Stunning, but hungry thirty minutes later.
I saw Tron: Legacy today. It was beautiful.
There were cultural things. They did a great job remediating early 80s computing and video games, from visuals to sounds to materials. Daft Punk’s soundtrack was splendid. Chip tunes. Subtle Nintendo sound effects. Sawtooth waves. The occasional synthesized horns, straight off Pink Floyd’s Division Bell. I loved how the enemy space craft were clearly designed after the enemies in Space Invaders (evoking this kick-ass music video by Royksopp).
And, the sound of a 5 1/4” floppy disk drive being accessed. Or a Compaq booting up. Strange how these sounds, nearly 30 years later, still symbolize computing to us.
Or, at least, to those of us over twenty. Not everyone shares the same relationships and meanings towards these cultural artifacts. “Why is the Save icon a floppy disk?” and all that.
Visually and audibly, Tron: Legacy was stunning. My eyes and ears felt satisfactorily fucked by the 3D IMAX Experience®. I wish, though, that instead of simply advancing the craft of representing an alternate universe inside a computer, it had advanced the thinking on the subject as well. How do we recreate worlds within computers? How do we populate those worlds with ourselves? What would a digital rapture look like?
I had hoped that, like The Matrix, the visualization of the thinking that went into Tron: Legacy would catapult our brains into into a fresh space regarding our digital future. As it is, this is well-worn territory.
Clearly, everything has a materiality in The Grid. What defines this materiality? Much of it seems to be glass, but also plastic. There is rubber, in the form of svelte suits and vehicle tires. The tires can scuff the glass, just like street shoes on the basketball court in your elementary school. The plastic can be scratched.
What defines those materials? Why are the individuals called programs? Why are they programs at all? If Flynn was theorizing on quantum teleportation back in the 80s, why doesn’t teleportation exist in The Grid?
No, Tron: Legacy does not offer any blueprint to continue imagining the future. If anything it looks backwards, offering no new thoughts as to the meta-properties of a digital parallel universe. I guess I’m talking about embodiment, sensory experience, the nature of being… and what that means in a digital space.
All Tron: Legacy has demonstrated is that today’s movie technology has finally caught up to a point where we can express our ideas about digital worlds from more than 20 years ago.
Finally:
The disk I wear on my back that is my entire life and ultimate weapon in one? Whatever the fuck? If I had my way I would put my life somewhere, you know, safer.
Like in a to-go container.
