Worlds collide in new Tron: Ares trailer

By Blair Marnell Published April 5, 2025

It’s been 15  years since Sam Flynn (Garrett Hedlund) and Quorra (Olivia Wilde) escaped from the Grid in Tron: Legacy. A third Tron film was in development that would have continued Sam and Quorra’s story, but it was ultimately canceled. According to director Joseph Kosinski, that movie would have featured the real world facing an invasion from the Grid. Some of that plot has been retained for the upcoming film, Tron: Ares, and that’s readily apparent in the new trailer that features lightcycles wrecking havoc in our world.

More alarmingly, a Recognizer – a digital warship from both of the previous Tron movies – has also crossed over to the real world. The way it plays in the trailer is like more a serious version of the movie Pixels, except the Recognizer dwarfs everything around it. And it doesn’t appear that conventional weaponry is having any effect on it.

Ares is a standalone sequel that doesn’t directly callback to the events of Legacy. Tron (Bruce Boxleitner) also appears to be completely absent from this story. However, the voice of Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) – the hero of the first film and Sam Flynn’s father – can be heard in the trailer telling someone that “there’s no going back.” He may be speaking to Ares (Jared Leto), the title character of the film who has traveled to the real world on a mission of his own. If Flynn’s words can be taken literally, it may be a one-way trip for Ares. But he’s clearly not the only one who crossed over.

Evan Peters, Greta Lee, Jodie Turner-Smith, Cameron Monaghan, Sarah Desjardins, Hasan Minhaj, Arturo Castro, and Gillian Anderson round out the cast of the film. Joachim Rønning directed the movie from a script by Jesse Wigutow and Jack Thorne (Adolescence). Nine Inch Nails will provide the score.

 Tron: Ares will hit theaters on October 10.