in long straight lines, adhering to the angular layout of antique arcade games (or even nightclubs); one even emits a death ray which slices a cop car in two. But there is zero tension or danger or human interest throughout. This franchise now looks as relevant as an automobile CD system.