I recently got the chance to see TRON: Legacy in 3D at the nearby Henry Ford IMAX Theater, and now after watching the entire movie, I can say that it really wouldn't have mattered whether the movie was 3D or not. All that mattered is that the movie ranks as one of my favorite movies of all time. The 3D special effects were just icing on the cake.
The movie opens up in Center City with the main characters, Kevin Flynn and his son, Sam, in 1989, during the night before Kevin went missing. Kevin, the creator of the hit arcade game, Tron, was also the head of a large gaming company, Encom. After the day he went missing, the company's stocks declined sharply and caused discord within the company, as leadership shifted between members. Sam ends up running away from his home, and twenty years later, he heads out to Encom Tower to hack into their systems right before the first release of their new operating system. He ends up successful but does get caught in the process.
After spending a night in jail for breaking and entering, Sam returns to his flat in a remote part of Center City to find out that his father's assistant stopped by to tell him that he received a page from Kevin's office at the now abandoned arcade. The office's number was disconnected for twenty years, but Sam didn't seem to care. But Sam quickly changes his mind and heads out to the arcade, where he finds Kevin's secret office and, after fiddling around with an extremely outdated but fully operational computer screen, is transported to the world Kevin created -- The Grid. Almost immediately after he sets foot outside, two "guards" in black seize him by the arms and place him in an empty slot, along with seven other people.
Sam was confused at first as to where he was and why he had been taken by the guards. However, he quickly finds out where and why these mysterious people had taken him -- the hard way. He is lowered down to an underground bunker and is clad with a battle suit and an identity disc. He was then taken out into an arena where he faced various "Programs", under the guise of humans, also equipped with suits and identity discs. In the enclosed arenas, the identity discs were the weapons, and if the opponent was hit with an identity disc, then the opponent was "de-resoluted" and burst into several metallic cubes.
When Sam made it to the final round, Clu, the overseer, finds out that he was not a “Program”, but a “User”. Thus, he had to compete in the “Challenge of the Grid”, in which he faced his opponent from the final round in a “Light Match”. In the Light Match, both combatants are given a Light Cycle (similar to a motorcycle) and four teammates. In this game, the combatants attempt to destroy enemy Light Cycles by trapping them within boundaries, similar to the game Snake. When it was just Sam and his opponent left in the arena, and Sam was on the verge of losing, Quorra, Kevin’s “apprentice”, bursts in and lets Sam escape in Kevin’s Light Runner.
Sam and Quorra eventually arrive at Kevin’s residence outside of The Grid. There, Kevin explains why he could not return to the outside world and why it would be extremely dangerous to try and escape. Back in 1989, he created Clu and promised to make a perfect world with him. However, as Kevin discovered that “isomorphic algorithms” had came out of the blue, he and Clu had conflicting views on them. While Kevin viewed them as the perfect individuals, Clu viewed them as imperfections, and thus, eradicated all of them (except one, as revealed later), betrayed Kevin, and took control of The Grid. It is also revealed that Sam opened up a portal to the outside world when he entered, and that there is a way to the portal.
Knowing this, Sam sets out back into The Grid and meets someone he met during the “games”, who escorts him into a club. At the party, he meets Zuse, the only one who can access the portal. When Zuse realizes that he was the son of Kevin Flynn, he treats Sam like royalty and discusses the escape plan in his private lounge, but when Kevin and Quorra arrive, several programs controlled by Zuse swoop in and fight everyone off. During the fiasco, however, Quorra becomes injured and Zuse steals Kevin’s disc. Clu arrives at the scene later on, and Zuse tries to work out a deal for the disc, but Clu just takes it and blows up the club.
Meanwhile, Sam realizes that Zuse had taken Kevin’s disc, but Kevin jut shrugs it off. The three end up boarding a freight train-like vehicle to the portal. During the ride, Kevin tries to figure out how to repair Quorra’s damaged disc, which proved to be a complicated task, since the disc structure was fairly complex. However, Kevin manages to succeed anyway. While the three were on board the freight train, Clu orders a search for the three, and just when the trio saw the portal in reach, they soon realize a horrible nightmare: Clu is building an army of programs, with several shipments of new programs coming at that very moment. Clu even delivers a speech talking about how the programs have been restricted from entering the outside world like Kevin does, and promises that a new frontier will open up for them.
The three organize a plan to escape to the portal, despite the low probabilities. They use Quorra as a diversion, while Kevin readies a jet plane and Sam retrieves the ring. Everyone in the plan know that the possibilities are low, but they carry on with it anyway. Kevin ends up forcing one of the programs to let him through, with a simple bonk to the program’s head. Sam fights off four of Clu’s cronies with magnificent style, and surprisingly, Clu’s chief assistant, Jarvis, ends up surrendering. Sam takes the captured disc and escapes to the flight deck with Quorra.
Clu, however, would not give up the disc that easily. He takes six of the jets for him and five other programs. When Kevin and Quorra end up seeing the pursuing jets, Sam is instantly assigned to the turret position and shoots down four of the planes with ease. The final two planes, the ones piloted by Clu and Tron (the other original creation), remained elusive until Tron decided to crash his plane into Clu’s. However, Clu survives and continues pursuing the trio.
Kevin, Sam, and Quorra eventually make it to the platform. But Clu got there first, and is the only obstacle between them and the portal. Kevin tries to explain the situation and why Kevin “betrayed” Clu. However, Clu did not believe Kevin’s apology and both sides fight each other. Kevin lets Sam and Quorra proceed to the portal and sacrifices himself. As the portal begins to close, Clu takes Kevin’s disc, only to find that he secretly swapped it with Quorra’s. Clu attempts to jump to the closing portal, but Kevin holds him back with a powerful force, which then destroys everything he created.
Sam finds himself back in the real world, and is greeted by Alan, Kevin’s assistant from earlier. Sam explains to him what happened inside the parallel universe of The Grid. He exits and finds Quorra next to Sam’s motorcycle. The two ride on the expressway and they finally get a feel for the outside world.
I am normally not someone who enjoys science fiction, but this movie was one of the few exceptions. The plot of the movie was cleverly written, and the special effects/CGI were spectacular. Some of the scenes were so intense that they made me glued to my seat despite my urge for popcorn and a soda refill. I would give this movie a four out of four stars. It is one of the truly magnificent movies of 2010.
