Disney’s latest science-fiction blockbuster, Tron: Ares, has been slammed as one of the worst films of the year in brutal reviews.
The film is the newest instalment in the long-standing franchise that began with the revolutionary original film in 1982 and was followed by the eagerly anticipated sequel, Tron: Legacy, in 2010.
Now, 15 years later, the saga continues with Jared Leto and Greta Lee at the helm of this action-packed flick, which sees the digital Programs invading the real world for the first time.
Directed by Joachim Rønning, known for Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales and last year’s Young Woman and the City, critics have commended the film’s visuals and soundtrack, but little else.
Set to hit cinemas on Friday, 10th October, the film currently holds a disappointing 53 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The Independent didn’t hold back, branding it “the worst film of the year and a new low for Disney” in their scathing one-star review.
Critic Clarisse Loughrey further described Tron: Ares as “an ethically dubious, horribly written nadir in franchise slop.”
She added: “Tron: Ares has the visual flair of a mobile game and a thematic depth that makes the 1982 original’s premise – Jeff Bridges gets sucked into a computer – feel like it was written by philosophers”, reports the Mirror.
Robbie Collin of The Telegraph agreed in his own one-star review, writing: “Tron: Ares is so bad it makes you wish AI would hurry up and destroy Hollywood.
“A shambolic film populated by some of the most aggressively charmless characters ever seen in a blockbuster.”
And The Guardian’s Peter Bradshaw also branded it with a one-star review, noting: “Even Gillian Anderson can’t slap this mind-bendingly dull sci-fi into shape.”
He went on to describe Leto’s lead performance as “unremittingly, unrelentingly awful”, and concluded “there is no drama or jeopardy or human interest anywhere.
“This franchise now looks about as urgently contemporary as an in-car CD player.”
Slant Magazine’s Jake Cole summed it up on Letterboxd: “1.5 stars for a new [Nine Inch Nails] score, 0 for the dullest entry yet in a franchise that is mostly fondly remembered as sort of a vibe over anything that actually happens in these movies.”
However, not every critique has been quite so scathing, with Empire awarding Tron: Ares a more forgiving three-star rating.
They were equally taken with NIN pair Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross’ soundtrack, remarking: “The real MVPs, however, are Nine Inch Nails, whose staggeringly brilliant soundtrack dominates the entire proceedings.
“Not since, well, the last Tron film, with Daft Punk’s masterfully sweeping orchestral-bleeps mashup, has a film score elevated its material so significantly, so impressively.”
Will you be avoiding Tron: Ares following these rather lukewarm critiques, or are you prepared to give the neon-drenched sci-fi series another chance?
Tron: Ares is in UK cinemas from Friday, 10th October.