The thing I hate that MET gala is Tron, Advil is Tron, Zayn is Tron, Eurovision is Tron, literally everything is Tron, the whole live popculture is so heavily influenced by the Tron universe that every week there is a new clip or event celebrating it, only Disney would not care I just hope one of these days a forgotten contract comes around and these fuckers lose the rights of Tron and the whole thing goes to somebody that cares about it.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Isn’t it crazy? I don’t get it. I don’t get why it has to be this frustrating. I don’t get why everyone is inspired by it but Disney isn’t doing anything to really move forward with it–why they don’t seem to see that people will eat up the aesthetic and love it artistically.
Tron has had a huge pop culture influence, just very subtly. Anything glowy is automatically reminiscent of and acknowledged as reminiscent of Tron. Tron Lines. CGI in movies. DOZENS of references across media. Fucking DAFT PUNK was inspired by Tron!
Tron has had a bigger pop culture influence than Avatar could ever hope to, but guess which one is getting 4 sequels?
#SALTY FLYNN IS COMING OUT TONIGHT #DO NOT MENTION UPRISING TO ME RIGHT NOW
I THINK WE’RE ALL FEELING PRETTY SALTY RIGHT NOW
Alright, I gotta add my pile of salt thoughts to this.
Tron has been a pretty big, yet subtle, influence in a lot of things. It’s been a big influence in the film industry due to its usage of CGI, and its aesthetic been ingrained into pop culture to the point where anything neon immediately gets people to shout “TRON!”, but it doesn’t stop there either.
The Tron film has had a pretty big influence on the science-fiction genre as a whole. Be it movies, novels, comics, or whatever else, you will find something influenced by Tron or, at the very least, something that was influenced by something that was influenced by Tron.
On top of that, it’s been a big influence in the computer industry. Many people who went to see Tron in theaters back in the day left that theater thinking “Hot damn, computers are fucking awesome!” and that spark of interest in computers has lead to many people get into game development, software design, and computer engineering. Which is pretty fucking huge! Not only have computers become so widespread that we all carry a small computer in our pockets all day every day, but the video game industry has grown to be a massive part of western culture, and Tron inspired people to be a part of those industries and help them grow.
While everyone else was just trying to make easy money off of “New things are bad here’s story where everything goes wrong because we dared to advance technology”, Tron took the trope of the A.I. gone rogue and destroyed it by showing that all you need is another human creation and a little bit of user intervention to solve those problems, instead of having them spiral out of control to the point where the only solution is destroying the computer.
Steven Lisberger looked at computers, saw the potential for amazing things through them, and wanted to inspire people with that potential.
It’s not just the neon look, it’s not just that ‘80s nostalgia. The optimistic narrative, usage of technology that everyone else shunned, and its ability to inspire people helped drive the film industry, computer industry, and video game industry to where they are today. Its influence isn’t something immediately apparent, and it didn’t single-handedly change those industries on its arrival or anything like that, but its influence is still there and it is not insignificant by any means.
But at the end of the day, no matter what it is, Disney executives have this to say about Tron: “Eh, it doesn’t make us billions of dollars every week from our minimal effort, so it’s not worth bothering with it again. Let’s make Frozen 2 instead.”
Tron has always been a niche product. It will do well, but it will never be able to rake in the billions upon billions that Disney wants. So because of that, the Tron franchise, the creators of Tron media, and its fans will always be fucked over.
Fuck my personal feelings of it not being fair to the consumers; it’s not fair to the people behind the various Tron media.
It’s not fair to the visual effects artists, actors, prop designers, costumers, makeup artists, and everyone else who worked on Legacy.
It’s not fair to the people behind Tron: Uprising, who put their heart and soul into making a one-of-a-kind cartoon with an awesome story.
It’s not fair to Monolith Productions and the heart and soul they poured into Tron 2.0 only for its existence to be ignored by Disney.
It’s not fair to the writers and artists for Tron: Ghost in the Machine and Tron Betrayal.
It’s not fair to all the designers and programmers behind the Tron: Evolution video games and Tron Run/r.
They don’t deserve to be looked at as failures by the company who always makes sure that their creations can never flourish.
All of these people, who have collectively spent god-knows-how-many-hours creating all of these things, deserve so much better.
I gotta add one more thing that I just remembered. Without Tron there would be no Toy Story, and that’s a quote from John Lasseter. You hear that? GODDAMN TOY STORY WAS INSPIRED BY TRON, AND THAT KICKED OFF PIXAR’S ENTIRE FILMOGRAPHY.
And to add further: the people behind Tron: Uprising, who put their heart and soul into making a one-of-a-kind, AWARD-WINNING cartoon with an awesome story.
YOU KNOW WHAT ELSE????
Legacy was profitable. IT MADE MONEY, IT DIDN’T LOSE MONEY. Now Disney Infinity is being cancelled because it didn’t make ENOUGH money. Age of Ultron was considered a failure because it didn’t make ENOUGH money. SHEESH. COME ON. THESE THINGS ARE MAKING MONEY. THEYRE MAKING A PROFIT. Maybe, just maybe, it’s the EXPECTATIONS that need to be adjusted??? MAYBE? Come on! I’ve run into SO many people who go “Tron? Yeah I liked Tron! I’d like to see another one!”
SO.
MANY.
