Commentary Track: Tron

Greeting programs! With a brand new sequel in theaters, the MovieFilm have reconvened in the Grid to talk through the original TRON from 1982! Lots of fun and lots of laughs as we point out behind-the-scenes stories, interesting factoids and much more! We hope you'll stick with us before you say, "End of line"!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome friends. The podcasts podcast is done to join Tack again.
Ryan the Talk Dat Booby's Mom in their backs only made.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
The income five to eleven computer center of the most
calculating intelligence on Earth.

Speaker 1 (00:23):
I still do not understand why you want to break
into the system, because man, somewhere in one of these memories.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
Is the obult Kevin Flynn computer genius searching for answers
inside the system.

Speaker 1 (00:37):
Hey, hey, it's the big Master control program everybody's been
talking about. Stop, I'm more than you.

Speaker 2 (00:42):
Trapped inside an electronic arena. Journey across an electronic scene
on cycles made of light. Tron enter its world.

Speaker 1 (00:57):
This summer.

Speaker 3 (01:00):
Greetings programs, Welcome to a movie film commentary track. I
am the program Zachy, and I'm here with my user Brian.

Speaker 1 (01:11):
Hello, what's happened? We are real. Don't let any of
the other programs tell you otherwise, and we love you.

Speaker 3 (01:22):
Hey, you know there is a brand new Tron movie
coming out, Brian. That's a sentence I never thought I
would utter, being honest, I never thought that.

Speaker 1 (01:30):
That would be true with the second one when that
came out, And now I just can't believe we're actually
getting a third one. But I love it. I love it.
I mean, this is like the day and age where
the most anything that's gonna get made with a big
budget has to be based on some sort of IP
by and large, and so with Disney owning so many things,

(01:53):
it feels like Tron would be like their twentieth priority,
you know, out of all the things that they own.
So I'm just I'm I'm shocked they went back to Tron,
but I'm happy.

Speaker 3 (02:04):
What's interesting to me is like in the IP Overdrive
age that we're in, weirdly, Tron ends up being kind
of like a niche indie thing.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
That's That's just what I mean, right, because it has
to have a big budget, but they have to also
know that this isn't going to take the world by storm. Yeah,
you know, you know in the Disney architecture, Tron is
like Blair Witch, you know. Yeah. But you know what,
now that I think about it, they have a Tron
ride at parks, don't they. So I wonder if there's

(02:38):
like a calculus where they think this feeds into the
parks a little bit, you know, maybe someone will buy, uh,
do the ride and also buy the shirt at the
gift shop at the end, I don't know. Yeah, well,
you know what, Brian, it's Tron's world. We're just living
in it. That's true. That's true. That's the way I
look at it.

Speaker 3 (02:53):
And and for me, this is fantastic because it gives
us an opportunity to hop in the old way back
and watch the original Tron from nineteen eighty two. Yep, yep, Yeah,
this is a movie that, certainly I have a great
deal of affinity for. I think I've told the story before.
I went to preschool with a Tron backpack slung around

(03:15):
my shoulders.

Speaker 1 (03:17):
Wow. So we go way back, wow Wow.

Speaker 3 (03:22):
And you know, I suspect we're gonna have a fun
conversation because it had been a little while since I
had seen this original film. So it's fun, fun to
watch with commentary eyes.

Speaker 1 (03:34):
Yes, I gotta say, I have a lot of well funness.
But also my nostalgia is probably even bigger for it,
like my memories of it more than I actually remember it.
So it was I've seen chunks of it on TV
and things like that throughout my life, but sitting down
watching the whole thing, I mean, I don't know. It
hasn't been as many times as I think. So it

(03:57):
was cool to go start it from the beginning last
night and get reacquainted. Well, hey, we're about to watch
it again.

Speaker 3 (04:03):
So, folks, if you want to watch Tron with us,
this is the nineteen eighty two original, you're welcome to
do that. Otherwise, we'll try to keep our conversation interesting enough,
hopefully to keep you engaged, and we'll suck you in,
just like the MCP does to poor Ole Kevin Flynn.

Speaker 1 (04:20):
Right, and we're gonna hit play in just a second,
so we'll do the usual thing. One two to three
plate Brian, you're ready to go, I'm ready. All right,
let's do this. So here we go, one two three plate.

Speaker 2 (04:36):
A.

Speaker 3 (04:36):
Right, So I have to say when we talk about
sense memory, this opening sequence here where we see this
little pattern here in the construction of Tron man the
process where it comes together in that note as the
Tron logo comes up, it pulls me right back.

Speaker 1 (04:57):
Oh yeah, yeah, I think I had this aped off
of TV when I was a kid. Like this makes
me think of Saturday Afternoon Fox thirty two, you know,
in Chicago, and I remember just being dazzled by I
mean this, this is sort of a brief thing here
of computer graphics we're seeing, but when Flynn is brought

(05:19):
into the computer world and we go through that almost
like two thousand and one Stargate style sequels. Oh yeah, sure. Oh,
I mean that was dazzling to me as a kid,
and I remember watching that a lot. You know, It's
why I have several things I want to say. But
did you know that there was apparently a prologue to

(05:40):
this movie in theaters that kind of explained the world.

Speaker 3 (05:45):
Yeah, well, my understanding is that was in international releases,
and it was definitely on international home video releases.

Speaker 1 (05:52):
Yeah. Yeah. I was reading a bunch of different things,
and I was reading two different prologues, so I don't
know if they were different in different ways.

Speaker 3 (06:00):
I remember when I was living overseas, so by way backstory,
when my family moved to Saudi Arabia, we took a
bunch of movies with us. My my my uncle had
a whole collection of movies that he duped to it. Actually,
my cousin Samsa and Harris, they listened to the show

(06:22):
we got movies from their dad, and so Tron was
among them. We had This and Star Wars and Superman
and the black hole, like all the stuff that was
really like my formative you know, yeah, wow, okay, the
wet cement, if you will. So we had we had,
you know, the American release of Tron that we took
with us, and then over there I happened to see

(06:43):
somebody else's copy and it starts with a thing.

Speaker 1 (06:45):
It's like, this is the story of two worlds. One
world is our world, the real world one the other
world is a world of programs and whatever. And I
was like eight or something when I saw that, I
was like, I get it, guys, I don't think you need.

Speaker 2 (06:56):
To do it.

Speaker 3 (06:57):
Even that's funny, you know, but I very distinctly remember
seeing that and being finding it off putting.

Speaker 1 (07:04):
You know, yeah, that's funny. Because yeah, then I guess
there was some card that also said kind of it ended.
The last card said on the other side of the screen.
That's when we get that moment at the beginning where
we see the light cycle. That's right game. I just
find that's interesting. And then apparently there was there was
two prologus, and again it might have been according to

(07:24):
region or something, but one of them got into you know,
every time we renew our driver's license or pay our
telephone bills. Each of us is left. A little bit
of each of us is left within the computer. Just interesting.
I well that was the other thing too, is I
had forgotten. I remember that these were programs, but I

(07:49):
guess I wasn't really thinking of what it meant. I
just remember the aesthetic of the movie, most of them all.
And I do wonder if in nineteen eighty two.

Speaker 3 (07:58):
Quick, Brian, before this has seen end here and point.
First of all, the actor that Ram is talking to,
that's the guy play the guy Ram is talking to.
His name is crom That's Peter Jurassic who ten years
later was one of the regulars on Babylon five with
Bruce box Lightner. Ah, but more interesting to me on
this rewatch. I didn't realize that that's the guy who

(08:19):
Flynn does the ring game with, right, yeah, And so
you know suddenly we're like, oh, we know that guy.
We kind of like him, you know, oh totally yeah. Yeah,
so you feel a little more anyway, apology sorry continue,
well no, no, no.

Speaker 1 (08:34):
Just yeah, sort of like humanizing these computer programs, and
I had forgotten that, you know, they're like, oh yeah,
I'm gonna accounting program. I don't I don't even know
why I'm here. Yep, yeah, that whole thing. So it's
like I was thinking about this, like imagining my you know,
copy of Microsoft Word looking like me in there, just
being like, I don't understand we're in a little Neon suit,

(08:55):
you know. Yeah. Yeah, And I would love if you know,
people use like bad grammar sentences and he like corrected them,
you know, his like spell check grammar check got kicked in.
That'd be a fun personality quirk. This is incredible, I mean, still,
the inside of this tank or whatever it is, this
is just so gorgeous. The way they achieved these effects,

(09:18):
which is largely not digital, right, No, it sounded pain
I mean you're probably gonna talk about it, but it
sounded painstaking. Yeah, I mean it's nuts, you know, And
it's remarkable because the way they visualized this world, and
it's partly Mobius the kind of artist, and partly Sidmeade

(09:42):
the production artist, coming together with this unique aesthetic, which
to me, you watch it, you know, forty plus years later,
and it it stands completely apart. It's unlike anything else. Still, Yeah,
I mean, even with the neon trim and the sort

(10:02):
of future tech lookie sort of thing that other people
have kind of adapted into their own works. Yeah. You
look at one frame from this film and you know
exactly what it is.

Speaker 3 (10:13):
Yeah, And it got me thinking about how there's something
remarkable about you can create something that is absolutely state
of the art, and then wait a couple of years
and it starts looking kind of janky and dated, which
I would argue is what happened with Tron. Like ten

(10:35):
years later you're like, oh, that's really dated, right, and
then it comes it goes from timely to out of
time to timeless.

Speaker 1 (10:45):
Yeah. Yeah, and so we're fully on the other side
of that now. I think it helps that it's leaning
into the video gameness of it instead of trying to
make these ships look anything other than a collection of blocks,
you know what I mean. So then it's like, oh, yeah,
well this this is how it's supposed to look. It's

(11:06):
not that it looks old. Yeah. Well, it's sort of like.

Speaker 3 (11:11):
The world of the Grid is completely its own thing, right,
So this isn't like a wreck at Ralph situation, right right, right, right,
Like it's not reliant on our familiarity with various ips,
you know.

Speaker 1 (11:26):
And then by the way, we see Clue there was
yellow for a bit. That was the original intention to
have the good guys be yellow and the bad guys
be blue. Interesting, and then they at one point switch
that up, which I don't know why it is, but
it just sort of makes sense. It's like, yeah, no,
red bad. I think it's the the you know, the

(11:47):
good guys of the blue Lightsabers, the bad guys of
the red light Saber. That's exactly what I was going
to say. Yep, and the Star Wars is just apparent
every which way in this movie. Right now, I should
say this.

Speaker 3 (12:01):
I remember very distinctly the part where Clue gets de ress.
I remember it scaring me when I.

Speaker 1 (12:06):
Was yeah, because it's pretty horrifying. Yeah yeah. And then
I can't remember the character's name, but the elder program
who's sort of like a face, yeah, but also part machine,
and he's swiveling around toward the end. Something about that
like really unnerved me. I don't know, like, yeah, well,

(12:27):
it's like like human had been taken over by a machine.
I know that's not what it is, but it's it's yeah. Yeah,
this right here, I remember is creeping me out. Yeah,
this is crazy. By the way, this helicopter yep, right,
I read that they used like three M tape to

(12:51):
do that, and I thought this would look amazing now, right.
I was kind of shocked when I saw it. It
looked too cool and good for something. This whole sort
of it looks like, yeah, a Neon style trim on
this helicopter, but it's just reflective tape. Amazing, that's and
it's very distinctive, and I like how it it blurs

(13:14):
the line between the world of the grid and the
real world. Right.

Speaker 3 (13:18):
I think that's the one thing I remember watching this
movie at a very young age, and I have to
imagine that this was at least some factor in my
not wanting to work in a cubicle.

Speaker 1 (13:32):
Especially that one shot where it looks like, yeah, that one.

Speaker 3 (13:35):
Match shot that goes just way down in the distance,
just a sea of cubes, you know.

Speaker 1 (13:39):
Yeah, yeah, like no, thanks. Well, they said that they
intentionally chose this view out the window with the la
you know, city scape because it looks like sort of
like a computer grid, interesting like circuitry. Yeah. And then
this I was curious about this too, This desk where

(14:01):
you see you know, like a keypad light up keypad
and the messaging and apparently that was done with rear
projection from under the desk. Well, and there was nothing
like that at the time. Yeah. Yeah, and yet now
we're like, no, that's we have that now, totally totally
touch pads. Yeah, yeah, essentially. And it's funny though. I

(14:23):
was thinking when he was using the keypad that when
in the middle of the day, when you're not using
it as a keypad, you would just see nothing but
finger smudges all of your desk. That's so true. And
I was like, eh, so I were only in here
at night, I guess. Yeah. By the way, I have
to say, this version that we're looking at that's available

(14:47):
for streaming is stunning. Oh, it's amazing. Yeah yeah. I
mean I remember this movie looking aged, you know, and
which makes sense it is older and whatever. But it's
just amazing what they can do now and how they
can restore these films because it looks very filmic still, right,
but it just looks so crisp and sharp and beautiful. Yeah,

(15:07):
they've they've done right by this movie. Yes, in terms
of the restorations.

Speaker 3 (15:12):
I mean, I remember when the DVD came out. We're
talking two thousand and two, I believe. Yeah, we've been
for the twentie anniversary and they did a nice job,
and then the Blu ray in twenty eleven, and you know,
at every step of the process, they've really.

Speaker 1 (15:29):
Worked to preserve the essence of the movie.

Speaker 2 (15:31):
You know.

Speaker 1 (15:32):
Yeah, Yeah, it's it's worth calling out because a lot
of times people overcorrect, that's right, and they try to
smooth everything out to the point where it just looks whack.
People look waxy. Yeah, you know, but this I thought
this was a stunning restoration. Bruce Boxeitner like full on

(15:52):
Christopher Reeve as Clark Kent. Yeah, right, with the I
didn't even think of it that way. Yeah, with the glasses.
He's comically oversized class that's so funny.

Speaker 3 (16:03):
The one thing you got to say about this movie,
and it really stuck out to me on rewatch, is
like Tront himself not that interesting a character, being honest.

Speaker 1 (16:13):
Totally right. Yeah, I mean back, I have revisited this
since my childhood. But if I hadn't seen it since
then and you asked me now, I would have thought
Tron was probably Jeff Bridges because he's a more dynamic,
Yeah character, it's interesting because the story is situated as
such that that Flynn is our POV character. Yes, but

(16:39):
you know he has more of an arc. Well, he
has an arc Tron does not, you know. And and
I mean Bruce box Lightner is just one of these
like classically heroic. I mean he's got like a face
chiseled out of granite, you know, a classical hero. I
just wish they gave I wish they gave his character
more to do. I mean it's kind of a bummer

(17:00):
that even in the sequel, like his character most important
character development happens off camera. Interesting. See that's the thing too.
I don't remember the sequel. I haven't seen it since
it came out, but I do plan on watching it
now that I've seen this, and with the new one
coming out. Yeah yeah, I don't even remember how they
further the story. To be honest, Well, in that case,

(17:20):
I just won't I won't say. But yeah, I mean
it's funny. I was like, oh, I forgot that there's
kind of like a Wizard of Oz element, you know,
where you're seeing actors played two characters. But I mean
it's not the same because thought I had that thought too. Yeah, yeah,

(17:41):
And That is kind of cool though, the idea that
the user who either interacts or created the program has
imprinted a bit of themselves onto it, so we see
that personified. See.

Speaker 3 (17:54):
My thought though, is like, well, people write multiple programs, right,
so it'd be funny. Sure, multiple people look the same,
but like one of them has like a funny mustache on,
one of thee has like, you know, like a mohawk.
But it's all the same person, right, just to differentiate,
you know.

Speaker 1 (18:09):
Right, right right, It would be funny. Now that there's
so many more programs and they're so silly, I mean,
even just like an AD blocker or something, it would
just be interesting to see those things personified. See, I
see it like multiplicity, you know, Michael, exactly exactly. Yeah.
One of them is wearing boxer shorts on his head,
like just just different. Yeah right right, I'm flappy Bird,

(18:32):
remember me? You know? Oh yeah, just too many of
them now.

Speaker 3 (18:46):
Yeah, this this whole conceit of the of the matter
transmitter thing, Like I I love the movie shorthand it's like,
oh yeah, we can do this thing. And there's the
orange and now it's there and and you know, you
just roll with it. Certainly as a kid, you just
roll with it, but like the implications are staggering.

Speaker 1 (19:04):
I actually I was like, wait, what's happening, Like it's
putting the particles into the laser, but then it's like
reassembling them inside a computer or what. So mine now exists? Well, no,
it's it's data. It's it's data. Yeah, So it's in essence,

(19:24):
it's like a transporter from Star Trek. Okay, So it
takes your your image, it transit it, it translates you
into data, and then it stores you. I mean the
amount of data that would be required would be astronomical, right,
and they can reassembly you. So in essence, again, it's
like a transporter. Yeah, yeah, which I mean, yeah, it's
it's I get it.

Speaker 3 (19:45):
Like it doesn't matter that that's just an orange right.
That is life altering What just happened there?

Speaker 1 (19:50):
Yes? Right?

Speaker 3 (19:52):
Right, Like that changes all notions of what we know
about the world. But it's kind of like, hey, here's
this thing, and Alan's like hey neat, So anyway, what
are you doing later?

Speaker 1 (20:00):
Right? Right? Right? Yeah? Yeah? I was thinking of like,
would you want to introduce an element where it seems
a little more dangerous, like you see the orange explode,
It's like, well, it's just experimental. We're not sure if
we can get it to work. But then the first

(20:21):
time on him, But then I'm like, maybe that's just
too many. I think the problem there is that's not
what the story is about, right, Like, yeah, yeah, I
realize I'm thinking of Honey, I shrunk the Kids, which.

Speaker 3 (20:32):
Is yeah, because ultimately, all you're trying to do is
seed the thing that lets us get to the thing
that we want to see. Yeah, no, no, right, So
Cindy Morgan, she was also on a show called Bring
Him Back Alive with the Bruce Box Lightner.

Speaker 1 (20:49):
Oh funny, right around this time. Actually, she was also
in Caddyshack, right, she was in Caddy Shack, that's right.

Speaker 2 (20:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (20:57):
Yeah, she passed away a couple of years ago. Yeah,
I remember that. Yeah, it was really sad. Yeah, it was.

Speaker 3 (21:07):
This summer, by the way, was just bananas. I mean,
this is the summer of eighty two in terms of
the movies that were released that year. I mean it
was just like hitters week after week. This this movie
had the misfortune of sort of coming out close enough
to e t that it that it sort of got

(21:28):
you know, people chose that one instead.

Speaker 1 (21:30):
You know, well that's kind of the problem. I mean,
Disney originally was going to release this around Christmas time.
It was gonna be a holiday one. Yeah. Yeah, but
then when they found out that Don Bluth was putting
out The Secret of Nim in July, you know, they
were like, well, we got to go against Don Bluth
because Don Bluth used to be a Disney guy, but
he ended up leaving to start his own He broke bad,

(21:50):
He broke bad on Disney. Yeah, and he brought some
Disney people with him, so there was some bad blood there.
So it's just funny that this was this release date
was out of spite, but then ended up competing with
like yeah, et Rathocon Poultrygeist.

Speaker 3 (22:04):
Yeah, although it did it did do better than Secretive Nim,
So there is there you go. Disney got their pyrrhic victory.

Speaker 1 (22:12):
Yeah. Well, also apparently it had a lack of marketing.
I don't know if you read about this, but there
was sort of a Disney felt like they had a
way they do things and they'll build on word of
mouth and they don't need to spend like et had,
you know, ten million dollars in marketing and Annie and
other movies, you know, big marketing campaigns. But Disney was like, no, no, no, no,
we don't do that. And they spent for Disney. Damn

(22:32):
it kind of and they let's see it says well,
they spent less than five hundred thousand dollars, citing Walt
Walt Disney's adage that the only publicity worth the money
was free. And I think it really came to bite
them in the butt.

Speaker 3 (22:51):
So when you consider that, the fact that the movie
did like okay mm hmm, is itself kind of remarkable
because if they had put some marketing muscle behind it,
it probably would have done a lot better.

Speaker 1 (23:01):
Yeah, like it did. It did okay enough to not
embarrass the studio, but not okay enough to to continue
with the brand, you know. Yeah, yeah, but it was
funny taken. Sorry, I mean for.

Speaker 3 (23:17):
Most of the eighties, this was their highest grossing live
action movie.

Speaker 1 (23:23):
Well that's because they didn't make another one after the failure.
That would explain that almost a decade. There you go. Well,
following this and the black Hole, I should say the
black Hole.

Speaker 3 (23:33):
See this did better than the black Hole, I think
in terms of money money in versus money out.

Speaker 1 (23:37):
Yeah, which, by the way, you look at Disney's live
action output in this moment, and Disney was in a
weird like crossroads moment where they were trying to figure
out their identity. Yeah, but you've got to admire the
black Hole in Tron like what weird bold films? That
is really true.

Speaker 3 (23:55):
So so you know there, you know, they say necessity
is the mother invention, right, and if Disney was riding
from success to success, they wouldn't swing at these kind
of off kilter projects, right, and certainly the black Hole
is just.

Speaker 1 (24:14):
That's fascinating. Like, I mean, I know we're going to
talk through that one of these days, Jeacubly, we haven't
we You and I share such an affinity for that movie. Yeah,
I know we'll get there. And it's they're like, hey,
we need to make something like Star Wars, and they
go with the black Hole. Yeah that's a choice, you know.

Speaker 3 (24:31):
Now, this one much similar, much more similar thematically to
Star Wars. But it's out there, right, and you realize, like, well,
if they weren't just sort of grasping for something, they
wouldn't have taken Steven Lisberger's pitch and been like yeah,
we can do this, you know, so, like I'm glad
about that, and then you fast forward to today where

(24:54):
it seems like Disney's sort of on the back foot,
like maybe that's how we end up put this neutron
mmmm mmm.

Speaker 1 (25:01):
Yeah, you know. Yeah, but yeah, I grew up with
The Black Hole too, probably because it was again, it
was one of those things they'd put on Saturday afternoons.
But you know what's interesting is I do feel like
they're very in it. They're both innovative, and they're both
really visions, yeah for sure, but they're also missing like

(25:24):
certain sparks of fun and like dynamic characters like a
Star Wars. Ye, you know, so they I think they're
very watchable, certainly for people like us, because we love
not just enjoying good stories and characters, but we also
love watching movies and looking at movies. And these are
two movies that are just a pleasure to look at

(25:44):
and to watch and to admire the filmmaking. But you know,
we also know that that isn't enough to make a blockbuster. Yeah,
you know, there's yeah, I don't know, but but I yeah,
the Swings. I really admire that Disney went for it.

Speaker 3 (25:58):
With something like this, like that's the thing because this
era they're they're cranking out Herbie movies probably Oh yeah.

Speaker 1 (26:06):
Yeah, I forgot about those, right, And that was I.

Speaker 3 (26:10):
Mean, it's so weird because Disney circa early eighties is
vastly different from from what we know of as Disney now,
you know, oh yeah, and and and I think this
movie just emerged from that that like sense like hey, this, yeah,
what the hell? You know, let's give this a shot.
And Stephen liz Berger comes in with this deceptively simple

(26:35):
idea and yet like to me, what what sticks out
to me when I watched this is all of so
much of the shorthand that informs this movie in terms
of the computer world, and you know, the the iconography
and everything and and all much of that I should

(26:56):
say has been sort of subsumed more broadly into the
culture in the deck had since in terms of like
the anthropomorphization of computers. And and I mean you and
I how much time lately have we spent talking about
AI and all this stuff? Well, shit, man, this thing
got there.

Speaker 1 (27:13):
Yeah ahead of the curve, right, I had forgotten about
the plot element where the MCP or yeah, yeah, I
also want to say MCU. The MCP is not just
you know, watching over its own affairs. It's also like
I'm gonna mess with the Kremlin. So yeah, it's becoming
this Yeah, I don't know, ai sentient sort of thing,

(27:36):
and I had forgotten about that, but yeah, pretty pretty
ahead of the curve. And you've got to imagine too.
I mean, this is when atari is so hot and
like new and innovative, and video games and arcades are
just you know, and so someone comes in and be like,
what if a guy went in a video game? Like
now you can completely imagine it, but back in nineteen

(27:56):
eighty one, that must have been like, oh, dude, do that,
and don't tell anyone we're making this because we're going
to be the first people to do it. Yeah, so true. Right,
by the way, I just want to call out because
I don't think we go back there, but Flynn's Arcade,
that building that's on Washington Boulevard down in Culver City,
no kidding, Yeah, And I've gone down there a couple

(28:17):
of times and I always forget about it. There's a
restaurant at the bottom of it now and I'm always like, oh, yeah,
like it just because it's that establishing shot we see
when you walk toward it on the sidewalk. It's like, Hey,
Flynn's arcade. That's cool. I mean I look. Oh, by
the way, you should say Bernard Hughes. You know who
who plays the the the elderly fella here. What's his name?

Speaker 3 (28:40):
He oh, Walter Gibbs. Yeah, he's he's also Dumont. But
I didn't realize until this rewatch that he's also the
MCP who we see at the at the at the
end of the movie. Oh, interesting, the old man, right,
And and he's also the voice. He's the voice of
the MCP that's speaking to Dillinger. And I'm like, yeah,

(29:01):
because because essentially it started as a chess program that
Gibbs wrote and then Dillinger uh annexed it. So it
makes sense that like, like the m c p IS
is based on Gibbs, not Dillinger. Fascinating, Yeah, like sark

(29:21):
Is is Dillinger's program.

Speaker 1 (29:23):
Yeah yeah, right, huh. I love it. The biggest.

Speaker 3 (29:34):
Radiation, see, you know, seeing this movie as a kid,
this and then Star Wars very much as part of
that same nexus. I think I think I I just
my my affinity for for the good natured rogues a
La Han Solo and and Flynn.

Speaker 1 (29:51):
Right, they just come from the same that same uh
a bag of archetypes, you know, yeah, totally mad mart
again in Willow. Yeah yeah, yeah, right, that same the
charming rogue you know, yeah, yeah, I think that's the
thing is is Jeff Bridges is is so fun in
this that he does kind of just blow the other

(30:13):
characters off the screen. Yeah, you know, And it's funny
because I think of different in my mind. Well, so, yeah,
this thing right here where basically the mcps like I've
I've grown bored of corporations, and he starts talking about
like wanting to enter the Pentagon and the Kremlin and
it's like, oh, I don't remember that. It's like a
big threat. But it doesn't it feels like it doesn't

(30:35):
get revisited, Like there isn't like some sort of countdown
at the end where it's going to like get out
of the building and it needs to be yeah for it.
Oh that's that's interesting, right, You think there would be
something like that, Yeah, I mean, now there would be,
I'm sure.

Speaker 3 (30:47):
Yeah, kind of like Flynn has to get out of
the grid so that he can stop the MCP in
the real world. Yeah, like there's there, there'd be some
kind of conjoint thing like Tron has to do this
thing in great world, and then Flynn asked to do
something in the real world.

Speaker 1 (31:03):
Right, that's exactly it. That's what it would be now. Yeah. Yeah.
And then David Warner.

Speaker 3 (31:13):
Yeah, by the way, I just saw him a couple
of weeks ago. I just watched Titanic with my kids.

Speaker 1 (31:18):
Yeah. I was gonna say, yeah, he's uh, Billy's Ane's
right hand man in there, or enforcerr whatever you want
to call him. And of course he's Ninja Turtles too, yep,
Ninja Turtles two. I mean, David.

Speaker 3 (31:29):
Warner was like the quintessential character actor. He would just
pop up in anything and you knew you were going
to get something dependable from him.

Speaker 1 (31:37):
Yeah. Yeah, just certain actors like they just whatever that
comes out of their mouth, they do it in an
interesting way. It sounds good. Yeah. He was in Time
after Time, which I think you saw relatively recently. Right,
Oh that's right. Yeah, he was Jack the Ripper and that. Yeah.
I couldn't help but think this shot here at the cubicle. Earlier,

(31:58):
we saw the cubicles from a different angle where we
had that man painting where we see they go on
and on and on. That's right here. It just for
some reason it stuck in my brain because it was
such a dynamic looking visual. Yeah. I was like, oh,
we're here from a different angle where we can't see
the expanse. And then I was like, oh, it's because
the lights are out. They'd have to make an entirely
different painting of it with them. That's a good point,

(32:18):
so they shifted the angle. See.

Speaker 3 (32:22):
I love how the MCP is blackmailing David Warner in
the real world and the digital world, both in different ways.

Speaker 1 (32:29):
No, that's funny. Yeah, yeah, but that's that's also the
whole thing about Dillinger stealing these video game ideas from Flynn.
It's just these are the details I'd forgotten. I just
remembered the broad strokes.

Speaker 3 (32:44):
Yeah, you know, well I love that because because here,
so Flynn is here, he's hacking into n com so
that you can find the proof. And it's like, I
have proof that Dillinger stole my my programs. How I
got this piece of paper that says so.

Speaker 1 (33:00):
Yeah, I want it to just prints it up It's like,
how do we know that's what there should have been
deleted scene? You know, like, well, how do we know
that you didn't write that out and just print it
because I didn't. Yeah, chucks out nineteen eighty two? Else
would you know? How would you do that? So this

(33:22):
apparently was a real like laser bay at Lawrence Livermore
National Laboratory. That's where all the door, that huge door
is it from the same sort, right right down the
street from where I live? Pretty cool? Yeah, yeah, pretty cool?
Just like uh what you we call it Cyberdine right, Yeah,

(33:42):
that's right, yeah, yeah, right down the street from you.
There we go. We got we got all kinds to
reveal your location. But yeah, one time I said, evil
Machine Intelligence are being berthed. Yeah, but no, I realized
that it was close to you, and I remember I
was like, can we please go and drive up and
see it? And you didn't have to twist my arm
too much? You know, so so amazing seeing that in person.

(34:03):
I mean it's almost like seeing a character from a film,
you know, Oh totally. Yeah. Now, I don't know if
I mean this bay is laser bay is real? I
don't know if that's the actual laser. I certainly wouldn't
want to be Jeff Bridges and having that thing pointed
at my head. Yeah, right, that thing switched off.

Speaker 3 (34:22):
Right, Man, you're realized, you know, I've my memory of
the second film is he's much more doing kind of
a Lebowski thing, you know, yes, yes, And and I
didn't realize watching this, Oh no, it's it's very much
in play here because it's a lot like far up man.

Speaker 1 (34:43):
You know, he's I was going to bring that up
because that was my memory too. I was thinking there
was different eras sort of Jeff Bridges, but no, there's
a couple times where he throws down a man, yeah,
you know, and here he's quoting John Lennon lyrics exactly
right before the laser goes off. So yeah, he's at
that sort of. It is funny.

Speaker 3 (35:01):
I mean when you see him in interviews, he has
like this haggard mountain man persona.

Speaker 1 (35:06):
Yes, right, it's like I grew up in the wilderness
and it's kind of he's like pseudo Sam Elliott thing happening.
It's like any from Malibu. You know. That's so funny. Yeah, yeah,
he never like shook the rooster Cogburn or whatever.

Speaker 3 (35:24):
Yeah, exactly, he just stayed there. Yeah, it's like Austin
Butler and Elvis right right.

Speaker 1 (35:30):
Right right, because he still got yet like the sort
of hippie thing, but like he added the grizzled at
one point, and it feels like that's lingered. It just stuck. Hey.
But it works. If it works, it works, you know what. Truly,
I think Jeff Bridges is one of our great living actors. Oh, unquestionably,

(35:50):
you know. I just like he's have you seen The
Old Man the TV show? No, I'm familiar with it though,
but I haven't seen it.

Speaker 3 (35:57):
It's it's like the show is, it's like it's it's good.
It's not bad, but it's not it's not amazing, but
like he elevates it just by being in it, you know.

Speaker 1 (36:08):
I Mean I gotta say, like this, that image of
him just standing there, his glowing outfit and then all
the stuff around him, I still find it dazzling. Yeah. Yeah,
even after all the things I've seen now since and
the advances we've made with visual effects, I mean, I
still find this dazzling.

Speaker 3 (36:29):
Well that's the thing, and and I think what's what
works in the movie's favor It stands completely apart, right,
Like you could you would never make a movie like
look like this today because it's such a foolhardy proposition, right,
Like you know, they say fortune favors the foolish, right
the Stephen Lisberg is the first movie. He didn't know

(36:50):
what he was getting into, all the work that was
going to be involved, right, And so they got it
done and it's like, holy hell, that was a that
was a that was a lift.

Speaker 1 (36:59):
Yeah. Yeah, And so nobody's going to try that again.

Speaker 3 (37:03):
And there's more economically, there's more visually economical, and just
more efficient ways of doing it for follow ups and whatever.
But the result is that this movie stands completely apart
in terms of the visual approach and the technical approach.

Speaker 1 (37:21):
I mean, we should get into that and talk about
how they did it. I mean, have you watched anything
behind the scenes about that? Yeah, I've dipped in.

Speaker 3 (37:28):
Yeah, I remember twenty some years ago. There's like a
feature length documentary on the DVD that I just inhaled
back in the day.

Speaker 1 (37:36):
You know, Yeah, I watched that too, and I kind
of skimmed through it last night. But yeah, no movie
will ever look like this again because there's no way
anyone will do this process again. Yeah, which is basically
everything in the computer. They shot the actors on sixty
five millimeter film because of the high resolution, but everything

(38:01):
around them was entirely black, and all of the color
lines on their costumes were entirely black. And then they
printed out every frame of this movie well in the computer.
And then they made these different layers, right, So they
made a layer where they just exposed the faces. The
eyes and teeth were a layer, the costume was a layer.

(38:23):
Then there was layers of what the black lines all
over their costumes were, so they could make a negative
and put a light through it so they could get
this glowing effect. And basically they took all these layers
and smashed them together and shot it like an animated film,
frame by frame, reshot the film frame by frame as
if it was an animated movie, having printed out the

(38:43):
original frames and composited all those different elements they wanted
to add to them. I mean, that's insane. This old
movie has been shot and then printed out and then affected,
and then all these layers slapped on top of one
another and then shot. That's what we're looking at the
final product. Wow, amazing. Yeah, and and that's why you'll

(39:07):
see the blue isn't perfect right, Like you'll see there's
parts like ram right there on the right how it's
black where it should be blue because it's it's it's
done by hand, you know. And you know what, I
love it. It makes it that's you're live exactly right,
like you.

Speaker 3 (39:26):
Know, it's the ghost in the machine. It's like that's
the that's the soul like in every frame.

Speaker 1 (39:32):
Yep, yep, I love it. I love it. And also
I guess in the computer they just couldn't well, I mean,
with with all the process that was having to happen,
it was too difficult to move the camera. So all
the shots are locked down. And that's something that definitely

(39:53):
stuck out to me on this watch. You can feel
it a little bit unfortunately. But but but then they
all the shots that are strictly that was the thing
also is they couldn't the computer animation. They didn't have
a way of blending that at this time. Yeah, So
although the computer animation shots are, there are a lot

(40:14):
of camera movements I think probably to try to make
up for an.

Speaker 3 (40:17):
Ad Yeah, some motion, but but I I think I
think you know, there's times where it gives kind of
student film energy. Uh, not in terms of performances, but
in terms of like I get like THHX vibes.

Speaker 1 (40:31):
Right, oh, one, which is funny. You say that because
the original idea was that all the backgrounds and things
would be more white.

Speaker 3 (40:40):
Why oh see okay, oh that would have been that
would have been nuts. That would have been really hard
to pull off.

Speaker 1 (40:46):
Yes, and they were saying it would have required huge
amounts of light and they're like, you know, let's just
make it black. So but I like it. I think
it works. Especially having those colors against a darker background.
I think works. They pop more than they would against
the white background. Yeah, I agree. See, I'm saying I'm

(41:08):
watching this and I'm I'm picturing them all being yellow
as originally intended, and I'm like, nah, man, no yellow, Like,
why would you give them the color of cowardice?

Speaker 2 (41:17):
Right?

Speaker 1 (41:18):
Oh that's funny. You know what it makes me think
of Raised Lightsaber too at the end of Skywalker, and
I remember thinking yellow. I don't know, yellow is not
a color that really pops. It's interesting. Yeah, Now, these
disc battles.

Speaker 3 (41:35):
My my first of all, I remember like being blown
away by them. As a kid rewatching, I'm like, I
wish I.

Speaker 1 (41:42):
Thought there was more of this, you know, oh funny, yeah,
like we get this, which is awesome. Still, it's it's
so unique, you know, so unique, Yes, you know, it's
just it's just a cool idea, you know, Oh, this
idea of people are fighting with these discs. You know,

(42:03):
it's but it's it's the sound design. That's what occurred
to me on this watch because this, of course, I
mean they're literally just throwing glowing frisbees at each other,
but they add this real like dangerous sounding like like
like oh I don't want to get hit by that thing,
you know. And and then during the light cycle sequence,

(42:25):
which is still to me like thrilling. That's great. I
was thinking about it when I was watching it, though,
and I was like, this isn't We're not seeing these
crazy They're not like flipping over one another, they're not
doing these crazy things. And then it occurred to me,
I'm like, oh, but the sound yea, the sound is
so intense and the engines are just escalating, like it

(42:47):
just really adds this. It's sort of you know, it's
like fifty percent of it. You know, and I just
did you see that? I guess the sound was nominated
for an Oscar, which I think makes sense and is deserved,
but the special effects were not. Now I saw that, Yeah,
because they thought using computer The Academy thought that using

(43:08):
computers was cheating. Oh oh you sweet summer child, right
if they knew what was coming, You're right right now.
It's like, hey, there's an AI actress who might get
nominated for an oscar. How about that? Yeah, we're like
two we're like two steps removed from that. So are
we Are you talking about my favorite actress, Tillie Norwood, Oh,

(43:30):
the very same future Academy Award nominee, No doubt. I'd
like to think she's listening to this. You know, she
probably is because she's always connected to every computer in
the world through whatever service she's going on. So Tilly,
here's to you.

Speaker 2 (43:50):
You know.

Speaker 1 (43:50):
I do kind of like, too, is that well before
we lose it, because I do want to talk about
this this battle here. But Disney animators refused to work
on this movie because they were all also thinking like, oh, well,
computers are going to put us out of business if
we advance this and make it look cool. And then
twenty two years later, so you got to ask, right,
is are we the Luddites when we're expressing concern over Ai?

(44:16):
You know what I mean? Yeah, like, well we Yeah,
someone listening to this in thirty years be like, oh
you you old senils. Yeah exactly. By the way, I
never noticed as a kid that Tron has the tea
has a t on his chest. I still didn't notice.

Speaker 3 (44:33):
If you look, it's it's it's like, well, when we
have a clear look, I'll show you this scene here
with with Flynn dueling the guy. It does the thing
that I that I love about about it establishes our
hero's morals right away.

Speaker 1 (44:49):
He doesn't know this guy from Adam. He didn't know
what the hell's going on, right h And he's like,
I'm not going to kill that dude, mm hmm. Right.
And even as a kid, as a kid, I.

Speaker 3 (45:00):
Remember really liking this, not because of what happens to
the guy, but become being like, no, that's the hero,
that's who you want to be.

Speaker 1 (45:07):
Yep. Yeah. You know what I love about this too
is this is such a simple game. I mean, they're
really throwing frisbees at each other and playing highlight you know.
But what they do is I think they do an
admirable job. Yeah of like uh, I don't know, plusing

(45:29):
it up and making it feel because then it's like okay, yeah,
but when the ball touches the ground, there are these
different rings and certain rings will appear and it becomes harder,
Like it feels like a video game. I want to play.
That's right, well, it evokes the I see right there.
He's like, no, I'm not doing it. Yep.

Speaker 3 (45:46):
It evokes Pong and that type of stuff that was
you know, Atari games back in the day m hm,
where you know, the interface, the visual interface was not
something that resembled real life, right, but it made sense
within the confines of the game, and so I think
weirdly again, that adds to the sort of timelessness of.

Speaker 1 (46:06):
The movie.

Speaker 3 (46:08):
Where it gives us a game grid, multiple game grids
that make sense. We understand them, We understand how it works.
You know this thing, Oh if the if the little
doudad hits the ring you're on, that that disappears like that.
It's like video game rules, you know, yep. But it's
not something that we're connecting to the real world either,

(46:30):
you know, yep.

Speaker 1 (46:33):
It is funny though, I mean the facts. Look at
look at Tron's chests. You see that, damn it? Oh
I see it, yep, yep, yeah, it's see it's a
t Oh that's funny. I didn't notice that. I was
gonna say, with that guy dying, yeah, I'm like, oh
my gosh, like and it's such a perfect actor too,

(46:55):
because he feels like, I don't know, just very human,
like a little fluss hanging dangling off of the thing,
and then when he falls. It would be kind of
funny though, if Flynn was just like, no turbo tax,
and then you'd be like, oh right, yeah, no, it
is just a program.

Speaker 3 (47:17):
See we should we should we cut to the real
world and suddenly like people are getting like massive tax
uh tax audits and everything because now that turbo tax
has been deleted, you know, right.

Speaker 1 (47:27):
Or I was even picturing some guy just like hitting
his laptop like, hey, turbo tax won't start. Oh well,
I'll just redownload it. It's just not a big deal.
I am. It's even better. I mean this today is
still it's so great, so good. Well, you know, I

(47:48):
stand by the Oh no, you're go ahead, sorry, just real.

Speaker 3 (47:51):
Quick, I mean, the the the mechanics of the game
are so brilliant, right, Like the light cycle creates this
this trail behind it and got to avoid that trail,
so to win the game, you cover up the grid
with your trail. I mean it's it's like, that's brilliant.

Speaker 1 (48:09):
You know that Centipede, there's a game sort of it
reminds me of that a little bit, like those old
school games you can actually download on your calculator in
high school. Yep, yep, that's right. But you're adding a
human element to it and this amazing sound design, and
it looks really cool and futuristic, and it's Yeah, I
was gonna say my comment about the sound design, I
stand by it. I really do think it takes us

(48:31):
to a whole other level. But I gotta say, I mean,
looking at this, I silent right now. I mean, this
is still really thrilling. Yeah. I can't even imagine being
in nineteen eighty two and seeing this, Like you, you
haven't seen anything like this.

Speaker 3 (48:48):
Before, right, Well, that's that gets to back to what
I was saying earlier. I mean that that that summer
and more broadly that year, I mean, my god, just
just hit her after mm hmm. Yeah, you know, like
you said, Wrath of Khan, e T. John Carpenter's the Thing,
Blade Runner, Conan the Barbarian.

Speaker 1 (49:11):
What was that?

Speaker 3 (49:11):
Yeah, Poultrygeist, Yeah right, Poultrygeist, you know, and it really
just this embarrassment of bridges where you're like, you know,
I mean that that year is sort of celebrated now.
You know, there's like a whole documentary about just the
movies of that year.

Speaker 1 (49:27):
Yep. And there was that book which I told you about,
which is really good. Yes, yeah, I remember, you know.
What was funny though, I was reading that the movie,
you know, they said it was a commercial failure, but
the arcade game based on it was a huge hit
and outgross the film. Yeah. So anyway, I was hanging

(49:49):
out with my friend Chad last night who's gen X,
and so I was telling him that we were going
to do this today and I was like, oh wait,
did you see it in Oh wait, we should call
it the pac Man there on the screen on the right,
see that, right, like a really really obvious Easter egg
that they're just like, hey, look there's back man. Yep.
Kind of funny. But I asked him, I was like,

(50:10):
did you see trom because you would have been kind
of young.

Speaker 2 (50:11):
Was it?

Speaker 1 (50:12):
Did it blow your mind? He goes, no, you know,
I didn't see it, but you know I loved the
video game. And then he went on and on. He's like,
if I could have two arcade cabinets. He was like,
it was like one thing and Tron and I was like, wow, darn,
he just proved to prove that true. That's what he crazy,
That's what he loved. Yeah, we should talk about the

(50:37):
score too, for this one by Wendy Carlos. I was
gonna bring that up.

Speaker 3 (50:41):
Yeah, yeah, like she did music for The Shining right, Yeah,
Clockwork Orange, Clockwork Orange also. Yeah, And it's it's interesting
because this I know, I know Disney wanted something more.

Speaker 1 (50:52):
Orchestral and hm and like it's it. I I as
I was watching this, I was imagining, would would this
movie be like does the I think the music is
very interesting in terms of it it works within the film,
it's not really you can't really listen to it on
its own, but like, would the movie be better or

(51:15):
worse off with an orchestral score? You know, I can
imagine a good orchestral score making me really feel something,
but at the same time, I think it feels true
to the material. Yeah, like it feels like that. Yeah,
I wasn't sure. I couldn't remember, but if I remember
thinking this last night and I didn't fall through on

(51:37):
checking it out. But it would make sense if there
was orchestral in the real world and then inside the computer,
if it was synthesizer, that makes sense. Yeah, that might be,
you know, to distinguish a little bit, right right. But
I was curious because, yeah, she used this synthesizer. I
guess she did an album called Switched on Bach in

(51:57):
niceteen sixty eight, which was, you know, groundbreaking in a
lot of ways. I want to check it out. I'm
curious to hear it. I assume it's the music of
Bach through a synthesizer. But when I read that she
had done the shining and everything, I was like, oh, yeah,
that totally makes sense. And she used the same keyboard. Okay,

(52:17):
those films in this one, and I can recognize it.
It's so funny.

Speaker 3 (52:24):
That book I mentioned, by the way, in case somebody
is listening who wants to hear it. It's called The
Future was Now by Chris Nashawatti, and it's about the
films of nineteen eighty two.

Speaker 1 (52:35):
Cool, it is fantastic. I like reading those books and
I remember, you know, best movie Year Ever that was
a fun YEP retrospective of nineteen ninety nine. It's it's
definitely weird to have these these very in depth retrospectives about.

Speaker 3 (52:54):
Times that are like within our wingspan. They don't feel
like that long ago. Yeah, it viewed with you know,
decades of historical context, you.

Speaker 1 (53:03):
Know, yeah, yeah, it's it's strange. I mean I said
that on a regular episode recently, but I had that
with Forrest Gump recently, where a movie theater was showing
old classics and usually you're like, oh yeah, two thousand
and one and you know, Casablanca and those sorts of things,
but then Forrest Gump was included, and I was like, no, wait,
I saw that when I was a teenager. That's not
what like, oh time, it's a flat circle.

Speaker 3 (53:31):
Yeah, I thought this, So I was thinking, yeah, and
if I'm part of this group, I'm definitely the ram.
I'm like the guy who just sort of hangs back
and eventually dies.

Speaker 1 (53:46):
Totally Yeah too, me too, that's me. I'm good at
like flipping the frisbee around on my finger, which is
what he does right right playing the game. I don't
know we'll ask me to throw it at somebody, but
I can definitely do some some Harlem globe shit with
it in my hand, you know. Yeah. Yeah, And I
always have like a fun little comment, you know, we
can be you and I would be a little Greek

(54:06):
chorus to these guys. But then eventually we'd be killed
just to set the steaks and then they could go
save the day.

Speaker 3 (54:12):
Well, and the funny thing with Ram is like he
just kind of gets exhausted and dies, right, And I'm like, yeah, no,
that's that would be me, just get exhausted.

Speaker 1 (54:22):
And I was thinking about that too. I'm like, didn't
you just drink all that power juice? They don't make
clear what happens to Ram, yeah, or clear clear enough.
I would say, they don't make it clear enough. You know.
They also don't really get into the nitty gritty of

(54:42):
how Flawn flawn, how Flawn is made. Well, you got
you need some eggs first of all. Yeah, I love
me some flaunt. But Flynn, like he basically is like
Neo in the Matrix, where he can stop bullets and
he kind of does it, but they don't really. It
just kind of happened. And because I've seen so many movies,
I understood what was happening. But it did take me

(55:03):
a second to be like, oh, because he's not He's
not like the other programs. He's special and you know
what I'm saying, Like, I didn't think they really uh
explained it. You just kinda see it.

Speaker 3 (55:19):
There's a lot of sort of hand wavey shorthand m
that you are expected to just kind of go with. Yeah,
you know, because the broader sort of the you know,
the ecumenical point here about who are the user? What
is the movie saying about through its use of users
and programs? What is it saying about the relationship we

(55:40):
have to God? Like, there's a lot there.

Speaker 1 (55:42):
You know, I admire the notion, but yeah, they don't
really get super into it. And it was funny because
when yeah, one of the programs is saying, you know,
there's no such things as users or whatever, like you
believe in users? Yeah, I'm like, well, yeah, do you
think they got here? You know what I mean? Like
they you know what I'm saying, Like, they don't get

(56:04):
into them, Like, well, then what do they believe or
what are they trying to make the others believe? You know,
because obviously if you're a program, you had to be built.

Speaker 3 (56:14):
Well let's let's carry that discussion forward. Is it that
different than people who say, you know, who argue that
everything just kind of came to be in our world?

Speaker 1 (56:26):
Right? You know? It's so funny. As I was saying it,
I was like, uh, yeah, so yeah, but I am,
I am interested in it, but I'm also like, don't
really care that it's missing from this film, but I
so yeah, like they think that this computer world, they
just are their own thing and they aren't being controlled

(56:48):
by anyone else or yeah, like for all we know,
we're we're just you know, our little you know, chunk
of cinder that we're on. We're just a little marble
a in a bag of marbles and a locker room
at MiB headquarters, which is a whatever that movie shows.
I mean, we don't know, right, that's true, Okay, okay,

(57:09):
but it's like, yeah, I.

Speaker 3 (57:09):
Mean like are are are the are the programs? Like
here this is where my mind goes, like are they
religious fundamentalists or are they just one of the mill?

Speaker 1 (57:21):
Like, yeah, there's users you know, like you know what
I'm saying, it's probably all kinds. There's probably all kinds,
you know. But yeah, I mean that's the thing too,
is at me being a user, Like it's obvious to me,
you know, and I understand what they are that this is,
you know, like a podcast app, you know, fighting for
its life here. But like, but so I am, I

(57:45):
guess a little curious about a little bit more about
what they believe, right well, users wrote them so there, Yeah,
all right, Kramit god boy like that that would be

(58:05):
kind of funny.

Speaker 3 (58:06):
Is like the little we get of Tron we're like
on board with, but then the more time you spend
with him, you realize he's like really hardcore into his
user beliefs and it just starts getting uncomfortable for everybody, Like,
we don't, that's.

Speaker 1 (58:23):
You don't. We don't. That's why we don't spend too
much time with Tron. Yeah, you know, in in in
the Grid, we don't talk about politics and users at
the at the Thanksgiving table. Okay, uh, you know it's

(58:45):
kind of interesting And I don't know if this is
out there, but I guess this so Steven Lisberger and
his producing partner Donald Kushner. They had this idea, and
originally they thought they could make this story as an
animated film, entirely animated. Yeah, and then they made some

(59:06):
sort of demo reel about what they wanted to achieve,
and they went around town pitching this movie and everybody
basically said no until Disney said yes. And I really
wish I could see that demo reel that they had.
I'd be very curious. Is it available.

Speaker 3 (59:25):
I think I've seen some clips, Okay, Like his original
conception of Tron was he looked kind of like a
like a Cylon from the old Battlestar Galactica show, but
with like a beard, Like it's real, It's not this
in any way, shape or form.

Speaker 1 (59:40):
Okay.

Speaker 3 (59:40):
Interesting, the fully animated version, I don't you know. And
I think that was several steps in the process before
they arrived at what this is, you.

Speaker 1 (59:51):
Know, okay, And I can imagine too. I mean, you
have the resources available to you and so you adapt, right. Yeah.
I was curious to see because this is such a
visual experience, this movie. I was kind of curious to
see the earlier phases, you know, what his original vision was,

(01:00:12):
the animated version whatever sort of test footage that he
eventually shot that convinced Disney. I was kind of curious
what that looked like, right, you know something I had forgotten.
Oh go ahead, no, no, if you want to talk
about this moment where we have ram basically it makes
me sad. Yeah, he's a likable guy. He's got a
lot of personality. He flips that disc like nobody I've

(01:00:35):
ever seen. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:00:41):
I do like how the movie establishes he's a good
dude because he's like, I'm an actuarial program and you know,
it's nice helping people plan for their retirement.

Speaker 1 (01:00:48):
You're like, all right, this guy. I like this guy. See,
that was the kind of thing that I had forgotten.
I love that. It's kind of sweet. Yeah, they like
doing the functions that they do that they're helping people
if they believe in all right, cram it, god boy.

(01:01:08):
But something that I had remembered was that there you
see the flicker on the suits that were looking at
it right now. But I thought I remembered their faces
flickering a little bit more. Oh interesting, And it turns
out that was the case, and that had to do
with man, I can't even the compositing and stuff. Yeah,

(01:01:32):
I read the details about it, and I don't even
know if I could recite them back. But it had
something to do with the film and the way that
it was printed and people not paying close attention to
certain sorts of things, and they were accidental. There were
mistakes basically, but they were like, well this they called
it pulsing. They're like, it kind of works. It does

(01:01:52):
sort of feel like it could be something that would
happen in this world. Then flicking like that. But then eventually,
when they did the two thou eleven blue ray release,
the director had them correct it because that wasn't his
original vision. So he finally had the opportunity and he
was like, you know what, get rid of that flicker.
So that's fascinating, right, So their faces do not flicker

(01:02:14):
in this version the way that we would probably remember
it from when we were kids. I see, wow. See,
I'm wondering if if we can find some footage of
the earlier version just to compare, you know, And that's
kind of what I think I was saying earlier without
realizing it is I remember this movie looking like really,
you know, Haggard, probably for a lot of reasons. When

(01:02:37):
we were kids. But now it just looks so stunning
without sacrificing anything. I don't think it like it looks
like it's been manipulated in a negative way, but it
looks beautiful. But I remember this looking like a you know,
like the film negative had been like driven over by
a truck or something when I was a kid. And
that probably has to do with you know, whatever sort

(01:02:58):
of prints that they made the TV versions out of,
and their faces flickering in a way that they don't anymore,
and all that stuff. I remember for the two thousand
and two DVD, the retrospective documentary. You know, Jeff Bridge

(01:03:18):
just talking about making it, and he pulls out his
flint hat. Oh really, and he puts a he hung
on to his flint hat, and I'm like, I love
this guy. Right, he didn't look back at Tron with
the contempt. You know. I love that. I love when
people man that shit was crazy. Yeah. I like when
people can do that. They seem like fans of the

(01:03:40):
stuff too in a way, or at least you know,
it's not like well that one. You know, we were
trying for something and it did okay, but you know, yeah,
instead like, oh no, I still got the hat, want
to see it, you know, and he pulls it out,
he puts it on. You know. I love that attitude,
that spirit. Now, now this is the bit here, you know.

Speaker 3 (01:04:00):
I remember every time I watched it, I was just like, oh,
I guess the bit just comes with the the you know,
the the unit that he's in the recognizer, And it
didn't occur to me until this, just just this rewatch,
I'm like, oh, no, that's the bit from the beginning
and he thinks Flynn is Clue, right.

Speaker 1 (01:04:21):
I was like, duh. I think I got a little
distracted because I was like, I wonder if this was
a Disney note, like you always have to give a
character a cute little sidekick, yeah, you know, like a
little like a talking animal or something. But in this
it's like a cute little bit.

Speaker 3 (01:04:34):
I was, Yeah, but it's literally because if you remember
at the beginning, when Clue gets captured, he's like get
out of here, and the bit leaves.

Speaker 1 (01:04:40):
Yeah yeah, and then no, there's this master that's that's Clue.
Oh that's funny, right. I like that. I was like,
how how forty years? I never I never made that connection, right,
you know though, I think I'm gonna stick up for myself.
Maybe it's partially forgivable because there's just so much to
take in when you're watching this movie, that is true.

(01:05:03):
You know, like I am listening sometimes, but other times
I am just listening to it and looking at it,
and it's just, you know, you need almost multiple viewings
to really hear everything that's being said because your eyes
are just so drawn. Your brain is drawn to everything
your eyes are taking in. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:05:22):
See, I think that structurally, the mistake is separating Flynn
and Tron for so much of the movie. Yeah, yeah,
I think that's an odd choice because because our affinity
for Tron is going to grow based on, you know,
the partnership he builds up with Flynn. I think that

(01:05:43):
that just inherently is more interesting and there's such different
energies that you can you can see banter being a fun.

Speaker 1 (01:05:51):
Part of it, you know, oh totally. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:05:54):
Right, So we got we got this whole you know,
side quest portion where you know, Flynn is figuring shit
out and and I'm like, the more in terms of
the story, the more important stuff is what Tron.

Speaker 1 (01:06:10):
Is doing.

Speaker 3 (01:06:12):
Because he's trying to defeat the MCP and I'm like, well,
you got to find a way to weave them together better,
you know.

Speaker 1 (01:06:19):
And then they're a funny mismatched pair, right, exactly right.

Speaker 3 (01:06:22):
I think I think that would be fun to see
totally because essentially, you know, the you know, the the
light cycles get shot, Tron thinks Ram and Flynn are dead,
He goes off, does his thing, and then we have
a good whatever it is, twenty minutes something of just Flynn,
Flynn's side quest. And that's that's an odd choice to me,

(01:06:46):
that that that stuck out to me.

Speaker 1 (01:06:47):
Yeah, yeah, I think that's a good note. I think
it's interesting we see those other programs and they look
more unusual. Yeah, you know, some some Star Wars, Canteen
Action there. Yeah, definitely. And if they were together, yeah,
Tron could be like, oh yeah, that's uh, that's real player,

(01:07:14):
some old scrappy program or something. Oh Ship, How frustrating
was that piece of ship program? Never worked? Your files
wouldn't play? Oh my god? Oh yeah, you see you

(01:07:34):
see that guy, don't talk to him. That's Kazah. You
remind me of that that Chippendale Rescue Rangers movie that
they did on Disney Plus. Yeah, that's right, that's right
where they're at a convention.

Speaker 3 (01:07:48):
There's Ugly Sonic, yes, yeah, which is the the you know,
the the initial design for Sonic from the Sonic the
Hedgehog movie that fans were horrified by, so they undid.

Speaker 1 (01:08:02):
Oh man, think of how many millions and millions and
millions of dollars it saved them changing that design. Talk
about it? What I mean like, would they have even
made a sequel with that Ugly Sonic? Probably not, yeah,
much less having you know, a fourth one on the way. Yeah.
I think it would have become like a Morbid Time

(01:08:23):
style meme sort of thing Sonic, you know. You know
it's funny. As I was watching this, well, see, okay,
so this is actually what inspired That's why I'm thinking
of it again. The whole sort of there's romantic illusions

(01:08:44):
between these programs, which I was like, oh, that's interesting,
what is that about. I mean, it's a movie, so
you want to have a little bit of romance, I guess.
But I just started thinking about it, you know, like
all these programs are like attracted to each other and
kiss one another and stuff, And then it made me
think about like it weird, right, Yeah, And for some
reason that romance made me think of do you remember

(01:09:08):
when we were kids and you had to do Valentine's
in school, and so there'd be these little boxes you
get at like the drug store for like mumpet babies Valentine's,
you know, heman Valentine's. And I was just picturing these
like discount Tron Valentine theme Valentine's, and I just out
of my mind just started wandering and I was like
imagining one being like I love you to bits, you know,

(01:09:31):
and like, don't de rest my heart pictures of these
characters on them and like very wholesome. Yeah, I feel
like I was gonna be like I'd love to hack
your drive, but now I feel bad. Well, I mean
I was just picturing like those little, you know, elementary
school ones and yeah, yeah, no, me too, I love

(01:10:01):
you to bits, that's adorable. Well, I'm just picturing smash
cutting you sitting outside the principal's office and you're like,
you're like, you know, no one understands me in my
own time, not a Tron fan. Yeah right exactly, but yes,

(01:10:21):
this this character here where we're seeing the old man
like he's like Dumont Dumont he's like part of the machine.
Something about that really unnerved me as a kid.

Speaker 3 (01:10:31):
Yeah, well he's not, though, right, because they yank him
out of this and he's just like a regular old dude.

Speaker 1 (01:10:38):
Yeah, I know, I just you know what I mean, Like,
I don't know, just the I don't even know if
I was thinking of this, but just the idea of
like a man assimilated into being part of a machine
just something that made me uncomfortable. I don't know why.

Speaker 3 (01:10:57):
It says the man who pondered fishing his AirPod out
of the toilet.

Speaker 1 (01:11:05):
You know what's funny, that's exactly's referring to an old
episode where I dropped one of my AirPods into a
toilet once, and I was literally thinking about that a
couple days ago. The fact that I shared that story,
you know, I was like, too much.

Speaker 3 (01:11:22):
I don't think it's I don't think it's too much,
because I think the fact is you pondered it for
like a fraction of a second before you're like, well,
obviously I'm not gonna do that. But anybody who's had
a similar experience has had that moment, that do ardie moment,
the dry time moment.

Speaker 1 (01:11:39):
Yep, yep. Well they're so damn expensive. Yep. Actually, I
was in a parking lot the other day and I
saw one air pod on the ground and I was like, oh,
like my heart broke for that, I know, for the person.

Speaker 3 (01:11:52):
Yeah, yeah, I love this scene here where Tron is
getting his instructions from Alan. You know, yes, the literalization
of just entering command code and this is how the
programs are receiving.

Speaker 1 (01:12:07):
I just think it's so cool. And I also love
that that what follows is essentially are briefing on YAB
and for moment. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:12:20):
Yeah, it's like you gotta do this, you got you know,
one shot into the exhaust port, you know, I mean, yeah,
letting us know exactly what needs to happen.

Speaker 1 (01:12:28):
You know, that's funny. It made me think of that.
And it also the design here where he needs to
strike made me think of the interior of the Death
Star in Return of the Jedi. Those two. Yeah, oh
totally another Yeah, yeah, absolutely, yeah, Sorry I think I
cut you off. No, no, no, no, I was just
gonna riffle it. I was just yes, I love this too.
It's very i don't know, like almost feels holy or something. Yes,

(01:12:49):
I'm talking to my user exactly, but it would be
kind of funny. And I realized why they didn't do
it is then you cut to the real world and
you see you know, Alan at his death but he's
really got like three windows open, and he's like half
paying attention like oh, oh okay, like closing you know,
like a eBay and you know that's jcrue dot com,

(01:13:12):
you know, just sort of like looking at sweaters like oh,
and then he puts the command half heartedly in Uh yeah,
I guess to fix this, you could probably do that,
you know, go to if then you know, just whatever
the the doss code was back then, yeah, exactly. Yeah.
Well I think that's why it's such a smart choice

(01:13:32):
to that once we go into the computer world, we
stay there. Yes, yeah, we're not having like a back
and forth, I think, I think because because it just
diminishes whatever's happening here, you know, Yeah, it would remove
all the tension. Seeing him at the snack machine, he like,
you know, he raises his disc to speak to his user,
but like there's no response. It's like, why have you

(01:13:53):
forsaken me? And then we cut to the real world
and he's just like his dollar keeps going in and
out of a snack machine. Oh damn it, like you
tried smoothing the dollar out on the corner.

Speaker 3 (01:14:04):
That would be a funny something else, you know, Like, yeah,
a different approach, you know, Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:14:17):
I see this. This is one of those things too
where I remember this image but I couldn't remember what
it was. The solar ship. Yeah, isn't they cool looking?
Though it is? It's very cool. Kind of clever use
of the light on the tips of that spear too,
you know. That looks sort of like they probably just
have some sort of special lens or something. I love

(01:14:39):
how that jumps off. Yeah, I wasn't even part of this.
It's like, what is it an ironment? These guys are
so weird and right? That does kind of raise a
point though, the guard jumping off there. There isn't a

(01:15:00):
ton of humor in this where you could imagine Flynn
reacting a little bit more humorously to some of this stuff. Yeah,
not to diminish anything, not to like be meta or
make it silly, but it feels like nowadays that's the
tenor that's struck most. We need a little more. Well,
that just happened. I'm not saying that I don't you're right, Yes,

(01:15:23):
I'm I'm but he's right. Yeah, I mean yeah, that's
you know a little bit, but not I don't want
the whole movie to be that. But you know there's a.

Speaker 3 (01:15:35):
You got no, it's it's you know the again, I
keep I keep dipping into this, but you need a
little bit of Han solo energy.

Speaker 1 (01:15:45):
Yes, yes, you know he's the guy.

Speaker 3 (01:15:48):
Who's like, I don't believe in the force, you know,
and that should essentially be Flynn.

Speaker 1 (01:15:52):
Yeah, yeah, he has a fun energy and a perspective
that they could be playing off of. Here. Here's the thing.

Speaker 3 (01:16:00):
Look, I was joking about Tron being that really obnoxiously
religious guy, right, that should be the journey for Tron, right,
Like Flynn is like, hey man, users are we don't
know what's going on either.

Speaker 1 (01:16:11):
You know you kind of have a little bit of that,
right sure. Yeah yeah, Like so Tron.

Speaker 3 (01:16:17):
Learns that from users users are you know, they're playing,
they're just figuring stuff out as they go, and that's
something Tron recognizes mm hm, and like, yeah, learn.

Speaker 1 (01:16:26):
From one another.

Speaker 3 (01:16:27):
Yeah, right, Like the thing at the end when he's
got to throw his disc in like that should revolve
around him having to improvise a solution. Mmmm, because the
improvising is not something a program would know how to do.
But Flynn says something to that effect like sometimes I
just got to figure it out. You're in the moment,
you don't know what to do, you figure it out,

(01:16:48):
something like that, and then Tron does that.

Speaker 1 (01:16:50):
Yes, Yes, because that's the thing. I was trying to
put my finger on it, because I do really enjoy
this movie. Yeah, but there's something about it that makes
me feel like I wouldn't necessarily recommend it to everyone. No, No,
that's true, and it's because I think it's missing a
little bit of that thing that everyone can latch onto

(01:17:11):
with its characters.

Speaker 3 (01:17:13):
I think that the story keeps you at arm's length
a little bit exactly right, because I think the heart
of it should be the characters. Like I like the
moment we just had where Tron is happy to see
Flynn again, and it's like it feels like a genuine moment, right,
And I'm kind of like, well, we're we're about fifteen

(01:17:35):
minutes before the end of this thing, and there's like,
how long were the characters apart?

Speaker 1 (01:17:39):
Right? I think the movie needs to be about building
their relationship.

Speaker 3 (01:17:44):
Yes, you know, at the beginning he's like Alan, He's like,
how do you know that name? They're kind of you know,
it's like that's how there starts. And then at the
end when they part ways, each has learned something from
the other.

Speaker 1 (01:17:58):
Right, yep. And I do enjoy things that happen with
the characters, and I certainly enjoy existing in this world,
but it's not something that I feel like the story
itself can be enjoyed universally because it's about characters and
their relationships and the things that they learn. It's it's

(01:18:18):
missing a little bit of that.

Speaker 3 (01:18:20):
The dialogue that we just had, right, Flynn is like, hey, listen,
I'm actually a user and Tron's like you're a user? Oh,
kind of basically right, And I'm like, why not like
make that more of a thing, like introduce that element
a little bit sooner and have Tron be like this,
this crackpot idiot thinks he's a user. I'm just keeping

(01:18:41):
him around so he doesn't hurt himself kind of thing.

Speaker 1 (01:18:43):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 (01:18:45):
And then you know what, you get what I'm saying,
And then you have something that you have something crystallized
for Tron that, oh he's telling the truth. And then
and then Flynn is a guy. He's like, you are
a user, and Flynn is like, yeah, I'm a user,
and he's like, well, then you must know fix all.
He's like, I don't.

Speaker 1 (01:19:00):
I don't know how to fix any of this, you know,
And then right, totally yeah, by the way, I'm just
I'm just like workshopping this as I'm watching. No, no,
for sure, these are like easy things they could have done,
you know. No, No, I don't disagree, I mean exactly,
I feel the same way. I'm sorry. I got a

(01:19:23):
little distracted because those bugs on the ground, They're like,
oh no, those bugs don't want to run a follow
those and then they're just never seen again. We never
see them again. I was thinking when I saw those
last night, oh, I don't remember those and it's for
a good reason. They have no effect on the story

(01:19:43):
at all. I mean, I guess they are being pursued,
but I thought, oh, is it just to add an
extra bit of tension, like, well, there's danger below us.
And it was just like a quick fix, like I
don't just make some bugs real quick. I like that
that in the scene that we just saw where Dumont

(01:20:03):
is like, I remember when the Master control is just
a chess program, which is what his user says earlier
in the movie. Also, yep, the lesson is don't play chess. Yeah,
that's my takeaway. And it makes you think of war
games too. You know. It's like it's all a game
to those machines, that's right. But yeah, I like this

(01:20:26):
him being able to divert the beam dimensionally his user powers. Yep. Yeah.
By the way, it was just looking at the costumes. Two.
I forgot to note that the costumes were nominated for

(01:20:48):
an Oscar as well. That's interesting because when you when
you look at the production stills minus all of this
flim flam, you know, mm hmm, there's just these like
white tights with you know, like magic marker on them,
And I'm how did they feel wearing those things? Were

(01:21:11):
they like what the hell did we sign up for?

Speaker 2 (01:21:14):
You know?

Speaker 1 (01:21:14):
I mean they must have seen that test footage. Yeah,
because this isn't like a movie where you can just
have someone pitch this and go trust me, you know
it is. I mean, it's a little bit like signing
on to make the matrix, you know. Yeah, that's a
great comparison right. Famously, Will Smith was like, I don't
get it right, which is kind of understandable. Yeah, you

(01:21:39):
think about the leaps of faith sometimes the studios make yeah,
you know, and then you wind up with the matrix
and I'm sure they had to shoot some sort of
test to show them what bullet tyme would look like.
And you know, but still, you know, it's we always
get to see the finished product and and can celebrate
it because it worked. But when you know, there's you're

(01:22:02):
putting together a budget and all you have is script, Yeah,
you know, a script in a prayer. You know, like
you don't you don't know that it's going to turn
out the it's tightly edited, and the music's going to
work as well as it does, and the action is
going to look as cool as it does well. And
and the sad part is when it doesn't turn out
the way they would have hoped, you know, which is

(01:22:22):
what arguably happened with this film. Yep, you know, I
mean it. It ended up having a very long cultural
shelf life, and so history was on its side. But
at that moment, you know, you want the you want
the Catharsis of the movie. That you that you took
this big chance on doing well, totally right, and it

(01:22:46):
is amazing to think all these years later, this concept
is still potent enough for Disney to drop millions and
millions of dollars into it. Yeah, well and they apped
into something that.

Speaker 3 (01:22:58):
Just something yeah, and and well I think what it
speaks to the strength of the world real quick by
So this oh, where's Tron, Oh he's dead? And we
just went through the where's Flint, Oh He's dead? And
I'm like, you know, some of these we got to
find a way around these repetitive beats, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah, no.
But the I think the fact that we're we're revisiting

(01:23:24):
this world, you know, forty plus years later, speaks to
the fact that the universes is fundamentally interesting but also
remains largely unexplored.

Speaker 1 (01:23:39):
Mmmm yeah right.

Speaker 3 (01:23:40):
So there's like a lot of room, Like it's it's
an interesting concept with lots of room for stories.

Speaker 1 (01:23:47):
And a singular look. Yeah, you know, I mean even
with all the tools digital tools we have now the
one that I haven't seen the new one yet, but aries,
but the previous one obviously they can have more bells
and whistles but it still feels of a piece to this.
It was consistent with it. Yeah, yeah, because this is

(01:24:09):
just so you know, singular and spectacular. Yeah yeah. I mean,
I have no idea how the new one is going
to be received, but I would ideally I would like
it to do well enough to keep going, but not
so well that everybody gets their fingers in it. Mmm. Yeah, sure.

Speaker 2 (01:24:28):
You know.

Speaker 3 (01:24:28):
I think I've said before with like with the Planet
of the Apes films that they've been making for the
last ten years or so, right, like they they seem
to do just well enough to make it worthwhile, but
it's still allow it still gets to kind of just
be its own little corner.

Speaker 1 (01:24:42):
Yeah, that's a great example, you know, that's kind of
that's what I would like with this. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:24:48):
Worth mentioning, by the way, that that after Tron Legacy
came out, you know, Disney had an animated.

Speaker 1 (01:24:55):
Series called Tron Uprising. Yeah, that's right. Our friend friend
she was he was on post production for that show.
I think he edited and and that show is terrific.
I should check that out. Yeah, until it's a prequel.
It's a prequel to the second movie. Okay, so it's
set between the two. Man, I like, I said, I

(01:25:20):
don't remember anything about the second movie. And now that
i'm you know, I've dipped my toe with this. Yeah,
I'm like excited and see this world get built out.
I like it. I like this. I liked it. You know.
That was Humza's very first movie. Can you believe that? No,
in the theater? Oh wow? Yeah? He was uh three

(01:25:41):
going on four wow. And he could sit through it.
Huh he sat through that's the thing. And I first
of all, it's PG. It wasn't even PG thirteen. Oh really? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:25:52):
And and he had watched this and he kind of,
you know, he liked it, And I was like, well,
he's not gonna remember, but he'll remember the experience.

Speaker 1 (01:25:57):
I think, you know, sure. Yeah, to this day he
has he has fond memories of legacy. He said, he
just watched it recently actually in school. In school. Yeah.
I have to imagine that this was while his high
school career is winding down and his teacher was on
is Hey, we're talking about computers. So here's tron. You know,

(01:26:18):
I'm guessing that feels like a real Mishoover move comes
us in the back. What does this have to do
with you quiet any Yeah, I think this is interesting,
this sort of romance.

Speaker 3 (01:26:40):
Oh yeah, it nowadays we would call it, you know,
AI psychosis.

Speaker 1 (01:26:49):
Back then it was just good clean fun, right, dude,
The m CP is terrifying. It really is a big face. Yeah,
remembers the South Park turned a character or had a
character that looked like that. Well yeah, and they had
and they also had Tron guy. Oh man, I don't

(01:27:13):
remember that.

Speaker 3 (01:27:14):
So so there was a guy who was like a
really big Tron fan and he made his own like this,
and he became like a pop culture fixture and and
kind of you know, you know people he was a
fixture in the way like Star Wars Kid is a fixture.
You know, people were he is poking a little fun,
poking fun of this guy because he's kind of a
doe looking dude and he's wearing this thing. And I

(01:27:36):
remember he used to show up on The Kimmel Show
a lot, and so yeah, that became that guy became
kind of a South Park character.

Speaker 1 (01:27:44):
Is that kind of funny? I mean not holy, but
like there used to be an age where yeah, those
sorts of people were still like nerd and you know,
people make fun of him online. But I feel like,
now this is those people's moments where it's like, whoa
you made that? That's amazing. Go on TikTok, you know, yeah, right,
like nerdy sort of things have just become part of

(01:28:07):
mainstream culture.

Speaker 3 (01:28:10):
That is true, But I don't think there is ever
a moment where it's gonna be socially no, no normative
for like a dude to walk around in a tron suit.

Speaker 1 (01:28:22):
You know, fair point, fair point. They're just more avenues
for them now instead of being like accidentally discovered like
some video accident, you know, uploaded and then you know
what I'm saying, Like there'd be like forums where that
those people could hang out and find their people. Yeah,
a little bit. By the way, I love this lights

(01:28:43):
like yeah, sorry, this is You're right, it's like a
lightsaber duel. That was a Freudian slip. But yes, it's
it's great.

Speaker 3 (01:28:50):
Again what you said before about the sound effects, I
just wish it kind of went a little longer, To
be honest, I would have liked some some Phantom Menace
style action where they're flip flopping and doing all kinds
of stuff.

Speaker 1 (01:28:59):
You see. I think part of the problem is the
camera needs to be locked down exactly, and it would
be cool to see them, yeah, like jumping over these
little partitions on the ground and flipping. We get a
little bit of that in the second one. Okay with
the disc fights. But shoot, what was I saying, Oh sorry,
guy wearing the tron suit. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,

(01:29:24):
you know. I mean I think that's always going to
be something that you look at. No, for sure, for sure.
I do like the the disc kind of like opened
up the guy's head. You get the part it's dark man. Yeah,
it's cool. And I like the video gameness of this too,
where it's got these the MCP has these shields. You know,

(01:29:47):
you can't get the disc through, and so I don't know,
it's just I talk about this a lot, or I
used to more, but I love really simple to understand,
you know, goals and finish lines at the end of
a film. So it's just like, oh, he needs to
get to the disc through the thing, but there's a shield,
so we got to get the shield down, there's the opening,
get it through. Yeay. You know that stuff's just really

(01:30:08):
primal and yeah, here here's the problem. Okay, So Flynn
is like, I gotta jump into that beam. Yeah, how
did he make that? How do you come to that conclusion? Yeah?
It just feels right. I don't know, this feels right
for him too. I'm gonna swap spit with this program.

(01:30:31):
See like like that to me, even if you have
him say something like if I jump in there, I
can disrupt his whatever. Mm hm yes, yes, yes, yes,
something because he jumps, he because he's making he's making
I was gonna say, he's making a lot of leaps.
He literally is, but he's making a lot of assumptions
like why would he think this would bring him home?

(01:30:53):
Does he what's the progression? Do you get what I'm saying?

Speaker 2 (01:30:57):
Oh?

Speaker 3 (01:30:58):
Why is him jumping in? They're causing this to happen
to the MCP. I think we needed something a bit
more motivated, Like we've established that Flynn is able to
impact the grid, and so we needed it's sort of
like he goes in there, this happens, and then Tron's like,
hey it's open, and he throws it in. I think

(01:31:20):
we needed some connection between what Flinn does and what
Tron does, like like this is their plan?

Speaker 1 (01:31:26):
Oh no, definitely, I you know totally Yeah, Like I
mean I think you said something earlier. I mean, this
movie kind of does a lot of shorthand. Yeah, but
in the style of you get it, Yeah, you know
what I mean? Eh, No, I agree. I think it

(01:31:47):
would make a little bit more sense, and it would
probably be just a few degrees more satisfying, you know.

Speaker 3 (01:31:52):
I think it'd be more satisfying because because for me,
the big issue I had on a rewatch is that
Tron is fitly inscrutable throughout the film, and I don't
I don't feel particularly invested in his character other than
it's his name on the masthead, which is kind of
puzzling to me. M hmm, yeah, sure, Like it almost

(01:32:14):
feels like it almost feels like Tron should have been
the name that Flynn adopts when he ends up in
the grid.

Speaker 1 (01:32:26):
Mm hm. And that's why the movie is called Tron,
because he's so clearly the main character. Yeah, do you
get what I'm saying? No, totally, it's weird. Yeah, I
have to call it. That the shot where everything's turning
from red to blue and you see those circles and
the floor and everything. I remember they use that shot

(01:32:48):
in the opening montage for the Wonderful World of Disney
on Sunday nights, so they'd show clips from all these movies.
I remember there was like Splash and Roger Rabbit things
like that, but I remember that shot being used. So
when I saw that in this I had forgotten about it,
and it just took me back to being like ten
years old since memory yeap having like a bowl of popcorn.

(01:33:11):
It was Sunday night, Like, what that's gonna be on
the Wonderful World of Disney tonight? What's what's Michael Eisner
gonna show us today? Remember he was like hosting it
for a while. Oh yeah, yeah. He'd always Hi, you
know who hasn't wanted to meet a mermaid? Well tonight
Tom Hanks will then say it like that. Well, then

(01:33:36):
someone in a goofy suit, remember, would like sometimes come
in and be like Hi, goofy. Wait wait, print print
out is coming now? What what is motivating this print out?
That's the the MCP turned good like giving up the evidence.

Speaker 3 (01:33:57):
Well, what I saw it is the MCP is deleted
it in essence, and it I see it as like
you know when your printer has is like backed up,
You've got a bunch of print print jobs. Sure, And
then and then you it's out of paper, and then
you put paper in and suddenly everything that was backed
up prints out.

Speaker 1 (01:34:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:34:15):
So Flynn has been trying to print this thing out
for a while, but the MCP was like holding it back. Okay, okay,
this is my head canon explanation.

Speaker 1 (01:34:22):
Sure, sure, sure, So it should be coming out of
like all the printers. Yeah, it should be like like
back to the future too, right, yes, yeah, or it'd
be kind of funny if it was. Yeah, because I
was like, why would it be in that laser bay, Like,
it'd be funny if it came out of his printer
back at his apartment and he's like, oh damn it,
and he has like run back to his apartment and
get the thing and then run back.

Speaker 3 (01:34:42):
Well, so so think about it. So Flynn goes in there,
he logs in, he finds the things, he's he's he's
trying to access.

Speaker 1 (01:34:49):
The file that's true, and MCP interrupts him.

Speaker 3 (01:34:52):
MCP interrupts and he's like, here's some algorithms that are
unsolvable to keep you busy.

Speaker 1 (01:34:57):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 (01:34:58):
And as far as Flynn is concerned, all that happened
is that, Oh no, I guess Flynn remembers everything that happened, right,
but like essentially keep the MCP at bay are able
to print out that file, right, And then Flynn storms
into a boardroom and he's like, I have a sheet
of paper here that says I wrote Space Paranoise. And
they hand the company over to him.

Speaker 1 (01:35:18):
Yeah, now he's everybody's boss. Now he's the boss. Because
it's just that simple. It's really funny, you know what,
it's fun. It's fun. I agree. There is a song

(01:35:39):
by Journey on the soundtrack called only Solutions, which I
think there's a line in the movie or Flynn's like
no problems, only solutions, something like that, and you don't
you hear it in the in the arcade.

Speaker 3 (01:35:54):
In the early part of the movie, but it's on
the album. And so I just yesterday I had put
on the soundtrack and I put on the song.

Speaker 1 (01:35:58):
I was like, it's a good song, man, I'd have
to hear it.

Speaker 3 (01:36:02):
These Journey kids, they got potential.

Speaker 1 (01:36:08):
Hey, Tron, So what do you think, man? It's fun? Yeah.
I think we agreed on a lot of it, and
you articulated a lot of what I was feeling but
couldn't put my finger on just like a few extra
bits of texture that would have made this feel even
more like something I could feel emotionally invested in. But like,

(01:36:30):
you know, keeping the characters together longer and some of
the characterizations and things. But this is just one of
those movies. And it might sound like an excuse, but
it's just so stunning and the vision is just so
striking that it's just really fun to watch. Yeah, you know,
and the characterizations as they are are still fun, you know,

(01:36:53):
like the Ram character and Flynn and everything. So and
you know, you get your sort of death star battle
at the end. You know, you're in the quote unquote
trench right with gotting to make your you have to
make your shot to shut the thing down. And that's
that's fun. And the light cycle stuff is amazing. So
I still think only solutions by Journey, oh there you go. Yeah,

(01:37:15):
So it's just you know, it's it's it's God, it's
the things we would we would have some notes for.
But I still think it's a really fun ninety minutes.

Speaker 3 (01:37:23):
I think that the mere fact that they really have
not replicated what this original movie looked like ever, including
in the sequels exactly. Uh says something about what the
movie was able to accomplish. And you know, we say
this often.

Speaker 1 (01:37:38):
You know, there is sort of temporal metric for success,
which is how did it do at the box office?
And this one only did okay if that, But I
think I think there's also the temporal metric of longevity,
cultural longevity, mm hmm. And and you know, for a while,
I think we talked about this before.

Speaker 3 (01:38:00):
Where there was that that Simpsons gag where you know,
Homer is in the three D world, right, yes, and
they're like, Homer, what is it like? He's like, have
you seen Tron? And I was like, no, no, no, no, anyway,
you know, and and and the joke was nobody's seen Tron, right,
And that was for me, honestly, that was the first
time I was like, oh, is Tron like not not

(01:38:21):
thought of?

Speaker 1 (01:38:22):
Well, like you know, Zachie, I thought of that yesterday.
And I I always take it personally when the Simpsons
attack something that I love, So I'm like, wait, I
didn't know that was a thing. Am I wrong? Yeah?
You know, I mean for me, one of them was Arby's,
you know, when the kids are stuck on the desert
Island and one of the Twins is just like, I'm

(01:38:44):
so hungry I could eat Arby's and the kids are like,
oh no, and I was as a kid, I was like,
wait what, I love Arby's. Yeah. And so then yeah,
I remember the joke about Tron and thinking, oh, this
does look like Tron. Yeah. And then when everybody's like
not wanting to admit that either they don't know what
it is or Chief Wigham doesn't want to admit that

(01:39:04):
he knows what Tron is, that's right, I was like,
oh I didn't. I didn't realize that was That was
the moment for me. Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:39:11):
And it's interesting because that was not that was what
maybe ten or twelve years after Tron came out. Oh yeah, weird,
it was relatively recent, so uh that joke notwithstanding, I
think that there there's been a general recognition of how
ahead of its time the movie was, both in terms
of the aesthetic but also like, again, how it really

(01:39:34):
anticipated the symbiotic relationship we would have with our technology. Yeah,
you know, and the notion of of the program being
an avatar of its user.

Speaker 1 (01:39:49):
I mean, look at look at people who live.

Speaker 3 (01:39:53):
Online lives and things like that, right, I mean, this
it's it's a reflection of that or an anticipation of it,
you know. Yeah, but I think I think it remains
a fascinating artifact.

Speaker 1 (01:40:07):
Oh yeah, agreed. You know two things I want to
throw out, just because I have them written out here
and we're at the end. But when you're talking about
its reception, it currently has a sixty seven percent on
Rotten Tomatoes. But I noticed that both Roger Ebert and
Gene Siskel gave it four stars. Oh yeah, yeah. Ibert

(01:40:30):
loved it. Yeah yeah, yeah, that's kind of cool. Yeah,
and he spoke well of it.

Speaker 3 (01:40:35):
You know, I remember Ebert fest like, you know, he
screened it at his film festival and stuff, you know,
and you get it because I remember, you know, just
under twenty years after he was such a champion for
Dark City. Yeah that's right, that's right, right, and very
different films, but also similarly informed by a very unique esthetic,

(01:41:02):
you know, and almost almost more esthetically appealing than the
characters are, right right, you know, so you sort of
see where his where his predilections.

Speaker 1 (01:41:11):
Were, you know. Definitely that's a good point. And then lastly,
I have this fact that I thought was kind of interesting,
so out of curiosity, I looked up the average computer
today has sixteen gigs of ram SO memory and about
five hundred and twelve gigs or to a terabyte of storage,
and the state of the art computers that were used

(01:41:32):
for this movie's special effects had two megabytes of memory
and three hundred and thirty mega megabytes of storage. That's
crazy wild, I mean, I was thinking that, like, can
you imagine rendering out these shots that must have just
I don't even know the time, and the gargantuan task

(01:41:55):
that must have been back in the day.

Speaker 3 (01:41:56):
Well, well, one of the effects technicians talked about how
they had to render entire sequences without the benefit of
like they would plot them out on on grids.

Speaker 1 (01:42:09):
M hm.

Speaker 3 (01:42:10):
So like like you know, nowadays you have key frame
animation where you just plot your key frames and then
you're able to manipulate the keyframe to have a general
sense of movement. Right back, they couldn't do that, So
they would be they they it would be you would
had to you had to create for each movement, you
had like six coordinates, and so you're plotting coordinates on

(01:42:34):
a time grid and you're putting those into a computer
and you're hoping it's like, at this time it needs
to be here here here, and moves here. And then
at this time it needs to be here here here,
and it moves here.

Speaker 1 (01:42:43):
But you're doing it.

Speaker 3 (01:42:44):
All just mathematically, not visually, and then you enter that
in and it gives you this thing. I mean, think
about how time intense of that is, because if you
screw up, you have to essentially go back you know, yeah,
and you're doing it, you know, one whatever, like one
hundred frames at a time, which amounts to like, you know,
for four seconds, I think right, twenty fives say yeah,

(01:43:09):
so four seconds, you.

Speaker 1 (01:43:10):
Know, crazy? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:43:14):
AnyWho, Hey, let us know your thoughts on Tron. We
had plenty to say, but we assume there's lots of
Tron fans listening to this, So if you have any
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(01:43:34):
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(01:44:06):
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And if you're looking for me online, you can find
me on social media at Zaki's Corner That z akis Corner,

(01:44:29):
and you can also read my reviews at the San
Francisco Chronicle and also at IGN and The Rap Brian
What About You. You can find episodes I've written for
the show's Puppy Dog Pals and Young Jedi Adventures streaming
on Disney Plus and with that on behalf of my
partner Brian home. My name is Zachie Hassan. This has
been our movie film commentary track for Tron. We will

(01:44:50):
catch you soon. Thank you programs,