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1[[WMG:FridgeBrilliance]]
2* As an ISO, Quorra can revolutionize science and medicine. And considering that Flynn's disk is the one that got Sam and Quorra out, Sam has the data available to possibly reconstitute his own father in the digital world if he did actually die from merging with Clu.
3* Also, regarding the arcade:
4** FLYNN's probably remained profitable until home video consoles killed arcades.
5** Alan probably paid the electric bill on it (relatively small with everything shut down) in hopes that if Kevin turned up anywhere it'd be here, which is why Sam was able to turn everything on.
6** Or Flynn himself setup the payments from his personal fortune. After all if you're going to spend time inside a computer, you're gonna want to make damned sure that your power bill is paid. There's even some evidence that it may have been Clu. After all if you can reactivate a phone line that's been disconnected for twenty years, keeping the power on should be doable.
7* When Kevin says Sam's "really messing with [his] Zen thing, man!", the sputtering he does isn't a grown man talking to his adult progeny, it's an angry dad trying not to swear at his 7-year old(?) son.
8** That he'd only just been reunited with. He was obviously about to have a longer, more heartfelt conversation with Sam after flatly ruling out any kind of action, but Sam had already taken off. It was nice to see a father acting like a real father. He doesn't appear to have any remonstrations with Quorra for setting Sam on that path, but by the time she wakes up he's gotten over it and has better things to do.
9*** I meant that he still, on some level, thought of Sam as a kid. Not sure if that was clear.
10* Maybe Clu ''couldn't'' have taken over the real world, and his entire scheme is a delusion of grandeur and overwhelming pride. It would in fact have been a fittingly karmic punishment for him if he actually succeeded in getting himself and his army to the real world only to find that all his digital war-making technology doesn't work, and [[HumiliationConga that he and his army of programs all as helpless and newborn babies completely unable to physically cope with the real world laws of physics, and have the whole lot of them taken out by the local police.]]
11** Now imagine if the Grid was connected to the Internet, and it's like the Grid's anthropomorphic construction, the damage that army could have done if they could conquer military program regions could have been horrific.
12** The MCP in the original movie outright stated it was going to take over military computer systems. Of course, the MCP was also a contemporary of those military systems. Now imagine Clu and his circa-turn-of-TheNineties programs taking on military systems and military programs from... ''2011''. Programs that are already experienced in cyberwarfare [[note]]one of the RealLife missions of the [[UsefulNotes/YanksWithTanks United States]] [[DeathFromAbove Air Force]] is in fact protecting America's interests in Cyber Space[[/note]].Talk about a CurbStompBattle.
13-->"So what happened this morning?"\
14"Really weird. It was like someone hooked up a botnet from twenty years ago. Exploits and attack vectors I haven't seen since my college courses... if anyone out there's still running EN DOS or Windows 3.1 with no firewall or anything, they might have a problem. Anyway, a little after ten I noticed most of the traffic was coming from one group of [=IPs=] and just cut it out of the net."\
15"Maybe somebody's virus archive got loose somehow."\
16"Maybe. What's really got me worried is this new worm from Singapore..."
17** Maybe not quite a curb stomp battle as one might think: Clu's army is trained in VR combat based on Tron's experiences in Sark's game grid. The modern security programs might just be assuming functions like factory workers, and may not even have identity disks.
18*** Re: that last point, it's reasonable to assume that they ''don't'' have identity discs. In the original, Sark had to make a speech to inform the new video game warriors (and the audience) what these new shiny Frisbees on their backs were. Programs that didn't play in the Games didn't have the discs (Yori, the random townspeople). Legacy programs have them because they were iconic, and, in-universe, it was what Flynn saw as normal and thus incorporated into his designs. It's likely that the discs were unique to the conscripts -- perhaps even a dehumanizing gesture on the part of the MCP -- and programs from other systems wouldn't have them. Other weapons, sure, but if you think about it, a disc isn't the greatest thing to fight with.
19*** Depends on whether Clu's forces are attacking the military computers on the Grid or in the Real World... because I'd wager good money that Clu's programs don't even know how to write [=JavaScript,=] much less a worm/virus/trojan.
20*** Maybe not. Flynn was like his world's equivalent to UsefulNotes/NikolaTesla; utterly brilliant, completely off his gourd, and not really good with thinking through little things like "consequences" (Clu is ample proof). That little experiment of his has been left to grow for twenty years on its own evolutionary path, run from the inside by the aformentioned crazy genius and his equally crazy A.I. dark side. If his Grid could create Quorra's people, Ghu knows what ''else'' it was capable of!
21*** If the Grid ''had'' been connected to the net, Clu would have had decades of experience with incoming worms/trojans/viruses. Recall that initially TRON was basically a firewall, so the Grid already has its own security systems, probably more than capable of handling those first simple attacks. One can imagine Clu spending time inspecting and ''integrating'' those first viruses and worms until he has enough personal experience to get bored with the sheer number of half-assed script-kiddie attacks and is able to handle anything thrown at him. Then consider that since we've been told Clu can't create, just repurpose, what better use for these thousands and thousands of daily incoming programs than to continue to expand his army until his "Rectify" button has worn out. Only this time his soldiers would be made of highly advanced attack vectors combining the best skills Clu has learned from everything before, along with the abilities of the Grid. It would probably be a matter of minutes from the point at which Clu unleashed his digital army until he completely owned the Internet. CurbStompBattle, indeed.
22*** If you pay any mind to Legacy's tie-in game, Evolution, the Grid has already had issues with viruses.
23* Based on how she was passed on from one Flynn to another, Quorra represents the new meaning of Shareware.
24** I like how the Apprentice has spent more time with the Master than the Son, instead of the usual "Master's male apprentice falls in love with the Master's daughter" story.
25* Quorra's endearingly innocent question of what Jules Verne is like makes even more sense when you realize that programs don't age, and Quorra herself has probably experienced hundreds of human years' worth of time. Even if she realized that Verne existed long before Sam did, she doesn't actually understand that a "user" who came into existence more than a hundred years before Sam would be long-since dead due to old age.
26** Well assuming Kevin's disappearance was when she was created (or soon there after), she'd have been alive for 20 real-world years or 1,000 Grid years. So she's that old. She probably does understand certain things like aging; she probably just has a lack of any real experience with out as, as far as programs go, it's either live or derez. Though this is assuming non-real world computing issues.
27** She has Kevin right in front of her, getting gray and wrinkled. She knows what aging is.
28** She probably doesn't know the difference between years and 'cycles', and assumes that everybody in our world has 1000+ year lifespan.
29* A lot of complaints center around CGI-Flynn/Clu not looking quite real. CGI-Flynn is one thing, but Clu is a program based on Flynn. Though the other programs are portrayed by real people, consider that they don't have Users around to compare to. The not-quite-perfect CGI is a useful, if unintentional, way of saying he's a Program.
30** Though even the CGI-Flynn in the beginning is somewhat justified if you keep in mind, we see that from Sam's point of view. If we treat this as a memory it makes perfect sense that to Sam his bigger than life father who (by Sam's knowledge) abandoned him, doesn't look quite human either.
31* Kevin hugging Clu as they reintegrated hit me extra hard when I realized that he was doing the same thing he'd done with Sam when they first met. In a way, Clu is Kevin's child as well, so the parallels made that final moment between father and digital son extra-powerful on subsequent viewings.
32** Likewise, Clu being unable to comprehend why Flynn was content to hide for 20 years, but was happy to spring into action once Sam got involved. Think about it - Programs do not self-replicate. They have no concept of family in the sense a human would. The closest he might be able to understand what Sam is would be an "upgraded version" - one that makes Clu ''obsolete.'' Little wonder Clu is pissed.
33* The more you think about the updated games, the more they make sense. Let's take the light disc one, for example. in the original film, it was between two people... most consoles and arcade machines of that era had two controllers. Fast forward to legacy, and the updated version resembles tournament-level multiplayer for any given beat-em-up.
34* Why was Sam able to fit the entire grid onto his phone's memory? Because, no matter how much it has advanced, it's still effectively built on an advanced system from the 1980s, which is easily emulatable on modern hardware... such as a phone.
35** In 1989, a minicomputer workstation with a limited number of users would have been lucky to get 1GB of disk space. Nowadays that's a drop in the bucket for modern memory cards.
36* Clu's army doesn't seem terribly impressive....until one realizes every single one of them can summon a fighter plane, light cycle, or possibly even a ''tank'' at will with the handlebar-like devices. Still not enough to TakeOverTheWorld, but they're a ''lot'' more powerful than just infantry with sticks.
37** In the physical world, where would the matter come from to create the vehicles?
38*** The same place it came from on the Grid? Given that Sam was made of flesh and blood while he was in there, it only goes to follow that the programs would be made of voxels while in meatspace. The problem is that cyberspace vehicles need to be modified to function off the Grid, which means that until and unless Clu sets up one hell of a supply line, those things will quickly turn into fancy lawn ornaments.
39*** If we follow that line of logic...what is Quorra now?
40* Anyone who has seen the soundtrack will likely know that there is a track called "Disc Wars". This ends up being played while the Flynns and Quorra infiltrate Clu's Rectifier, not during the actual Disc Wars games. A bit confusing, until you realize that's almost literally what the scene in the Rectifier is; a war over a disc.
41** Another soundtrack example. When Flynn reintegrated with Clu, this troper was disappointed because it looked like Flynn was dead. But if you listen to the soundtrack, what's the name of the song that plays during that scene? "FLYNN LIVES."
42*** Of course... Sam Flynn lives. On a more serious note, it may be alluding to the "Flynn Lives" ARG.
43*** Another possible explanation is that it's sort of a roundabout reference to two sayings: "Every man dies, not every man truly lives" and "Brave men taste of death but once, but cowards taste of it daily". While he hadn't truly become a coward, Flynn was existing in fear, letting himself do nothing but sit and dream of "someday" being able to do something, fearing that actually take action would just backfire... too, he was likely afraid of his own death by destroying Clu, because that's just a natural feeling. When he finally makes that decision, to do what is necessary, he wakes up from his long years of "death" and truly lives. In the process he ceases to exist, but in doing so he was truly alive for the first time in twenty years.
44* Initially, it becomes confusing when there's programs that speak with digitized voices, whereas other programs speak perfectly clearly. However, when Sam meets Zuse, he dismisses the resistance agents (who have digitized voices) as "primitive functions." Paying close attention to which programs are speaking what kinds of voices is actually an indicator of their hierarchy. Ones that speak clearly are higher-end processes, whereas ones with the more digitized voices are either subordinate programs or lower-end programs. Gem and the Armory Sirens, all of Clu's rectified troops, and even Rinzler all speak with these digitzed voices, indicating that they are subordinates or less advanced or complex programs compared to Clu, Tron, Zuse, etc.
45* At first it seems like an AssPull that Flynn could help Tron overcome Clu's brainwashing just by looking at him. Until one realizes that Tron did the exact same thing to Yori in the first movie! She was brainwashed by the MCP when he first found her, but when he looked into her eyes, she remembered her love for him and broke free of her conditioning. It looks like [[ThePowerofLove the powers of love]] [[ThePowerofFriendship and friendship]] are consistently stronger than the bad guys in the digital world.
46** There's a second part of Fridge Brilliance if you recall the first film. Remember who ''built'' Tron and ''why.'' Alan created Tron to monitor the Encom system because he knew something screwy was going on, and didn't trust Master Control as far as he could pitch its mainframe. If Alan even suspected just [[AIIsACrapshoot how far Master Control had gone off the rails]], it's only logical that he'd make for ''certain'' that his software would be ThreeLawsCompliant. (Alan is a much more cautious guy than Flynn ever thought of being, to the point of being a mild case of {{Chessmaster}}) Piggy back that to the UndyingLoyalty both Program and programmer have towards Flynn, and the surprise is not that Tron threw off the brainwashing, it's that Clu managed to get the level of corruption he did.
47* Rinzler having two Identity discs makes more sense when you think about it. [[spoiler: It's because he has two identities.]]
48** It gets better. Consider what was on the disks.[[spoiler: one disk is Tron's, the other belonged to one of Clu's minions in the flashback. Rinzler's second identity is derived from the second disk]]
49** Yet another piece of brilliance if you're inclined to import certain aspects of the discredited ''VideoGame/TronTwoPointOh''. A standard disc in 2.0 doesn't carry an energy cost. A Sequencer upgrade, which will allow splitting a disc into multiple copies like Rinzler, uses a small amount of energy with every shot...small, that is, for a User like Jet. For a Program, the energy cost would be much more adverse, but it would still be en effective weapon for short skirmishes. Clu saddling his brainwashed [[TheDragon dragon]] with an energy-draining weapon would both make Rinzler a deadlier combatant, ''and'' further Rinzler's dependence on him.
50* "Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)" in the soundtrack is a cleverly obscure throwback to the credits of the original movie, but even a cursory glance at the lyrics shows that it's more than a little bit of foreshadowing too ("Worlds apart, hearts broken in two/Sleepless nights/Losing ground/I'm reaching for you", right at the beginning, for example), chock full of oblique references to the separation that the Flynns experienced, as well as perhaps Kevin and Clu's uneasy relationship.
51** And contrasts with the first film's [[http://youtu.be/ooeriefgYAw "Only Solutions."]] . I read a comment on Website/YouTube that summed up the difference.
52--> '''arachknight1979:''' ''Was I the only one who was miffed when Sam turned on the power to Flynn's Arcade and "Separate Ways, Worlds Apart" was playing on the jukebox? I mean, it's a great song, but THIS song was in the first movie. THIS song should have been playing. lol I know it's a total nerd nitpick, but still...'''
53--> '''Grayarcadian:''' ''I was thinking about that. While Only Solutions would work, it wouldn't have had the same impact or meaning.  Flynn's "only solutions" approach worked with MCP, but he then met a puzzle he could never solve. A part of himself creates a system purge because it just couldn't take not having a solution. Now in the present day he's literally World's Apart, both he and Sam's hearts are "trapped between confusion and pain," there definitely were "promises made in vain" (seeing the grid) and at the end he really must go and be "wished love," but its clear that he's "never walked alone." Yeah, the context of a Journey love ballad [is] turned on [its] ear, but I appreciated all of the thoughtful details in the movie, and this song qualifies... What can I say? After leaving the theater I encountered rush hour downtown holiday gridlock. I had a car stereo, a Journey CD and serious time to kill. So I played the songs back to back a few dozen times and puzzled why I wasn't hearing "Only Solutions," because I had missed it, same as you.''
54** Another meta piece of brilliance; "Only Solutions" was the B Side to "Separate Ways." It was a literal inverse of first film's theme song.
55** And after the song "Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)" ends, the song that plays right after is "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)" by Eurythmics, which, according to band member and writer Annie Lennox said in an interview was about the search for fulfillment. The lyrics also work as another {{Foreshadowing}} layer: ''"Some of them want to use you. Some of them want to be used by you. Some of them want to abuse you. Some of them want to be abused."'' And what is Sam in this universe? [[PhysicalGod A User.]]
56* At first, I was mildly annoyed that there wasn't a huge final battle between Clu and the Flynns and Quorra and possibly Tron at the gateway. Then, I put some thought on the nature of the movie and how it was made clear that fighting Clu is a losing proposition at best, as well as the running theme of the movie that GodIsFlawed. Then I got it: the final confrontation at the gateway between Kevin and Clu was the thematic climax of the entire movie, where God stands before his creation and effectively says "I was wrong. I failed you. This was all my fault." Kevin's humility and admission of his flaws before Clu, then his sacrifice to allow Sam and Quorra to escape, serve as a far more powerful and fitting climax to the movie than any fight scene.
57** It's not just the second movie. The first has a heavy dose of it, too. Programs look at Users the same way we humans see Gods. They make multiple references to belief in the Users, and the dying Ram even whispers "Oh, my User..." when he's in incredible pain. Tron, during the I/O Tower scene, is practically in religious ecstasy when he contacts Alan. When Flynn makes his reveal, Tron's awed, but Flynn splashes cold water on the notion.
58--->'''Tron:''' ''If you are a User, then everything you've done so far has been according to a plan, right?''
59--->'''Kevin Flynn:''' [laughs] ''Hah, you wish. Ah, you guys know what it's like, you just keep doing what it looks like you're supposed to be doing, no matter how crazy it seems.''
60--->'''Tron:''' ''That's the way it is for Programs, yes.''
61--->'''Kevin Flynn:''' ''I hate to disappoint you, pal, but most of the time, that's the way it is for us Users too.''
62--->'''Tron:''' ''Stranger and stranger.''
63** This would be another reason why Clu would have had to [[spoiler: not just re-purpose Tron, but destroy Tron's very identity]]. Tron ''knows'' too much about the Users!
64* There's a question of FridgeLogic that someone posed (and now seems to be gone) about why the Grid would need a nightclub. It threw me as well, until I realized the answer is two-fold. First, after the events of ''Tron'', Kevin realised that even the most basic programs were sentient within the Grid -- they live, make friends, fall in love, have entire lives -- so why shouldn't they have a place to kick back and relax? Second, Kevin intended for the Grid to be something that hundreds, ''thousands'' of people would use, so it makes sense to create some places where they'd be able to interact with programs and each other in a social setting.
65** It also seems to be a neutral ground, in effect: a place where negotiations could be made, and programs of all colors (which sounds a bit worse than I'd intended... ah well) could hang out without being at each others' throats. Kevin may not have intended it that way (since when he was building, everyone was on the same side), but Zuse or perhaps even Clu helped re-purpose it for their own gain.
66* The first time I watched the movie, I wondered why Clu saw the ISO[=s=] as an imperfection, given that they could benefit both the Grid and the World alike. Then when I watched the movie again, I noticed Kevin and Clu's reactions: Kevin looked happy, while Clu looked dejected. At that moment, I realized that he didn't see them as an imperfection, but he was using it to cover up his true reason for bumping them off: he felt that they were stealing his ability to create a perfect system, which is ''exactly'' what he was made to do!
67** Which also explains why Clu attacked Kevin after he revealed that there's no such thing as perfection; He believes that Kevin is saying that he no longer has a purpose, and everything he's done up to that point is a lie.
68** There's also an "WhatDoYouMeanItsNotSymbolic" ShoutOut to the Bible, if one's inclined to go there. God created his best and brightest creation, humanity, in the final days of Creation. He was so delighted by His creation that He asked His angels to bow before Mankind. Most of them did so, but the best and brightest angel, the Morning Star himself, did not see Mankind as higher than angels, and refused to bow. Instead, he started a War against God and God's creations that continues to this day...If that's the case, than Sam's ''really'' in a position on the Grid he doesn't want...
69** His stated position works perfectly as his motivation. Programs are predictable and understandable. While they can apparently improvise and innovate ''within'' the boundaries of their function (as shown by how they can learn to fight on the Gaming Grid, or how Tron can go from being a firewall to a revolutionary), they'll still be generally predictable, even moreso the less you force them to step outside those boundaries. An ISO, on the other hand, has every indication of acting like a human... unpredictable, changing, learning, taking random chances. Unknowable. They couldn't be channeled and set in nice little repetitive grooves like programs could. Clu wanted [[Film/DemolitionMan the purity of an ant colony]], and [=ISOs=] would never have submitted to being drones.
70** Alternatively, he was just following his programming. When he was created, presumably his 'code' would have had a set of defined parameters for what made a perfect system. [=ISOs=] did not exist at that time, so these parameters would not have allowed for their existence. Anything outside of the set parameters that defined a perfect system would be seen by Clu as an imperfection. This also explains why he turned on Kevin and Tron. By favoring an element of the system that violated the parameters, they were, in Clu's mind, the equivalent of Dillinger and the MCP.
71** Humans are fascinated by the idea of life arising from nothing, order from chaos, since that's how we think we began, but can only guess at exactly ''how''. So a human is going to see [=ISOs=] as a miracle and/or a fascinating puzzle, the answers to which might help us understand our own origins better. Programs ''know'' their origin, and that they were created for a purpose; they wouldn't have curiosity or awe about what seem to be just random glitches that serve no function and only consume resources... grid bugs that talk and look like them, basically.
72* Dillinger Jr. uses Emacs. Kevin Flynn uses vi. If editor preference is hereditary, it would explain a thing or two about some of the conflict from the first movie, and possibly conflicts that might come up in the next.
73* Clu's goal is to make the world free for the programs. In the beginning, [[RussianReversal Sam accomplished his goal to make a program free for the world]]. Makes sense when coupled with the "Out there/in there is our destiny" IronicEcho.
74* The first movie ended with a night-time cityscape, lit up with neon and TronLines, indicating that we were not so different from the Programs. Legacy ends with Sam and Quorra turning off the computer, getting outside, and into the natural world to see a sunrise... reversing the message and reminding us Users that we really are quite different.
75** Also, the way the first movie ends and the way Legacy begins are BookEnds.
76* Speaking of TronLines, here's one - why, out of all the brightly lit-up programs on the Grid, are Tron's lines so tiny? It's because he's from a previous system, and therefore is more utilitarian/has a smaller data file than the more advanced programs.
77** Not just that; in the original, the lines were thinner and more detailed, compared to the redesign in the new one. His lines are smaller because he comes from a system with smaller lines.
78* When Sam goes down to the basement, there's a thick layer of dust over everything... except the bright, shiny key in the door. Someone else has been there.
79* In the new movie, ''Film/TronLegacy'', the CGI on the redone Kevin Flynn appeared to bug a lot of people, and then me. It's a bit dodgy. And then I realized. They're in a computer! Of course it's not supposed to look perfectly real! The slightly-off CGI may not be on purpose, but it makes sense!
80** Even better - The deaged Flynn is Clu, so ''of course'' he's not going to look perfectly natural: ''He's a computer program!''
81* Every scene from the fight on the Rectifier until Clu confronts the trio at the portal is a CallBack to the games sequences. Sam taking Kevin's disc from its cradle mirrors the scene in the armory with the Sirens. After a fight with Rinzler, the group is tailed by Clu and his mooks in light vehicles. They manage to kill the mooks, but Clu gets the upper hand. Seconds away from shooting the heroes down, he's taken out by an unexpected attack from the side, but survives.
82* The ENCOM guard isn't incompetent at all. He notices, apparently, the instant something goes wrong twice. Then he chases and confronts the thief with nothing more than a flashlight and a stun gun. Then he chases him all the way to the roof. This is a big guy who's presumably had to climb a lot of stairs, and he's still only a few steps behind Sam after Sam passes the conference room. Then he follows him onto the crane while his colleagues are just standing on the ground with flashlights, and when Sam makes a point, he actually listens to him and tries to understand what's going wrong. Either he's really dedicated, or he has a heck of a job description.
83* If you look at the screen of Kevin's IRL workstation when Sam wipes the dust off it, you'll see that the computer had an uptime of only two days, implying that the system had been rebooted two days ago. Seeing at no one is there to reboot the system The Grid is on, this implies that the Grid crashes quite regularly. If it does crash regularly, that means Kevin must have installed some way to backup the Grid and restore it every time it crashes. This in turn means while Kevin Flynn died at the end of Legacy, a copy of him exists on a backup server.
84** Or, the Grid and that terminal interact but don't share an uptime display. It had an uptime of two days because two days ago of our time, Clu finally managed to activate it so that he could send that page to Alan.
85** [[https://youtu.be/1Ay_H0p2YDk?t=49s The second trailer]] seems to show a much larger number: the "screen saver" (for just a moment, before it cuts to the desktop) reads 20:11:20:16:22:16:(rapidly-changing number), which would come out to 20 years, 11 months, 20 days, 16 hours, 22 minutes, 16 seconds, and X milliseconds. That sounds about right.
86* Quorra and Sam are the opposite of Gem and Zuse, even down to their character designs. The best example is when Gem and Quorra are sitting on a couch, in the ENDL club and Flynn's place, respectively. Quorra is just lounging casually, and Gem is poised carefully. Also, Sam is loyal to his dad and Quorra, while Zuse isn't loyal to anything or anyone except his own skin.
87* In the DVD Commentary for ''Tron'', the filmmakers comment how they would have liked a scene where a Program got to see what the real world was like. In ''Legacy'', [[spoiler: Quorra does just that.]]
88* Caster/Zuse doesn't send anyone to see if the Flynns were killed by the elevator, only "presuming" that they were. This bugged me as cliche for a minute until I realized that he's not used to dealing with Users, and with programs, they [[NeverFoundTheBody never find the body]] of someone who dies in the grid since they disintegrate. So what would be the point?
89** Which is ''precisely'' why Clu pulls a YouHaveFailedMe on Zuse immediately afterwards.
90* For a Grid that Kevin Flynn was last able to modify in 1989, it certainly looks like something more recent than that. Consider the analogies between Clu and Hitler (under whose regime such things as the computer, the rotary engine, and, so it's been said, magnetic tape came to be), and it'll be quite obvious as to who made the Grid look like it does even with Flynn out of the way. Clu aims to take over our world, but he wants to make sure his own looks up-to-date and fresh as time goes by; he does want to create the perfect system, after all.
91* Quorra might be the last ISO, but is probably not the end of the incredible things Flynn's Grid can do. If it spontaneously produced the [=ISOs=] before Clu really got going, what will emerge now that Clu is no longer in charge?
92* Why does (nearly) everyone in the grid wear skintight body-suits? Because free-flowing cloth is ''hard'' to simulate, even on modern hardware.
93** Not only is free-flowing hard to simulate, it takes a ''lot'' of processing power, something that would be in very high demand in a digital world like the Grid. So it only makes sense that Flynn would make everything more simple and easy to render in order to save power.
94* Flynn himself is a wonderful {{Deconstruction}} of what happens when you give the LoveableRogue protagonist actual power and of [[DeconstructedCharacterArchetype the archetype itself]]. He's brilliant with the ideas and big plans (half of which are probably {{Indy Ploy}}s he came up with over breakfast), but takes his more responsible and grounded friends, family, and allies for granted. While his charisma ensures their loyalty, he treats them shabbily. The Betrayal comic shows that the Encom board was already losing patience with him, his family was worried, and his friends were questioning his mental health. Even with all the brilliance, they have to run behind him with a broom and dustpan - even twenty years later! And while Clu 2.0 was never a nice guy, he turned on Flynn because he felt that Flynn was neglecting his duties, abandoning the Programs to fawn over the Isos, and letting The Grid fall apart. And when he was needed most to step up and fight for the Programs after the coup? Nope, he takes the last Iso, and goes off in the Outlands to play Zen master while his creations are left to de-rez or worse. Frankly, [[ComesGreatResponsibility with great power comes great responsibility]], and fun-loving Flynn could handle neither.
95* Alan is, by all accounts, a very mild and humble guy - very harmless looking. But there is a moment in the flashback part of the film where he looks about ready to clobber a reporter trying to harass a young Sam. But then remember that the Programs reflect what's in their User's psyche for good or ill. We saw Flynn's dark side manifest with Clu. And then remember that ''Alan'' was the one who built Tron in the first place. [[spoiler: Which means, deep down, he's got one seriously ''scary'' Rinzler-flavored dark side if you ever pushed your luck far enough.]]
96* Another Alan-related bit of brilliance. In "The Next Day," he's gone over to Roy's place, and it's clear he understands that Kevin is well and truly dead now, and Sam is still...well, young and a Flynn. In other words, a very flashy ''figurehead.'' Alan's the one who is calling the shots over how thing are going to be run ("We have ''our'' company back," he tells Roy), going over a list of what's going to happen. When Roy expresses his concern about Dillinger Junior, Alan says ''"Junior earned his place, he stays."'' But notice that Alan is very indirect about almost everything he tells Sam and Roy in the film, and that Dillinger Junior is clearly up to no good, both in the boardroom scene and his communication with the resurrected Master Control. It's probably less "Junior's earned his place" and more [[KeepingTheEnemyClose "I'm making damn sure I don't let Junior out of my sight."]]
97* ''Franchise/{{Tron}}'' is very much a product of the [[http://disney.wikia.com/wiki/Disney_Dark_Age Disney Dark Age]] (1982), when the company was trying out DarkerAndEdgier material or more experimental films, struggling to compete with ''Franchise/StarWars'', Creator/StevenSpielberg, and Creator/DonBluth (who used to be Disney's best and brightest). Flynn vanishing in 1989 coincides with the release of ''WesternAnimation/TheLittleMermaid1989'', the film that ended the Disney Dark Age.
98* CLU didn't start his mutiny until after Flynn said "Yes" to his question of "Am I still to create the perfect system?" When you take into account that CLU is a program, when he asks the question, it's a command prompt question, like when a program asks if you want to install/uninstall/modify/save/etc when you do something. Think about it: the question was a yes/no question, the typical kind that would come up on any OS, even DOS. Despite revolting against Flynn, he is still following his programming.
99** This also borderlines on FridgeHorror when you think about it: Had Flynn said "No," there's a good chance that the events in the film and tie-in media (the comic and game included) could have been avoided. The way Flynn says "Yeah" sounds like he was unsure of his response. Him saying "yes" pretty much instigated the genocide of the ISO's, his being trapped in the Grid and Sam growing up without a father.
100
101[[WMG:FridgeHorror]]
102* [[TheydCutYouUp How are they going to get all the wonderful secrets that Flynn said the ISO programs represented out of Quorra in the real world?]]
103** Genetic analysis. Remember, Sam is rich and smart enough to do it himself. Let's see if ''Tron: Upgrade'' or whatever has Quorra with special powers. And it's not like he wouldn't fight tooth and nail to keep the woman he loves safe. Also, destroying rare creatures, in real life, tends to be a very bad idea, since they're rare creatures.
104*** If it absolutely cannot be done in the real world, then she'll take a sabbatical, go live life in the analogue world, then get herself and Sam digitized into a computer program of a laboratory, where she can be studied for a while.
105** If ENCOM is supposed to be the Tron world's answer to Microsoft, Sam isn't just rich, he's so mind-blowingly, incomprehensibly rich that he can set up an entire new science department and fund it himself ''just'' for the purpose of studying Quorra without harming her. His wealth, and status as head of the company, also puts him at the kind of social level where if he objects to the Government's proposed treatment of her (if they want to run things), they'll damn well back down and follow his suggestions for a better path. TheydCutYouUp is all about heroes being threatened by huge government forces that stop for no-one, but Flynn is lucky enough to be one of the few people who can actually interact with the Feds on something approaching equal terms.
106** Plus, you never know - part of the way they were supposed to change humanity might come from [[InterspeciesRomance her (ahem) relationship]] with Sam, in the form of [[HalfHumanHybrid a human-ISO hybrid.]]
107* And yet more FridgeHorror: Yori doesn't show up because she probably tried to take on Clu after he repurposed Tron, and got rectified herself or derezzed.
108** Nope. The Grid is on a different server entirely from the Encom one. Which means that she's been without Tron for over 1,000 years.
109*** But Tron's a digital program. It would have been a simple matter for Kevin Flynn to copy Tron so that one copy gets to stay on the original server with Yori.
110*** That's assuming Flynn had the foresight to do it, but he probably expected for the original Tron to come back home eventually.
111*** Good End. Of course, since Sam copies The Grid onto the chip at the end, what's that like, existentially? Is it actually frozen and moved, with no one really noticing, or does everyone just see pieces of the Grid vanishing in beams of light?
112*** More horrible than that. When you move files from one computer to another, you're not actually moving anything. What happens is that the computer creates a duplicate of the file and erases the original. So basically, insta-Apocalypse combined with insta-Big Bang.
113*** Nope. He copied the file, not moved it. So nothing changed at all except that now there was a new version that he could study in any computer.
114** Actually, it would make sense for Yori to be de-rezzed. Lora was one of the people controlling the laser, and Yori was a navigation program that got Flynn back to the portal out of Encom's system. This means Yori was likely one of the Programs controlling the laser, and therefore Flynn's ability to get in and out of the system. Also, like Tron, she knew too much about the Users (Flynn) and had a rebellious streak (as shown in her actions against the MCP in the first film). Clu would ''have'' to destroy her if he wanted to trap Flynn. Yori's compassion and rebellion would also make her very likely to side with the Isos against Clu...and Clu would be just the type of bastard to send "Rinzler" to kill her, because if Yori was de-rezzed, then Tron would be under his complete control.
115** Even worse? Factor in that Flynn and Lora (Yori's creator) are AmicableExes and BetterAsFriends, but Lora clearly initiated the breakup (because Flynn is still hung up on her in the first film) and went on to marry Alan. Flip it to the Programs. Tron and Yori are an established RoboRomance, just like the Bradleys. Now add some ugly residual jealousy on Clu's part and the situation is likely to go to an operatic level of hell very quickly.
116** Good news: WordOfGod says she's still alive, and judging from the publicity stuff they're doing for the sequel, Cindy Morgan's aboard.
117* Another Yori-related bit of brilliance. Her SequelNonEntity status is one of the reasons that things got so bad in the first place! Her function, hinted at in her EarlyBirdCameo, is helping to run the laser. So if she had been there, Flynn might not have had his foolish ass trapped in the system. And while Tron is an amazing warrior, he has a CripplingOverspecialization issue where he's not very good at much else. Yori's diplomatic talents could have gone a long way towards negotiating the Program-Iso conflict. They also could have been very helpful for [[WesternAnimation/TronUprising growing a revolt in Argon]] instead of merely teaching one Program how to fight. And you can bet her not being around wasn't helping Tron's shaky grasp on mental stability. [[spoiler: BrainwashedAndCrazy and ReforgedIntoAMinion also has a bad habit of failing when a loved one gets involved]]. But for one reason or another, she wasn't there, and ForWantOfANail...
118* And [[BlatantLies now for something completely different...]] Whenever a human went into the Grid, his or her matter was stored away in the machine. Since Kevin Flynn sacrificed himself in the end, the machine recycled his matter to make a physical version of Quorra. So, if [[OfficialCouple Sam and Quorra]] "did it," Sam's technically [[{{Squick}} doing the matter that used to be his father.]]
119** Nope. The digitiser doesn't somehow "store" the matter, it converts it into two things: energy and data. The energy is constantly being replaced, since the computer is on a mains line. And the data is her's (obviously) since his father's data (right up to the point of him removing his own disc) is stored on the "master-key identity disc program".
120** Even if it is a bit more line-of-sight, logic and common sense would lead to the conclusion that a portion of the matter most people are made of, at some point, was crapped out by an animal. The matter is organized in such a radically different fashion that it is no longer his father.
121*** Heck, (almost) all matter was crapped out by dying stars. There's lame puns abounding.
122** For that [[{{Pun}} matter]], does the digitizer distinguish between the molecules that make up you, and the molecules that make up your clothes? Does it even store multiple people as individual collections of molecules? Sam and Quorra may be made up of a perfect blend of Sam's molecules, Kevin's molecules, and the molecules of their clothes.
123** Matter does not work that way. Yes, Quorra is made of the same atoms as Kevin was. She is also made of the same atoms as Sam, and everything else made of protons, neutrons, and electrons. If there was an electron that wasn't the same one as all the other ones, it wouldn't obey the Pauli exclusion principle. If every electron was unique, matter as we know it could not exist.
124** Your dog takes a leak in your vegetable garden. Your significant other harvests the next crop of vegetables and eats them for dinner. You and your significant other - who now contains some nitrogen atoms absorbed into your garden plants from your dog's pee - have sex. Does that mean you just had sex with Fido?
125*** This statement is wrong on many levels. Basic biology will show how nutrients are absorbed by plants as molecules, not whole pieces of material. So, yes, Fido's pee is in there. As well as nitrogen from decaying matter. Due to the Law of Conservation of Matter, technically everything you have ever eaten has pee and corpses in it. Enjoy your lunch.
126* This crosses over into WMG/PoisonOakEpilepticTrees because I'd ''really'' like to think better of the fellow, but was Flynn Sr. ''trying'' to set his son and apprentice up for an InterspeciesRomance with the intent of [[SuperBreedingProgram mixing the species]], so to speak? And even if it was just a happy accident that Sam and Quorra took a shine to each other, then we still have the question of [[GooGooGodlike potential]] [[HalfHumanHybrid grandkids]]...
127** If you look at the little smirk on his face when he sees Sam and Quorra talking, I'd say that yes, he was.
128** And what of it? They seem good for one another, and he's hardly forcing them into an arranged marriage.
129** Why assume Iso reproduction is the same as human? There were no onscreen Iso children. This could lead to an incredibly awkward moment when Quorra decides to be intimate with Sam, and reveals her sexy USB port.
130*** Even if it wasn't before, we assume she's more or less human now that she's in the real world.
131* The explosion at the end seemed to destroy the Rectifier... and all the thousands of [[BrainwashedAndCrazy rectified]] programs onboard.
132** Admittedly, there wasn't much else that Flynn could have done about that. Rectified programs are implied to be beyond saving (or at least, beyond saving quickly) and rezzing them may be a MercyKill. Tron seems to be the only exception.
133* Speaking of "rectifying," Clu cannot create his own programs. He can only destroy and re-purpose them from programs that already exist. Now, children, [[PainfulTransformation how do you think that feels]]?
134* You should really think twice [[ParanoiaFuel before you click that Delete button.]]
135** The franchise has gone here, but not in this timeline. The ''Ghost in the Machine'' comic based on ''VideoGame/TronTwoPointOh'' opens with the game's protagonist having a massive HeroicBSOD once he realized what being a User ''means'' in that universe, and explicitly mentions deleting software and reformatting hard drives as akin to the actions of a cruel or incompetent god.
136* Though a lot of flak has been given for Clu's not-so-well-thought-out plan, consider he is the spitting image of the long-disappeared Kevin Flynn, aka the guy who could take back Encom in the time it takes to BS his non-aging. With Clu in charge of Encom, and the possibilities opened up by the internet, suddenly that plan becomes a lot more threatening.
137** He wouldn't even need to take over Encom, he could just have some rectified programs insert themselves into the internet as soon as he figured out what it was, with the takeover complete before anyone knew what was happening. It would be like the opening to ''Series/BattlestarGalactica2003'', where the Cylons hack the Colonial network, cripple all their networked ships, and nuke everything before the Colonies know what's going on. Plus, Clu seems to have had every intention of bringing the Rectifier into the real world.
138* The digitiser copies people by scanning them at high speed with a laser. The shots of the laser show that the lens is very dusty with disuse... how long will it take before Sam starts suffering from multiple cancers from all of the little translation errors when being digitised and restored?
139** Luckily the Grid can cure cancer by simply correcting the programming, though.
140*** FridgeBrilliance: that's what the correction algorithms mentioned in Tron 2.0 were for, and why the digitization process never worked right for fCon employees!
141* ISO and Programs don't age, but now Quorra is living in the Real World with Sam. Will she stay static in her age [[WhoWantsToLiveForever while Sam and any new friends she makes slowly grow older and die around her?]] Or will she now be subjected to the process of aging, [[PainfulTransformation and how will she react?]] Bearing in mind that up until now, she's never had to deal with any types of major long lasting changes to her body.
142** Her youth can be restored by simply digitizing her and altering the code that dictates her physical appearance. As can anybody's youth. [[FridgeBrilliance That's one aspect of the revolution Kevin Flynn was talking about]].
143* When a disc hits a program clean, he derezzes by basically exploding into a mass of voxels. During his fight with Rinzler, Sam gets cut by one of his discs and bleeds like a normal human, not getting program-like voxel damage, so it means humans get hurt in the Grid the same way they do in real life. [[LudicrousGibs Now imagine a human getting hit square in the chest by a disc... Eek.]]
144** Of course, it's possible, even likely, that despite looking human on the outside, programs have a completely different internal makeup. The hit that derezzes a program would probably leave a human with three inches of laser disc embedded into his sternum. Not pleasant, but not quite a LudicrousGibs stuation, either.
145* One that straddles the line between horror and brilliance. Due to several {{Mythology Gag}}s from Horowitz and Kitsis, ''Series/OnceUponATime'' has been established as being in the ''same'' universe. What is the first rule? ''"Magic always comes with a price."'' User abilities pretty much ''are'' magic, and given Flynn's careless use of then in the first film and Betrayal era, he must have figured out the "price" part well after it was too late.
146* One which seems as yet unmentioned. CLU cannot create programs, thus he needs to rectify them. It has been an extremely long time inside the machine. Assuming a derezzed program is permanently lost - how many programs can still exist if a large number of them have been rectified or derezzed? Eventually, they would run out of programs to rectify/game, possibly leading to the system itself crashing. How long have the games been going on?
147* So, Sam Flynn. From the age of birth to six, he learned his dad's fantastic tales of digital wonderlands and BenevolentAI. Then, his dad vanished. He still believed in his father's message and became a PlayfulHacker, but unwilling to take a larger role in Encom. Then, down the digital rabbit hole and his childhood stories are nothing but a nightmare. His father betrayed by Clu, thousands of Programs cheering for his messy death in the arena, Zues and Gem turning out to be scheming bastards, Quorra's tale of narrow escape from genocide, Clu's regime threatening to take over Earth, and his father being killed right in front of him by Clu. Remember, the elder Flynn had to deal with Master Control, but saw more benevolent and benign Programs like Ram, Tron, Yori, and Dumont. Sam saw a never-ending parade of hostile AI; even Tron was warped into an attack dog that nearly slit his throat in front of cheering crowds. Now, he's trudged off into taking the throne at Encom - ''a software company.'' [[HeWhoFightsMonsters He has a position and]] [[GodandSatanAreBothJerks very good reason to become]] [[GodIsEvil a tyrant to the Programs.]]
148* Worse, if you got the PatchworkFic route? Sam and Jet Bradley would have been something like cousins or brothers, but their respective trips down the cyberspace rabbit hole were ''very'' different, with Sam seeing nothing but hostile AI and Jet seeing mostly sympathetic Programs and HumansAreTheRealMonsters. Jet also may have ''killed'' humans (the Wraiths' survival is questionable, he contributed to Thorne's death, and the F-con trio isn't coming back anytime soon) to protect those Programs. If Sam sees Jet as a traitor to humanity for protecting Programs, and Jet sees Sam as going down the path of people like Crown or Thorne, that could be a tragic and ugly confrontation akin to Marvel's Civil War or the whole Xavier and Magneto frenemy dynamic.
149* Remember what kicked off the plot of [[{{Film/Tron}} the first movie]]? Dillinger steals Flynn's life's work, takes credit for it, and Flynn is trying desperately to get it back. Lora convinces Alan to warn Flynn that his hacking attempts are being noticed. Queue a six-felony night to break into corporate HQ and expose Dillinger's fraud, which escalates to trying to stop Master Control from controlling both sides of the Cold War. Now, ''Lora'' was the co-inventor of the Shiva Laser and expressly calls it her "life's work." But come the events of the ''Betrayal'' comic, she's PutOnABus, apparently knowing ''nothing'' about what her "life's work" can ''really'' do. Meanwhile, her ex appropriates one for his own use and is taking joyrides with it in the arcade basement where he gets all the credit and glory for his "digital frontier," and Lora's LockedOutOfTheLoop. {{Hypocrite}}, much?
150* Another "cross the timelines and cringe": In ''[[VideoGame/TronTwoPointOh Tron 2.0]]'''s continuity, Tron is viewed as Encom's greatest hero, the focus of a KingInTheMountain style myth stating he will return to defend the system (and, by extension, all of {{Cyberspace}}) in its DarkestHour. It's not a stretch to think that it's probably true in this continuity as well. However, think of what would happen in a ''Legacy''-compliant timeline; at best, Clu could manipulate that legend to his own ends by demonstrating the legendary hero's on ''his'' side. Even if he told the full truth (and this is Clu we're talking about - the guy might give [[Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse Loki]] a run for his money), the truth would be enough to ''severely'' demoralize any opposing systems, especially if Clu invokes DarkestHour, and ''then'' reveals the KingInTheMountain as a rectified drone.
151* Quorra's defiant statement to Clu that she "knows" what Users are capable of is pure PatrickStewartSpeech, but it's coming out of the mouth of someone who has only read about humans in a carefully-curated selection of literature, and has plenty of reasons to overlook [[HumansAreFlawed Flynn the Elder's]] ''[[GodIsFlawed many]]'' [[WhatTheHellHero questionable decisions]]. There doesn't seem to be much in the way of history books in Flynn's stash. Sooner or later, she's going to read about [[PostHistoricalTrauma all the ways]] humans can and have done much worse things than Clu ever dreamed about, including the fact that ''modern computers themselves'' were designed primarily as a way for humans to hurl missiles at one another for maximum death for minimal effort, and modern-day cyberwarfare and cybercrime. How much is she going to want to help humans after all that?
152* A related bit of Fridge Horror to above. Okay, Clu succeeds in invading. But he has next to no idea about how nasty humans are capable of being. [[PuttingOnTheReich We've seen dozens like him in the past]] and we'll no doubt see dozens like him in the future. [[RobotWar So he comes out of cyberspace with an army]], proving AIIsACrapshoot. Even if we have to go back to slide rules and pre-World War 2 tech to nail his butt we will do so with extreme prejudice. Maybe a lot of humans die in the process, but we're still likely to win...even if there's two of us and none of them, we'll still call it a win. [[WhatMeasureIsANonhuman And after that,]] [[JustAMachine humans will systematically destroy our computers]] [[GuiltFreeExterminationWar and every Program on them down to Ada Lovelace's punch cards without losing a wink of sleep]].
153* Per the ARG, one of the reasons Flynn was so enamored with the Isos, and all but cast the Programs aside as a dead end was that he believed Isos and humans had true free will, where the Programs still had directives that they had to follow (see Ram's inappropriate insurance sales pitch in the Gaming cells and Tron's inability to act against Users). The horror? How much actual choice do Sam and Quorra get in their destiny? Sam resisted as much as he could, but he was always "fated" to take the proverbial throne at Encom as a proxy for his "earlier version," and Quorra was supposed to "change the world" (a world that isn't her own, and a species she doesn't belong to). Their fates and their functions were just as pre-programmed as any "Basic's," with just as much say in the matter.
154* In a bonus feature on the Tron: Legacy Blu-ray, a text conversation occurs between Edward Dillinger Jr. and an unnamed individual, implied to be either Edward Dillinger Sr. (as he calls it "Dad") or the Master Control Program (as it ends the conversation with "End of Line"). The conversation suggests the two have some mysterious plan. As Edward Dillinger Jr. is credited with the development of the new Encom OS which is leaked in the beginning of the film, this raises a question: what else might have been programmed into that OS?
155* A sharp-eyed fan on Website/{{Tumblr}} pointed out that the [[http://tron.wikia.com/wiki/Nervous_Program traumatized Program]] on the Recognizer babbling ''Not the Games. Not the Games!"'' looks a lot like [[http://tron.wikia.com/wiki/Zed Zed]] from WesternAnimation/TronUprising. We had confirmation that some of the ''Uprising'' characters survived the BolivianArmyEnding when Bartik got killed at the End of Line. But given the dim survival odds of everyone and Zed's [[ButtMonkey chronic lack of luck]], that very likely ''was'' Zed jumping to his messy de-rez instead of being sent to the Games.

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