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Sequel to TRON Coming Down the Wire

farrellj writes: "According to SF Wire, TRON is going to be released in a 20th anniversary DVD release...and they are working on a sequal, TRON 2.0. The DVD will be released Jan 15, 2002. There is also a new game in development too!" The rumors have been circulating for years. Maybe they'll get Lucy Lawless to demonstrate the proper application of a spinning disk.

43 of 98 comments (clear)

  1. What happened to Pixar rumors? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2

    At some point there were rumors that the Tron 2.0 would be handed off by disney to be handled by Pixar. Are these rumors now shafted to the "too implausible to even be repeated" list?

    P.s. to anyone who has played Mac Beamwars or any other lightcycles-like game : GLTRON

    What do y'all suppose will happen to the billions of lightcycles third-party implementations floating around out there once disney finally releases their own TRON pc game?

  2. Re:Just what we need by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2

    I hoping for Plan 10 from Outer Space. It's a shame the first nine didn't work out.

  3. Re:What's the plot? by jandrese · · Score: 2

    Reminds me of the Digimon movie (OK, Children's War Game OAVs) where they defeated the bad guy (who was a Digimon, sort of a computer program monster) by having kids all over the world mail bomb it.

    --

    I read the internet for the articles.
  4. As long as it isn't a Matrix ripoff by Sabalon · · Score: 2

    I would love to see another Tron. When we got our VCR it was the first movie we rented...I love that movie.

    But too often today, when they try to tie into something from the past, they feel they have to completely change it to make it cool for the current generation (of course, alienating the people that are most looking forward to it.)

    So, for Tron, since it is computer related, it would be a guess that they would probably want to make it a Matrix type thing. Then mention on Aint-it-cool-news.com of the light cycles still being there however is a good sign.

    If done right, then perhaps we would have something close to the MetaVerse (until someone finally makes SnowCrash!) Think about it, in Tron, all the characters were processes on one machine, some mainframe. Now, think of all the processes running on machines, with all these machines interconnected.

    I think they are gonna need some faster lightcycles to get around!

  5. David Warner? by Mr.+Neutron · · Score: 2
    I will not watch this movie unless David Warner (Dillenger/MCP) returns. He's pretty much my favorite (male) actor of all time.

    It would be nice to see Jeff Bridges and President Sheridan return, but David Warner is a must.

    --
    "How many six year olds does it take to design software?"

    --
    dinner: it's what's for beer
  6. Re:I can see it now... by Glytch · · Score: 2

    Tux in the games... Now someone with graphical talent has to go make a version of the Tux logo that has him in a glowing blue suit with a frisbee-o-death strapped to his back. :)

  7. Re:...the perils of unemployment... by Glytch · · Score: 2

    Don't worry, they'll add Qubit this time. He'll still only say two different things, but he'll be able to say them both *and* neither at the same time.

  8. Re:A little elaboration needed by unitron · · Score: 2

    Did you by any chance post a comment about a "Tron" remake to the nanotechnology and antibiotics story?

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  9. Re:Why are they doing this? by unitron · · Score: 2
    "...the in-name-only Mission Impossible's..."remake.

    Amen! The idea of making Mr. Phelps the bad guy just so that Tom Cruise could be the hero of the movie still gets me steamed.

    Of course we all that Barney was the *real* hero of the original televsion show.

    --

    I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.

  10. Sequel to "Tron" is tricky by IowaBoy · · Score: 2

    How they handle the computer world in "Tron 2.0" will be an interesting challenge, because when you think about the first film was very much of its time. The CGI was for then pretty advanced, and yet because of its limitations it was abstract enough that it clearly stood apart from the "real world." Now it's 2001 and we live with an expectation of full-screen, photorealistic CGI. Interesting, too how the arcade videogames that informed the first film are now underpowered compared to my PS2, and that the first film was made well before any public understanding of the nascent Internet. The whole idea of a story about unconnected computers seems quaint today.

    Of course, you could argue that a sequel to "Tron" has already been made: "The Matrix," also a story about people projected into computers battling the computer intelligences that run that world, albeit with its very '90s sensibilities of being wired and how powerful CGI can get.

    There are so many technological, philosophical and dramatic threads that could be picked up on that it's a shame they don't opt for a television series instead of blowing their wad on one take on the whole equation. An ongoing TV show would have room to breathe and explore all the inherint possibilities and address a lot of different viewpoints.

    In the meantime, Disney should get off its ass and release an audio CD of the Wendy Carlos' excellent soundtrack for the first film.

    BTW, if you want to have fun with the "Tron" DVD that's already been released, try watching it to the French audio track. Somehow it makes more sense...

  11. many hours spent playing TRON aganst friends by johnjones · · Score: 2

    I have spent hours apon Hours playing the simple tron game when pissed aganst pissed mates (pissed =drunk/tipsy)

    tho I have never seen the film

    look forward to it whats the remake about ?

    the orginal I though was getting the IP back from the guv and rideing bikes in a computer world as far as I could work out

    any answers ?

    regards

    john jones

  12. Re:Don't buy it! by Jeremi · · Score: 2

    All right, all right, I'll just wait for it to come out on DivX then. ;^)

    --


    I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
  13. Secrets of the Government? by SimplyCosmic · · Score: 2
    Although it's been a few years since I've seen it, Tron was all about an Evil Corporate Suit® who rose to the top after stealing several hit games from one of the main characters, who then, along with the corporate security guru who was suspicious of the program that was taking over all the company's main frames, went to try and take him down.

    You know, the kind of thing that seems to happen in every third MPAA or RIAA story here on Slashdot. ;)

  14. Re:Why? Why? Why? by dillon_rinker · · Score: 2

    Tron was for programmers like the Black Hole was for astrophysicists.

  15. Re:A big budget might ruin it by miracle69 · · Score: 2

    Maybe,
    But I just got back from Planet of the Apes, and I gotta tell ya, that was some impressive costume design.
    HI Mom!

    --
    Linux - Because Mommy taught me to Share.
  16. Good and Memorable Movies with Big Budgets by GoofyBoy · · Score: 2

    This is just the top of my head;

    Matrix
    Jurassic Park
    Terminator 2
    Gone with the Wind (You might not like it but it is a quality production)

    Movies do good are memorable regardless of a big budget or not. I'm sure that people can list their own favorite movies with small budgets.

    On the other hand, Tron 2.0 seems to be a direct to DVD so you might get your wish with repect to the small budget.

    --
    The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
  17. Re:Wonderful news - Tron 2.0 by nuintari · · Score: 2

    Do the original justice? How, by shooting it in the head? Tron was awful!

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  18. Re:What's the plot? by akiy · · Score: 2

    Wait'll Tron ends up in a pr0n site...

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    --
    http://www.aikiweb.com - AikiWeb Aikido Information

  19. Re:NO!! For the love of Linus NO!!!! by Minupla · · Score: 3

    Wargames caused me more grief in my early years then I care to remember...

    You see, I was 12, and had a modem. Everyone was telling my parents that I was going to start WWIII, because you could hack the military with modems.

    Give me a break, please? It's amazing what ppl will believe.

    Minupla
    --
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  20. Re:Don't buy it! by decipher_saint · · Score: 2
    1. "DVDs from the big movie industry players are pure economic poison" While this statement may make perfect sense whilst stoned, I'd still like you to elaborate. Corporate control eh? Whats the difference between copying DVD and VHS? A big sack of nothing!
    2. You are too late, Tron was released on DVD back in May 1999
    3. Hey, leave the Miniatures Industry Association of America (MIAA) alone, perhaps you meant the MPAA my weed smoking friend.
    4. The RIAA and the MPAA have become two acronyms associated with Slashdot banter, if you don't like them, don't support their products. Yes, that means no more TV, Radio or Movies if you can bear it.
    5. Heaven forbid that someone out there can make a good sequel, oh, but wait. Most of us cynical bastards have a perfect ideal locked in our brains so anything "the machine" makes is instantly crap. If anything, bad sequels generate wonderful conversation topics.

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    crazy dynamite monkey
  21. Re:Original Tron had no computer graphics by Apotsy · · Score: 2
    Next time you watch Tron take a look at the effects.. and know that no computers were used to do the effects. It must have employed all of Disney's animators to ink in each cell at a time to create this amazing movie. Of course the sequel will over use computer graphics and try to "push" the limits. This will take away so much that was the original Tron. Sigh.

    Not true. There actually is about 15 minutes worth of computer animation in the movie. However, you are correct in that the majority of the movie is not computer animated.

    The blue and red glowing lines on people's suits were done with photographic false-color techniques. To keep the glow off peoples faces, hand-drawn mattes were used to mask off those areas. You can see the edges of people's faces jiggling a little bit because the hand-drawn matte doesn't quite match from frame to frame. It's especially noticeable during the scenes before they escape (when the characters are all sitting in their prison cells talking).

  22. Re:Tron games (going after developers?) by andi75 · · Score: 2
    Wonder if the makers of the official Tron game will go after the developers of these games for trademark infringement.

    Can they? Tron games have been around for almost 20 years now, and one would think that Disney didn't try to enforce their trademark once.

    But then, it's probably safer for me not to visit the united states for a while...

    - Andreas (author of GLtron)

  23. Tron games by AirLace · · Score: 4
    For those who can't wait for the official release, there are some great GPL'd tron games out there, based on the lightcycle scene:
    • glTron - Probably the most mature 3D tron game. Features network playing and themes
    • Obviously Multiplayer Tron - New project, really unstable.
    • Armagetron - Came out when development of glTron became very slow. Best multiplayer support, but glTron's graphics are better.

    Wonder if the makers of the official Tron game will go after the developers of these games for trademark infringement. It's a crazy world.
    1. Re:Tron games by Chanc_Gorkon · · Score: 2

      Um....glTron looks most like the original. ALso, it plain ROCKS!!!! EVEN the windows version is SWEET! When multiplayer becomes stable, oh this will be a SHAWEET network game. The AI cycles seem to go in big squares. I imagine that multiplayer games could be short and sweet. LAG could SERIOUSLY be a problem in this game tho as fast as it moves. THANK YOU! Now can you port this to PocketPC ( I need games and I am too cheap to pay for em....at least I admit it. And at least I don't pirate them )? I'd run Linux except I can't because I have no flashrom! :)

      --

      Gorkman

  24. Given the Source by Greyfox · · Score: 2
    This movie will contain all sorts of schtick about how trading MP3s is Evil and why the DMCA is necessary. I'm waiting for one of these movies to come right out and tell us that we have to kiss corporate ass and beg The Mouse for the right to our very existience. That's pretty much what it's coming to.

    Me? Cynical? Nooooo...

    --

    I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?

  25. Re:I'm Not Buying: Disney/Hollywood Can Get Bent by JoeShmoe · · Score: 2

    This is an excellent point. Do we really trust Disney to green light a project that protrays comptuers/hackers in a positive light?

    More than likely, TRON 2.0 will be about an evil young hacker out to destroy the entertainment industry by hacking the encryption on digital content...and TRON will be a rights-enforcement program out to slay all the P2P clients that are sharing the ill-gotten goods.

    Remember, there is no better spokesman for Hollywood interests than Hollywood itself.

    - JoeShmoe

    --
    -- I wonder which will go down in history as the bigger failure: the War on Drugs or the War on Filesharing
  26. I can see it now... by bflong · · Score: 3
    --Opening scene--

    Our hero is using PSDoom to "mannage" a Linux workstation that has been infected with a twisted copy of the MCP. The virus was installed onto a Windows 2000 box on the network by the latest Service Pack. Suddenly, a voice is heard from the workstations speakers.

    MCP Virus:
    I see you are not running Windows on this workstation. Come to the dark side.

    Our Hero:
    Never! Just wait till I get the BFG! Then I'll show you whos boss!

    MCP Virus:
    So... You like to play games, do you?

    -- Our hero notices that his mouse, a Micorsoft Optical mouse, starts to pull away from his hand. It flips over, and shoots him with a strange light from its optical window. Our hero finds himself in a place unfamiliar to him. He sees hundreds of Linux sysadmins being held up to the walls of a circular room. They are being scaned by some kind of energy. Something pulls at him, and he is thrown toward one of the empty spots on the wall and held there.

    MCP Virus:
    HAHAHA!!!
    Now you will know my true purpose! I will drain all the knowledge you have and use it for my own evil purpose! I will be [long pause. Drumroll] Windows XP Server!

    Voice from off camera:
    Not if I have anything to do with it!

    -- In walks a short, fat, black and white bird with a yellow beak, wielding a BFG. Camera focuses on him, then the BFG.

    Voice from near dead Linux Systems admin off camera:
    We're saved! It's Kernel Tux!

    -- Uh... He blasts the hell out of everything, the workstation and the world are saved from the horrable evil.

    Damn. It's way past my bedtime...

    --
    Why is it so hot? Where am I going? What am I doing in this handbasket?
  27. Tron, the flop by Animats · · Score: 3
    Tron was such a flop at the box office that it was generally considered to have set back the Hollywood end of computer graphics by five years or so. Usually, only successful movies are remade.

    I always expected Burroughs to sue them. The Burroughs mainframe operating system was called the Master Control Program.

  28. Misleading by Nastard · · Score: 3

    Lisberger has proposed a sequel to Disney, and is working on the script, but there is nothing in the works, yet. It's sad that todays journalism allows for a "maybe" to be treated as fact (the Indy 4 stories).

    That said, it would be great if they actually got this going.

  29. TROFF? AOL already beat 'em to it by yerricde · · Score: 3

    TROFF: The story of a computer program transported to the real world.

    I see you've grasped the true origin of the name of TRON (trace on). But the story of a computer program embodied in a real world entity has already been done... by Warner Bros. Pictures, a division of AOL.

    A.I.: The Story of a Robot Who Is Even More Obsessed With Pinocchio Than I Am

    --
    Will I retire or break 10K?
  30. What's the plot? by GrouchoMarx · · Score: 3
    What's the plot going to be? Instead of actors in body suits pretending to run around inside a tape-driven mainframe, will we have actors in body suits running around the Internet? I can see it now...

    Tron: Uri, you made a wrong turn! That's a Windows 2000 server!
    Uri: AAIIIEEE!!!!
    Tron: No! Uri! NOOOOOO!!!!!

    The MCP, of course, has been replaced with a virus that is spreading and bringing down the entire computer infrastructure of the world. It will be defeated in a huge on-screen battle with thousands of little CGI critters who are all in one place for some reason, despite being contrary to the very nature of computer software.

    Of course, since the first Tron was one of the pioneers in computer graphics in movies, nothing short of Final Fantasy-level graphics will do 2.0 justice. Unless, they decide to save money and bring out the body suits again...

    --GrouchoMarx

    --

    --GrouchoMarx
    Card-carrying member of the EFF, FSF, and ACLU. Are you?

  31. DVD edition = soundtrack on CD? by gilroy · · Score: 4

    I wonder if this means Disney will finally get off theif duffs and authorize Wendy Carlos to do a remastered CD version of the soundtrack. Tron had a, well, different sound to it which I happened to have enjoyed. Yet despite the techno-intense nature of the movie, the music has never been released in digital. :(

  32. Just what we need by RedOregon · · Score: 2

    What's next? A sequel to WarGames?

    ____

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  33. Why? Why? Why? by Reality+Master+101 · · Score: 2

    Is Hollywood so starved for ideas that they have to mine for sequels this low? (rhetorical question, of course...)

    I mean, I haven't seen the movie since it came out, and maybe someone can refresh my memory, but didn't it, well, suck? I mean, I remember my group of friends saying "Finally! A movie for programmers!", but after seeing it I remember being sorely disappointed in its unrealistic, cheesy use of any buzzword they could pull out of the computer dictionary.

    If software marketing directors wrote a computer script, this is what the movie would look like (except without product placements. :) )


    --

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    Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
  34. ...the perils of unemployment... by jeko · · Score: 2
    The Tron PC video game is slated for a 2003 release, sources told the trade paper. The Tron game is also expected to appear on Microsoft's Xbox video game system.

    Tron went to work for the Master Control Program?! I don't believe it!

    I guess that's what happens after twenty years of unemployment on the game grid.

    But seriously, I hope that Bit character gets to say more than just two things this time around. He was always so predictable. If it wasn't one thing, it was the other...

    --
    He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
  35. sucked into a computer by blindbat · · Score: 2

    20 years ago...

    That is about when I first got sucked into computers. Can't seem to get back out though...

  36. Wonderful news - Tron 2.0 by hillct · · Score: 2

    People have recently complained about the number of old movies that are being re-made (like Planet of the Apes...) and TV series that were made into movies in the past couple of years - the travisty that was Beverly Hillbillies.

    Finally a movie that deserves a sequel. It should be an interesting chalenge for the producers to do justice to the original while at the same time updating it for the modern era - a daunting chalenge indeed but not impossible. I look forward to both the re-release of the original and the sequal with joy and aprehension.

    --CTH

    --

    --Got Lists? | Top 95 Star Wars Line
  37. Don't buy it! by SocialWorm · · Score: 4
    I find it ironic that a movie that touches, albiet lightly, on corporate culture should be released in the format of corporate control. DVDs from the big movie industry players are pure economic poison, regardless of their content -- not unlike an toxin-infused envelope. This movie may be marketed as Tron, but it should carry a warning that it's really a vote against freedom, a vote for the DMCA, and, by association, a vote to keep Dimitry in prison.

    Standing up to these megalomanaics is worthy of a movie in and of itself, but if we don't, we could all find ourselves against the powerful systems, both legal and computer, of the MIAA and its allies.

    Besides, do you really want to support these people in their quest to make Tron 2.0, which has "An ambitious hacker transports himself into cyberspace to pull off the ultimate hack." for a tagline? Even if nothing else written here convinces you to boycott the release of Tron on DVD, that almost certainly should. Yuck, awful -- just what we need, another bad "hacker flick" (almost certainly what's intended, given today's climate).

    --
    My Blog: http://nic.dreamhost.com/
  38. A big budget might ruin it by Waffle+Iron · · Score: 5
    One thing that made movies like the original Star Wars, Mad Max and Tron stand out was the spartan ambiance that came with a (relatively) low budget. As it happened, that ambiance worked well with the screenplay and acting for these movies; that's why these movies are still talked about while dozens of others from that time are forgotten.

    Twenty or so years later, they redo Star Wars (largely on the same planet) with a big budget and too many visual distractions and not enough focus on the story... and it doesn't work. There was nothing special about it compared to all of the other computer-effects scifi movies out there today. I fear the same thing will happen to this sequel.

    1. Re:A big budget might ruin it by Perplexia · · Score: 2

      Don't we always warn ourselves to keep away from those buggy x.0 releases anyways?

      I don't have high hopes for this movie, but that means it might surprise me.

      We'll see.

  39. Sequel to TRON? It's obvious! by guuyuk · · Score: 2
    TROFF: The story of a computer program transported to the real world.

    'nuff said!

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  40. If Disney allows it... by 6EQUJ5 · · Score: 2


    I don't want Lucy Lawless. I want Lucy Topless!

    --

  41. I'm Not Buying: Disney/Hollywood Can Get Bent by Proteus7 · · Score: 2

    Always remember that Tron is a Disney product. Disney is a major force behind the DMCA and the MPAA. Don't arm your enemies with your cash! Want freedom and respect? You can start by refusing to patronize the products and services of those that want nothing more than to strip you of both.

    Proteus7

    "Go to any elite university and you are usually speaking to very disciplined people, people who have been selected for obedience. And that makes sense. If you've resisted the temptation to tell the teacher, "You're an asshole," which maybe he or she is, and if you don't say, "That's idiotic," when you get a stupid assignment, you will gradually pass through the required filters. You will end up at a good college and eventually with a good job." - Noam Chomsky