Only 106 more shopping days until Tron: Legacy

In the 1970s, we got Rollerball. In the 1980s, we got The Running Man. In the 1990s, we got Space Jam. Last decade, the subsubgenre was won by Shaolin Soccer – oh yes, we’ll be calling that sci-fi. To get the science-fiction sports film started right in the 2010s, December sees the apparently simultaneous worldwide (yes!) release of Tron: Legacy.

Though BuckBokai is sure you’ve seen this promo poster (from Hungary, location of the BuckBokai.com home office), featuring the gorgeous Beau Garrett as Frisbee- weapon-supplying program Jem, by way of io9 or Slashfilm, it’s definitely worth another repost.

BuckBokai does fear that Tron 2.0 will be bogged down in a lot of self-referencialism and continuity that only nuts of the first flick will get. Geekspeak, too, is sure to be rife in this thing, so it may be best to hope for mere coherence and nice f/x, although we’re essentially guaranteed the latter.

Quality of the new Disney offering aside, Tron: Legacy already seems like an entrant for the above list of Top Science-Fiction Sports flicks due to the sheer thematic and stylistic zeitgeist. Rollerball screamed 70s disco and skating rinkiness, while Jesse Ventura’s presence was a giveaway that Stephen King’s short story had been turned into a paean to professional wrestling.

And the pervasity of superbrand Nike hinted at in Running Man had become so massive by the mid-90s that without so much as a mention nor a swoosh to the shoes, Space Jam could push the product – along with Michael Jordan himself, the hugest entertainment-related superbrand of that decade. Finally, the cinematic decade of The Matrix culminated in the soccer flick from Thailand whose worldwide success showed the new internationalism.

Reckon that in Tron 2.0, not only will we get the decade’s first sports science-fiction film, we might just get the first watchable film about the interwebs alongside some dope sports action. Can’t help but to worry about the plot, though…

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