So I finally watched Tron...

Pinwizkid

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Granted, this film was before my time, but being an arcade guy, I'm surprised it took me this long to finally watch it.

What a weird wonderful film. It is a little bit hard to follow exactly what's going on at times, since it seems like they get caught up in the special effects a lot, but still a cool movie. I love how the arcade industry is sort of a major piece of the plot. I wish I could go to Flynn's arcade.

I wanted to catch up before seeing the sequel, which I don't expect to be anything special, but does seem like it is worth it, especially since they rebuilt the arcade for some scenes.

Question to all those who saw this in the theaters... how did people react to these computer graphics back then? Were they absolutely spectacular? Or did people shrug them off as a gimmick? I'm curious.

Brendan
 
Dude, given any single James Bond flick, any single one of them is hard to follow. Maybe just me, but I have to watch them a few times to 'get' the conclusions they deduce on Bond films in one quick quip.
But at any rate, I do distinctly recall a group of 4 of us, for fun sake, going to a Mall, long since shuttered, to watch Tron for like the 20th time (back in the day when it was affordable to watch a movie for 20 times, with popcorn and soda) being the only one's in the theatre enjoying it.
It developed such a tremendous cult following since then however.
 
Tron was amazing back in the theatres for 'computer kids' like me. Arcades were just beginning the true boom and home computers were still somewhat alien to most families so the average viewer just didn't get most of the computer jargon. Think about just how many people understood just what 'bit' was in 1981 vs today where a bit is a pretty commonplace piece of knowledge. It was really ahead of it's time, but it had a limited audience. For me, fantastic memories and really good representation of the day and time in gaming/computers.
 
Everyone I know says it sucked. I finally saw it for the first time a few months ago. I liked it and watched it again a few weeks later. I think you really have to be into old school gaming to appreciate it. I have a friend who will brag about how much he likes it, then go on to say how awful the storyline is.
 
Question to all those who saw this in the theaters... how did people react to these computer graphics back then? Were they absolutely spectacular? Or did people shrug them off as a gimmick? I'm curious.


I saw it when it came out in the theaters in 1982.

YES, it was AMAZING back then.
Remember back in 1982 we still had Atari 2600 and the ColecoVision.
I think I got my first C-64 in 1983.

Steverd
 
I saw TRON in the theater in 1982. I was 14 and already a computer geek. I hope my son enjoys Legacy as much as I do TRON. My son is 8.
 
Everyone I know says it sucked. I finally saw it for the first time a few months ago. I liked it and watched it again a few weeks later. I think you really have to be into old school gaming to appreciate it. I have a friend who will brag about how much he likes it, then go on to say how awful the storyline is.

I hear that a lot too, but it's usually from people that were not born yet at the time. Tron's magic is very closely tied to the times that will just never happen again. Just like a classic arcade, that's a feeling that will never be duplicated and unless you were there you will never really be able to truly appreciate what it was. The early days of computers and gaming were really something special to be a kid growing up in. Things that we consider rudimentary and commonplace today were groundbreaking and amazing then.
 
I remember the day back in '82 and I was 14. My dad and two brothers all went to the movies. Choices that day were either Tron or Star Trek II. We split and two of us went to each film. After the shows we bragged at how great each movie was. I managed to convince my dad to buy 4 more tickes so we could all see Tron. What a cool time to be alive.
 
Yes it was a special time back then. Very cool movie to see for a video game geek, like me. I was playing the crap out of the game back then too. So the movie was really special to me. Arcades were so very popular and busy back the also!

Loved my 2600 back then too. Pitfall for the win! ;)
 
I also watched Tron for the first time ever the other night.. At times, it is a little hard to comprehend what the world was like back when this movie came out (I was 10 in '02, not '82). Overall, I just tried to imagine that arcade games where king, and that computers where new... and I loved the movie. :)
 
Well, back then, we were facing Armageddon with the Soviet Union. Some serious times. But then we had Ronald Reagan which all of us true blooded Americans loved. We were full of patriotism and spirit. We had Madonna, we had Billy Joel, we had Journey, you name it, the best of the best. We had Rushin' Attack - yes we all hated russians except for Sting.
We had MTV. We had friends that wanted to go to the mall and screw around at the arcade, then the hobby center, Monkey Wards, Walden Books.
All nighter ventures into Apple games, Warlords 4 player and Star Raiders on the Atari 800.
Parents that kept track of us and parents that recognized and gathered with our friends' parents.
Honestly it was a time, more than any - that we all worked together and clicked together and had an absolute blast going to see Tron and Star Trek II: The Wrath of KHhhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaannnnnnn!@!!!
We didn't have any racial problems. Noone felt they were better than any other.
Only malcontents will tell you otherwise. We had a great time in the age of tokens. :)
 
I remember the media making a big deal out of the computer generated images of Tron when it came out. 60 minutes did a special on it- it was in lots of tech magazines- everyone talking about how revolutionary it was. It was force fed to us so we could recite "the advancements in special effects through computer animation" but we REALLY didnt comprehend what the big piture was or what was on the horizon- or how archaic trons computer imagery really was!
 
...also: good movie or not- every kid in the neighborhhod was running around with a frisbee tucked in the back of his shirt! just waiting to bust it out and launch it into an unsuspecting foe's face! aaaaah..... ...memories...
 
i was 11 at the time, my dad took me and my 2 brothers to see it. same theatre i saw rambo and conan the barbarian in, it was next door to the local arcade i can still remember the smell of the place and the way our feet stuck to the floor of the theatre lol, back then usher's still walked the isle's with flash lights and made you take your feet off the chairs in front of you. anyway at the time i thought it was totally awesome even if i couldnt keep up at times i had never seen anything like it. now me and my 14 year old son still pop it in about once once a week just for back ground noise ive seen it ALOT and really enjoy it.
 
I don't necessarily think that "you had to be there" applies to this movie, as much as some other stuff.

I was born in '86, and I didn't see Tron until about four years ago. I've always been heavily in to computers, however, and I'm easily fascinated by all things tech.

What impresses me about it, it was ahead of it's time. Even by today's standards I think it stands out. It isn't full of the retarded "hacking wiz kid" stuff that most movies have now days. "We have to bypass the mainframe and insert the bits directly in to the server"

Not saying it was 100% accurate (it's sci fi, for pete's sake) but it's good
 
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