We're one month away from the theatrical release of TRON: Ares, and Disney is seeking to stoke interest with a new trailer that shows the titular program going back to the original 1984 grid—and encountering an unexpected figure: the one and only Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges).
(Some spoilers for Tron and Tron: Legacy below.)
As previously reported, TRON: Legacy ended with Sam Flynn (Garrett Hedlund), son of Kevin Flynn, preventing the digital world from bleeding into the real world, as planned by the Grid's malevolent ruling program, Clu. He brought with him Quorra (Olivia Wilde), a naturally occurring isomorphic algorithm targeted for extinction by Clu.
Disney greenlit a third film in the franchise in October 2010, intended to pick up where Legacy left off and follow the adventures of Sam and Quorra as Sam took full control of his father's company, ENCOM. However, by 2015, the studio had canceled the project. By 2020, the project had been revived and reimagined as a standalone reboot rather than a Legacy sequel, although the main AI, Ares, appeared in earlier (pre-reboot) versions of the script. One pandemic and a couple of Hollywood strikes later, the finished film is finally set to hit theaters this fall.
Directed by Joachim Rønning, the film's blogline is succinct: "TRON: Ares follows a highly sophisticated Program, Ares, who is sent from the digital world into the real world on a dangerous mission, marking humankind’s first encounter with A.I. beings." Jared Leto stars as Ares, with Evan Peters and Greta Lee playing Julian Dillinger and Eve Kim, respectively. The cast also includes Jodie Turner-Smith, Cameron Monaghan, Sarah Desjardins, Hasan Minhaj, Arturo Castro, and Gillian Anderson. Bridges is returning as Kevin Flynn. Nine Inch Nails composed the soundtrack.
Two earlier trailers were a bit short on plot but still had the show-stopping visuals we've come to expect from all things TRON. This new trailer gives a sense of the franchise's history, opening with footage of the young Kevin Flynn playing the 1982 version of TRON at his arcade before being sucked into the game world's grid. Bridges provides a suitably nostalgic voiceover about the digital world he discovered.
Cut to the introduction of Leto's Ares, much of which we've seen in prior trailers—but this time we see Ares encounter a digitized Flynn in that original grid. It seems some part of Flynn survived when he sacrificed himself in Legacy to defeat Clu and save his son. Flynn tells him that the two worlds are more connected than anyone realizes. So naturally, Ares finds himself locked in yet another battle to bring elements of the grid into the real world.
TRON: Ares arrives in theaters on October 10, 2025.
Does Silksong Seem Unreasonably Hard? You Probably Took a Wrong Turn