After 15 years, fans and users are transported back into the Grid for a third film in one of Disney’s most visionary and understated franchises. Released to middling success in 1982, TRON developed a strong following over many decades, culminating in the 2010 release of TRON: Legacy, a dazzling follow-up that likewise found lukewarm reception before growing into something of a cult film.
TRON is a bizarre, paradoxical franchise. Neither of the earlier installments were instant hits. It seems backwards to call Legacy a cult film when it grossed over $400 million at the box office, and yet it is true. They are both well-known and set aside from the mainstream of Hollywood entertainment, which makes it even more frustrating that TRON: Ares plays largely as a mainstream, run-of-the-mill blockbuster.
TRON was an unprecedented movie that broke barriers in terms of what was possible for visual effects. Legacy, in retrospect, feels like a miraculous outcome of, as the name implies, an early legacy sequel made by people with a genuine passion for the story. In comparison, Ares lands like another case of Disney making a profit-motivated nostalgia play.
Only a sequel in the sense that it does exist in the same continuity as TRON and Legacy, Ares makes no effort to follow Legacy’s narrative, even when Jeff Bridges shows up for a brief appearance as Kevin Flynn that has been vastly oversold in the film’s marketing. Flynn’s glorified cameo handwaves away how or why he is still around after the events of the previous film. As great as it is to see Bridges reprise his role, you’re left wondering if it served any function beyond giving fans something they recognize in a movie whose narrative is largely self-contained.
Ares is more of a reboot than a true follow-up, and without the affection that the Legacy team had for the world of TRON. With Legacy growing in reputation as much as it has over the last 15 years, it is a missed opportunity to not continue that story.
Ares is full of fresh faces for this franchise. Greta Lee steps into her largest role yet after a breakout performance in Past Lives, as Eve Kim, the new CEO of ENCOM who is searching for a code that will allow things from the digital world to be brought into the real world without decaying after a short period of time. Lee proves she can hold your attention in a spectacle-driven blockbuster, but she undoubtedly deserves a better film to show off her strengths.
Jodie Turner-Smith is a highlight as the ruthless Athena, a program who will stop at nothing to fulfill her directive. Evan Peters plays Julian Dillinger, a sniveling tech bro descendant of the first film’s antagonist, with a showy performance that feels most in line with the tone of TRON as a franchise. But this cast has a major hurdle to overcome, that is the presence of the film’s lead: Jared Leto.
Leto portrays the titular character, a program who goes rogue after experiencing emotions for the first time and desires to remain in the real world permanently. A corporate war plays out between Eve and Dillinger as they race for the “permanence code,” and Ares shifts alliances to use the code for himself. The role requires a delicate, gradual transformation from cold, calculated killer robot to a program that is warm, curious, and delighted by humanity.
Leto sells the first part, but he does not nail the transition. You never connect with Ares in any meaningful way, and the success of the film’s emotional arc hinges on that connection. Taking that into account, along with the storm of controversy surrounding Leto’s life off screen, his presence is an uncomfortable distraction that kills any chance of Ares working beyond the sheer spectacle, and even that is weaker than ever.
The Grid is largely pushed aside for a TRON story that is set almost entirely in the real world. The visionary sights and sounds of this expansive digital landscape are replaced with settings and set pieces that evoke any number of boilerplate action blockbusters. Seeing a light-cycle chase on the big screen will always hit, but there is not much else you haven’t seen in any number of superhero or sci-fi action films this decade. The few minutes we do spend in the modern Grid are exciting, and the extended sequence in the original Grid, decked out with the striking and visionary designs from the 1982 film is a real treat for fans. But these splashes of digital eye candy only underline how dull the rest of the film looks.
In TRON: Legacy, Daft Punk’s unique blend of synth and orchestral compositions made for a soundtrack that was worth the price of admission alone. Songs like ‘Derezzed’ and ‘End of Line’ worked just as well completely removed from the context of the film, allowing the score to carry on a life of its own.
Disney was wise to replicate this success, bringing Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross together for another pulsing mix of electronic songs. Reznor and Ross return to their iconic Nine Inch Nails moniker for the first time as film composers, and Disney has stamped that NIN logo on every bit of promotion for Ares, but it is not just an empty marketing ploy. Nine Inch Nails delivers a pulsing soundtrack that will have your seat rumbling, especially if you see the film in a premium format.
If you are seeing Ares, the IMAX or XD or Dolby difference is substantial, as the visual effects and musical score make the experience worthwhile. But even then, Ares only works in spite of itself. With little to offer in terms of expanded worldbuilding, dimensional characters, or themes that haven’t been handled better in dozens of other sci-fi stories, that soundtrack can only carry the movie so far. With Ares, you don’t feel the love for the material that either of the predecessors held.
All the lights and colors and easter eggs amount to very little when they feel so predictably programmed for a reaction the film never earns. While the two prior films settled into their place as cult hits, it is hard to imagine Ares will even be remembered 15 years from now, let alone revered.
5 out of 10
TRON: Ares is in theaters now.
This article appears in Oct. 1-31, 2025.