Tron: Ares Is Finally Happening, Here’s When Production Starts
After years of development and delay, production on Tron: Ares will finally be getting underway. The end of the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes have started the engine of Hollywood humming again and, according to ComicBook.com, the new surge in production includes Disney’s long-awaited third entry into the Tron film series. Of course, since the gap between Tron and Tron: Legacy was 28 years, from 1982 to 2010, waiting what should end up being roughly 15 years for another sequel is kind of a bargain at this point.
Production Set To Star Within Months
Joachim Rønning, director of Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, will be directing Tron: Ares, which is set to star Jared Leto. After multiple delays, including the pandemic and the writers’ and actors’ strikes, production on the sci-fi sequel is now expected to move forward within the next couple of months. With the new film scheduled to start production just after the end of the holiday season, speculative hopes are that cameras will roll as early as January of 2024, though a concrete date has yet to be made public.
The Cast
The cast of Tron: Ares will also include Evan Peters, Greta Lee, Jodie Turner-Smith, and Cameron Monaghan. Disney has continued to show support for the Tron franchise in the years since Tron: Legacy, including allowing the addition of Tron skins to a previous update of Fortnite and creating the Tron Lightcycle Run, a new attraction that premiered at Walt Disney World earlier in 2023.
A Long Time Coming
Producer Justin Springer said earlier this year that Tron: Ares was still in development, calling himself a producer on “whatever the upcoming film becomes.” At that time, Springer was tight-lipped about the future of the film, saying that the production team wanted to make sure everything was just right and ready to announce so that the film would live up to the anticipation and the quality of what has come before.
To this point, the Tron films have done nothing if not try new things, with the original seeing the development of an entirely new photographic process that has not been used to produce any film since.
Technology At The Core
Speaking to ComicBook.com about Tron: Ares earlier this year, Springer said at the time that evolving technology was becoming more and more relevant to the stories that could be told in the Tron universe. This is especially important as engagement with current technological trends has always been at the core of Tron stories.
Springer said he felt now was the right time for a new film in the series, adding that producers wanted to be sure both the story and the team or where they needed to be before production began or before much was said about what viewers can expect in the forthcoming film.
Steven Lisberger Still Involved
While Tron: Ares does not have full involvement from the original film’s writer and director, Steven Lisberger, the man who created the Tron universe is still providing his advice to the new production. Describing his current involvement as “the Obi-Wan role,” Lisberger says he should provide as little input as possible. Though he says he would ideally give the new Tron team only three sentences of guidance, he remarks that he’s “not down to three sentences yet.”
