TRON: Legacy - Review and Grading

[Temis the Vorta]

The original script "Tron 2.0" was completely different from the story that we saw on the screen.

Yeah, that script did look like it was the result of some serious chaos in the writing process, different writers with incompatible ideas about what the story should be. Do you know what the original plotline was?

Another Con is that CLU's mania for perfection didn't synch with the very imperfect and human way that he and his programs behaved. There was nothing remotely "perfect" about any of them, it was basically just human society re-created, complete with bloodsports, sleazy clubs and palace intrigue.

Which I liked, btw - the idea that AIs are creating this zany world on their own is fun and a lot more interesting that if they'd been Borg-like automotons of perfection.

But if CLU has no, well, clue about what he's doing, it undermines his credibility as a villain and just renders him pathetic. A good villain needs to be smart and powerful so he's more of a threat to the hero. His point of view may be bad but it needs to be accurate and internally consistent.

 

[Admiral_Young]

It's been a while since I read the script, I remember not liking it though. I've forgot the plot but could probably dig it out of somewhere. The thing about CLU though is that his intended perfection was impossible, because he himself possessed the same flaws that Flynn did. I just don't think that CLU was realized enough through the character development process. He could have been a much stronger villain than he was in the movie but I was fine with the way he was portrayed by Bridges.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

CLU just struck me as a generic bwahaha villain. He might have been more interesting if there had been more of a connection between him and Flynn - that their minds were linked in some disturbing way, and each influenced the other directly.

And am I weird for worrying about the dog the whole time? Sam should have at least said once, "I can't be trapped in here, Muffy* will starve!" And there was no confirmation at the end of Sam being reunited happily with Muffy. Why even include a dog in the story if you're going to treat him that way? At least the writers remembered to feed Muffy a big burger, and the rest got lost in rewrite chaos.

*Yes, I've forgotten the dog's name already.

 

[Admiral_Young]

It's okay, until you brought it up, I completely forgot about Sam's dog lol.

 

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

Alan can take care of the dog while Same is showing Quorra around

 

[Temis the Vorta]

I hope Alan came around to walk Muffy, or Sam is going to be taking Quorra back to a rather stinky, uh, what was that, a garage?

The nice thing about Quorra is as far as she knows, dog-poop-smelling garages are the height of luxury for humans. There's a low-maintenance girlfriend...

PS, the "program" rebellion is another dropped thread. And is there any reason to regard the programs as being in any way different from the ISOs and if so, what is it?

 

[Admiral_Young]

Flynn explains the difference between the regular programs and ISO's in the film. They're essentially sentient programs and obviously are actually able to manifest in our world. It my understanding that a typical program would be erased.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

And am I weird for worrying about the dog the whole time? Sam should have at least said once, "I can't be trapped in here, Muffy* will starve!" And there was no confirmation at the end of Sam being reunited happily with Muffy. Why even include a dog in the story if you're going to treat him that way? At least the writers remembered to feed Muffy a big burger, and the rest got lost in rewrite chaos.

AFAIK, time passes in the virtual world much faster than in the real world. So if Sam spent a few days in the Grid, this might translate to only a couple of hours in the real world.

Remember in the original - At the end of the film, Flynn arrived back in the real world almost right after he left, despite having spent what must have been at least a few days in the computer world.

Conversely, this means that as we see him in the second film, Flynn was trapped in the Grid for longer than 20 years (from his POV). I think it works out to about a thousand!

 

[Nick Ryder]

Yeah that always seemed a bit trippy if time moves faster on the Grid than in the real world, then by rights, a "user" could live almost forever on the Grid right?

 

[Admiral_Young]

^ Theoretically yes.

 

[Nick Ryder]

Then gee, fuck the real world and just live on the Grid with a Quorra who'll always have perky boobs and no cellulite. Although... can they even take those suits off on the Grid, would make sex a bit hard. LOL

Gee, how much you wanna bet second thing Sam did once Quorra entered the real world, was show her "and this is how users play disc wars!"

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

can they even take those suits off on the Grid, would make sex a bit hard. LOL

We see the sirens give Sam a suit (even before they knew he was a User) so it stands to reason the suits can be removed as well.

 

[Broccoli]

can they even take those suits off on the Grid, would make sex a bit hard.

That's what she said.

 

[Ayelbourne]

And is there any reason to regard the programs as being in any way different from the ISOs and if so, what is it?

The way i remember it, programs were all created by users at some point and as such are only able to act within the parameters and algorithms of their source code.
ISOs are pretty much source code that writes itself as they go along. Which is why they can become anything.

About the disks...that never made sense to me either, but they were used that way in the first movie and Legacy just carried that over.

I guess the real life equivalent to the disks would be the checksum.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

The way i remember it, programs were all created by users at some point and as such are only able to act within the parameters and algorithms of their source code.
ISOs are pretty much source code that writes itself as they go along. Which is why they can become anything.

But I didn't notice any difference in how programs behaved vs how Quorra behaved that would signal that there was any difference having source code and being source code. What does that distinction actually mean in terms of the characters and the story?

The single possible difference is that Quorra (and Tron - is he an ISO?) acted selflessly, which we never see programs do. So is this a moral difference? Do ISOs have souls? But if a program were programmed to behave selflessly, then they would act exactly like Quorra did, so that's not an ironclad distinction, either.

 

[Admiral_Young]

Tron is a regular program created by Alan Bradley in the first movie. You should really watch the original film, Temis. It might help with some of the in-universe questions you've been asking.

 

[Trekker4747]

Quorra was special because she wasn't created by anyone other than the sytem itself. All of the persons we see on The Grid are "programs" with a specific purpose as bult by a User at some point. Adam created Tron as a means to more-or-less control and protect the system, Flynn created Clu as someone to help him work on his new project on the grid. When the ISOs came Flynn's attention turned them. The ISOs were made by no one and written by nothing they were born of the system itself. Essentially they were programming bugs that had "life" of their own and no real specific purpose.

Quorra's behavior was notably different than the programs, notably her interest in literature, her curiosity about the Users and the world beyond The Grid. The programs did their tasks as told.

 

[Ayelbourne]

But I didn't notice any difference in how programs behaved vs how Quorra behaved that would signal that there was any difference having source code and being source code. What does that distinction actually mean in terms of the characters and the story?

The difference is that programs have static source code that cannot evolve. They can only do what their code allows them to.
CLU's purpose was to create a perfect world, so thats what he was trying to do.
Tron was a security program, his purpose was to "fight for the users", so that's what he did until CLU reprogrammed him.

ISOs, on the other hand, can do whatever they want, because their code changes and grows as time goes by, which is a lot more close to real life than a simple program ever could be.

In a nutshell, unlike programms, ISOs can become more than they are.

Do ISOs have souls? But if a program were programmed to behave selflessly, then they would act exactly like Quorra did, so that's not an ironclad distinction, either.

Yeah, the fact that programs in TRON have been depicted very lifelike ever since the first movie (to the point where they inherited character traits from their creators) does make it hard to differentiate.

 

[C.E. Evans]

About the disks...that never made sense to me either, but they were used that way in the first movie and Legacy just carried that over.

The identity discs came from the Master Control Program era from the original Grid and were used primarily during the early games as both weapons and personal data storage. They weren't a standard item for every program as they would be on the new Grid.

I guess the real life equivalent to the disks would be the checksum.

Or videogame memory cards. All the experiences and skill sets acquired from previous games are stored there so one can advance to the next level. Can be used for non-game applications as well (like unlocking doors) apparently.

 

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

The question "Do ISO's have souls?"" strikes me as troublesome because, well, it hasn't been demonstrated that humans or anyone else has a soul.

Just sayin'