Review of TRON: Legacy (2010) by Eric M — 08 Nov 2014

Thanks to its fascinating cast of characters and spectacular visual effects and graphics also combined with a super-hip-groovy and fun soundtrack composed by Daft Punk and an easy story to follow, TRON: Legacy, the quite hopefully FIRST sequel to the original 1982 film TRON, is one of the very best science-fiction films that I, for one, have EVER seen in my entire lifetime! Strongly recommended.

The film takes place two decades and seven years after the end of the first film, and its main plot takes place two decades after its beginning. Flynn disappears for twenty years, and his son Sam is under the impression that he abandoned him, right up until the moment their old friend, Alan Bradley comes to visit Sam, and gives him a hint about his dad, which convinces him to go and save his long-lost father; but simultaneously, they also have to stop Flynn's program CLU from invading the world of the Humans. In the end, his father never made it back to the Human world, but we never know: did he really die after merging with CLU and imploding, or is it just an ambiguous disappearance? That leaves open room for a possible third TRON film, which is, eve, as we speak, in development! Definitely the continuation of a promising franchise not sure to fail, and has become my SECOND personal fav. sci-fi franchise and alternative universe ever, behind only Star Trek, and ahead of The X-Files.

Now on to the cast of characters. Veteran films-driven-with-dazzling-visual-effects actor Jeff Bridges delivered a BRILLIANT performance as one of its leading characters, Kevin Flynn, and its primary villain, CLU. In the original, he was totally "dude", and this one, he's STILL got his "dude" mojo. However, now this might not matter so much to most people, but after watching this film, my FATHER's main concern is that Flynn kept calling his son, Sam, Kiddo; and my father's always going like "HUH?", even after I explained to him the fact that he hadn't seen his son for twenty years; but I, for one, really don't care. Meanwhile, Olivia Wilde amazingly portrays quite a gorgeous and stunning isomorphic algorithm named Quorra with quite a fascinating personality; she lives with Flynn as his surrogate-daughter-figure, and dreams of the world of the Users, us humans who write and create the programs. I guess in a way, that's how her character can relate a bit to Ariel from 1989's The Little Mermaid. Then aiming towards Michael Sheen: Castor/Zuse, the flamboyant owner of the End of Line Club, is such a character, and his humor is quite amazingly similar to David Bowie.

However, the visuals are just SPECTACULAR, and should DEFINITELY be considered as a new generation of sci-fi films for future references.

And as for the score composed by Daft Punk, it is totally super-hip-groovy and fun, as it blends traditional orchestral/classical sounds heard in the background music to ANY type of media, and the group's traditional electronic sounds. Should DEFINITELY be considered for any and all future sci-fi films, as well! And perhaps one of the coolest things is that Daft Punk has worked with film-makers before in the past, and they have a cameo appearance in the film as the End of Line Club's two masked DJs! Radical, man!

So, in short, definitely recommended! But if you don't want to see it, I totally understand.