Jared Leto Stars in TRON: Ares — New Trailer Drops

San Diego Comic-Con is right around the corner, and while Disney is planning on one massive event to show off all of its upcoming projects, the company has released a new trailer for TRON: Ares. TRON: Ares is the newest installment in the TRON film series and is directed by Joachim Rønning. While past installments in the franchise have taken place in the “digital world,” TRON: Ares will see the sci-fi series head to the real world.

The last time viewers were in the Grid was in 2010, with TRON: Legacy. The original TRON’s Flynn (Jeff Bridges) son, Sam Flynn (Garrett Hedlund) was the star of Legacy, which showed Sam not only defeating Clu, the evil program within the Grid from overtaking reality and the Grid itself, but Sam also teamed up with a female program, Quorra (Olivia Wilde), to escape the Grid. Quorra was also an isomorphic algorithm (ISO) and was being hunted down in the Grid by Clu for her rare status.

The third TRON film was set to begin right where Legacy ended. In October of 2010, Disney gave a green light to the sequel and had plans to continue on with Sam Flynn and Quorra on their adventures as Sam would take over the leadership of ENCOM, his father’s company. However, that script fell by the wayside, with a new one being started in 2012. By 2015, Disney decided to cancel the project, reportedly after the poor performance of the studio’s previous sci-fi epic, Tomorrowland.

TRON: Ares was finally announced in 2020, but at this point, it was not a sequel but a reboot on its own. However, some elements of the prior scripts were still present, including Ares, who, in previous TRON: Legacy sequel scripts, was an AI character. After some pandemic-related delays and a recently ended Hollywood walkout, TRON: Ares is ready to go.

The official synopsis from Disney reads: “TRON: Ares follows a highly sophisticated Program, Ares, who is sent from the digital world into the real world on a dangerous mission, marking humankind’s first encounter with A.I. beings.” The film will see Jared Leto play Ares, Evan Peters as Julian Dillinger, and Greta Lee as Eve Kim. Joining the cast are Jodie Turner-Smith, Cameron Monaghan, Sarah Desjardins, Hasan Minhaj, Arturo Castro, and Gillian Anderson. Jeff Bridges, who played Kevin Flynn in the original TRON, is back for the film, which will also feature a musical score by Nine Inch Nails.

Insider: The “Ultimate Soldier” Comes to Earth

A first trailer for TRON: Ares dropped in April and showed off some amazing TRON aesthetics. Bold neon lines, swashbuckling lightcycles, and gorgeous digital vistas were all part of this first look. The newest trailer for the film retains all of the TRON flair that fans of the franchise have come to expect, but this latest trailer also shows a little bit more of the potential narrative for this entry in the franchise.

The opening of the trailer is almost like something from a real-life tech conference keynote speech. A man by the name of Julian Dillinger is onstage in front of a crowd, and he is giving a speech that sounds like it could easily have come from any tech industry titan. “So much talk of AI and big tech today,” Dillinger begins. “Virtual worlds, what are they going to look like? When will we get there? Well, folks. We’re not going there. They are coming here.”

Dillinger then introduces the audience to his “ultimate soldier” — Ares. In an act of hubris, Dillinger boasts that Ares “is biblically strong, lightning fast, and supremely intelligent.” But then Dillinger makes it clear that this Ares is his property. “And if he is struck down on the battlefield…” (this is where Dillinger deliberately trips Ares on the stage) “…I will simply make you another.” Dillinger appears to be an evil executive from a large tech company that views his “AI soldiers” as simply tools for his evil uses.

But, of course, it might not be that simple. Dillinger might view Ares as his property, but in the trailer, Ares seems to have a much larger mission. Ares sets out on a journey for what he is searching for, but he can’t exactly define it. What does he want? Ares will have to find out on his own. Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) is in the virtual world, giving Ares the third degree, and asking, “A malfunctioning program that wants to live, why is that?”

Fans of the original will appreciate seeing Bridges back as Flynn, but Leto as an A.I. crossing over into the human world will add new wrinkles to the franchise’s long-running themes of the line between man and machine. The film promises both some massive action and philosophical musings as the two worlds collide.

Visually, the trailer is as smooth as one would expect from TRON. While Rønning will juxtapose futuristic techscapes with the real world, the Nine Inch Nails soundtrack for the film will bring all the atmospheric nostalgia fans have come to expect from a TRON film. All the sensory bells and whistles look to be in place, but the narrative will venture into new territory for the franchise.

It’s been a long time coming, but TRON: Ares is ready to go. The film is set to arrive in theaters on October 10, 2025