**** - I was three years old when the first “Tron” movie came out, and by the time I first saw it at the age of about twelve in the early 90s the look of the film had become dated enough that it didn’t make a huge impression on me. That is unfortunate; as I think, looking back on it, if I had seen it when first released and been a bit older I would have been blown away by the linear, high contrast, geometrical visual style that is right up my alley. Fast forward to December 2010 and the long awaited sequel “Tron: Legacy” debuts in theatres on my 32nd birthday (although I didn’t see it until now, several months later) and the intriguing but primitive retro-future visions of the 1982 original are updated, amplified and augmented to a level that is quite honestly beyond anything I have ever seen before. While maintaining a distinctively 80s motif, the makers of this spectacular follow-up manage to create an alternate parallel universe to our own that feels both richly authentic and distinct from anything that has come before it. As much as I would like to give this even higher than a four star rating, I can’t do so in good conscience due to its derivative mess of a plot and laughably poor dialogue. But taking into account a glorious mix of the orchestral and the synthetic in the grandiose score by Daft Punk, and I can overlook those faults for the most part. Beyond the music and the mesmerizing visuals and effects, what is perhaps the most remarkable accomplishment of this movie is that it lays the groundwork for the extension of a unique mythology that has the potential to become truly legendary. I hope I am not let down.
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