Greetings Programs! If you’re here, you’re either a deep cut fan celebrating how Tron: Ares tickets are now on sale, or you’re a newcomer who wants to know more about this intriguing Disney franchise. In either case, this is the perfect place to run through the key happenings that have taken place prior to Jared Leto’s emergence as Ares. Prepare to enter the world of Tron folks, as I’m about to give you a rough guide to the story so far, in order to traverse the three Grids more confidently in just one of the most exciting movies of fall 2025. Here goes everything!
How Tron’s Story Started
If you wanted to boil down the story of the Tron movies to two words, they would be “Users” and “Programs.” The former describes the humans that created the digital world of The Grid through computing, while the latter are the digital processes that keep those systems running. Normally a Program will look like the User that created it, which is something that is a double edged sword in the realm that co-writer/director Steven Lisberger created with the 1982 original.
As Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) was zapped onto that first Grid by the Master Control Program, what started as trying to prove that his boss Edward Dillinger Sr. (David Warner) stole his work turned into a battle for his life. Roaming that digital landscape he meets and befriends Tron (Bruce Boxleitner), a security program that “fights for The User.”
Together, Flynn and the digital avatar of his best friend Alan Bradley fight to defeat the MCP. In doing so, the two incriminate Tron’s first big bad, and install Kevin as the new CEO of the ENCOM Corporation. Movie wise, that’s a pretty happy ending; if you left the story at that point.
Tron’s Legacy, Continued
After Kevin Flynn took over ENCOM, he became obsessed with “the digital frontier.” What he saw as the solution to all of the problems in the world of the Users, we would learn through Tron: Legacy that he’d continued visiting The Grid to explore that potential. The good news is that he found a new lifeform in ISOs — digital beings that sprung forth without human programming or intervention.
The bad news is that his own digital avatar CLU (Codified Likeness Utility) saw them as imperfections. Tasked with creating the perfect system, Legacy saw this Program trap his creator and corrupt Tron in the process. Save for a lone ISO named Quorra (Olivia Wilde), the rest were wiped out; and Kevin Flynn was seen as abandoning the outside world. (We would have learned more about this in-between period, were the Disney XD series Tron: Uprising to have survived past its single season run.)
Decades later, Kevin’s son Sam Flynn (Garrett Hedlund) would be summoned onto The Grid by chance. Reuniting with his father, he learned that CLU had designs on escaping into the real world — and Kevin’s ID disc was the key. Tron: Legacy also saw Tron’s new corrupted form originally fighting the Flynns, under the identity of Rinzler, a Program under CLU’s control. After a gambit that spared Sam and Quorra’s lives, Kevin Flynn and his digital creation were neutralized, leaving the Son of Flynn to take ENCOM back for good.
The ENCOM Corporation
As you can see, there’s a pretty huge family feud being fought throughout the Tron series; and the common battleground is the ENCOM Corporation. Via a franchise timeline over at CinemaBlend, you’ll note that Edward Dillinger Sr. only ever became CEO after buying out original founder Dr. Walter Gibbs (Barnard Hughes). While he and his daughter Dr. Lora Baines (Cindy Morgan) would continue to work for the company, the battlelines were drawn.
Between the events of Tron and Tron: Legacy, Kevin Flynn’s disappearance saw Alan Bradley take over as interim CEO. Sadly, as the rival Dillinger Systems would rise in prominence, ENCOM would lose favor. Alan lost his position, while still serving the company. But by the end of Legacy, Sam would take his rightful place in a feat of optimism.
ENCOM would change hands at least once more before the world we’ve seen in the latest Tron: Ares’ trailer, as what we know about Joachim Ronning’s new entry labels new character Eve Kim (Greta Lee) as the firm’s current CEO. Though she’s not tied to either bloodline playing in this power struggle, she’s about to find herself in the crosshairs.
The Dillinger Family
After Edward Dillinger Sr.’s ousting from ENCOM, he started Dillinger Systems — a rival computing company that would put Tron’s central company through its paces. That didn’t seem to stop that corporation from employing the son of its supposed enemy, as Tron: Legacy briefly showed Edward Dillinger Jr. (Cillian Murphy) as a loyal employee/presumed board member. Secretly (as seen in the Tron: Legacy special feature shorts), Jr. and Sr. were scheming to fight the Flynns after Sam’s return to the fold.
While we don’t know what those plans were (as they were more than likely ditched with the original three-quel project, known as Tron: Ascension), we do know that Dillinger Systems is still going strong in Tron: Ares’ plotline. Run by Julian Dillinger (Evan Peters), he and his mother Elizabeth (Gillian Anderson) are the latest in this line of tech pioneers.
Their relationship to Edward Dillinger Sr. is unknown, however Julian seems to have inherited his predecessor’s thirst for power. Which sees Tron: Ares’ plot pushing him to discover what could be the key to digital dominance: the Permanence Code.
The Flynn Family
Kevin Flynn saw himself fired from ENCOM after questioning Edward Dillinger Sr. about whether or not several games, including the blockbuster hit Space Paranoids, were published without proper credit. That would be the seed of a grudge that played out across the decades, especially when Tron saw Edward Sr. revealed as a double dealer after all.
Unfortunately, Kevin’s life would go from triumph to tragedy, as he’d lose his wife Jordan shortly after she gave birth to Sam. That fed his obsession with ISOs and The Grid, in an attempt to help the world with his discoveries. After being stranded at the top of Tron: Legacy, Sam thought his father had abandoned him. Reforming from a rebellious punk who pulled an annual prank on ENCOM, the company’s largest shareholder found responsibility during the events of Legacy.
He may have even found love through Quorra, though we don’t know about her post-sequel whereabouts. As for Edward Jr.’s grudge with the son of Flynn, that prospect is just as mysterious.
Why Tron: Ares Is Important To The Future Of The Saga
The mere existence of Tron: Ares is pretty important to fans, as there are a lot of gaps to cover. What ever became of Edward Dillinger Jr. and his plans against Sam Flynn? Did Tron survive the reformatting that took out The Grid in Tron: Legacy? Are we going to get any indication of what happened to Quorra, or the programs from the short lived (and criminally underrated) animated series Tron: Uprising?
Whatever happens in Ares could provide answers to these questions, while also opening the door for further exploration. Which, of course, depends on how fans receive the film when it hits theaters. So if you’re as pumped as I am to see what comes next in the Tron saga, don’t forget to grab your tickets for Tron: Ares’ October 10th opening at your earliest convenience!
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