TRON: Legacy rules. End of line. (Spoiler-free)

Well, okay, actually more like beginning of line, but as a single-statement sentiment it works pretty well.

This is one of those movies that you can't really trust the critics on. Even those critics as esteemed as Roger Ebert, who writes that the effects and sound are spectacular, but:

The plot is another matter. It's a catastrophe, short-changing the characters and befuddling the audience. No doubt an online guru will produce a synopsis of everything that happens, but this isn't like an opera, where you can peek at the program notes.

He gives the movie his traditional snarky, verging on hostile, treatment based on that lack. And yet, he still gives the movie three out of four stars and gets listed as a thumb up on Rotten Tomatoes.

James Berardinelli isn't quite as kind; he seems to be unhappy that it wasn't as amazing and revolutionary as its predecessor. That's the problem with trying to follow up a movie generally accorded as revolutionary: everyone is disappointed if you aren't even revolutionarier.

And honestly, it's hard to do that 28 years later. Tron was revolutionary largely because it laid the groundwork for everything that followed. So now you can't revisit the same ground without seeming trite and clichéd, even though you're just continuing in the exact same vein as you began. You can't both follow up to something old but groundbreaking and break entirely new and different ground. Just about every decades-later franchise sequel or prequel has run into that problem (think "Star Wars") unless it basically threw out everything that came before in favor of a total reimagining (think "Battlestar Galactica"). Even immediate sequels ran into that problem (think "Matrix").

( But it doesn't really have to be groundbreaking. )

TRON: Legacy rules. End of line. (Spoiler-free)

Well, okay, actually more like beginning of line, but as a single-statement sentiment it works pretty well.

This is one of those movies that you can't really trust the critics on. Even those critics as esteemed as Roger Ebert, who writes that the effects and sound are spectacular, but:

The plot is another matter. It's a catastrophe, short-changing the characters and befuddling the audience. No doubt an online guru will produce a synopsis of everything that happens, but this isn't like an opera, where you can peek at the program notes.

He gives the movie his traditional snarky, verging on hostile, treatment based on that lack. And yet, he still gives the movie three out of four stars and gets listed as a thumb up on Rotten Tomatoes.

James Berardinelli isn't quite as kind; he seems to be unhappy that it wasn't as amazing and revolutionary as its predecessor. That's the problem with trying to follow up a movie generally accorded as revolutionary: everyone is disappointed if you aren't even revolutionarier.

And honestly, it's hard to do that 28 years later. Tron was revolutionary largely because it laid the groundwork for everything that followed. So now you can't revisit the same ground without seeming trite and clichéd, even though you're just continuing in the exact same vein as you began. You can't both follow up to something old but groundbreaking and break entirely new and different ground. Just about every decades-later franchise sequel or prequel has run into that problem (think "Star Wars") unless it basically threw out everything that came before in favor of a total reimagining (think "Battlestar Galactica"). Even immediate sequels ran into that problem (think "Matrix").

( But it doesn't really have to be groundbreaking. )