Why 'Tron: Legacy' is superior to 'Avatar'

The fact that I can't stand Avatar is no secret. If I've had the chance to rant to you about everything that is wrong with movies and the Oscars, you've heard my argument against Avatar. It was Pocahontas with Smurfs in space. Boom. The entire movie boils down to that. It wasn't original. It wasn't creative. You know what it was though? Horribly preachy and patronizing. It managed to preach the green movement in its most hippiest of forms, try to place guilt on anyone who endorses technology, and make the argument that a group of native people still need a white guy to show up and save them. Somewhere in the voting process for the 2010 Oscars, the voters clearly confused "quality" with "amount of money made." Yeah, Avatar made a crapload of money. That doesn't mean it was worthy of a Best Picture nomination though.

My copy of Tron: Legacy arrived on Wednesday, and I had the chance to rewatch the film on Thursday night. After wrapping up that viewing, I can confidently write on this blog that Tron: Legacy is a superior film to Avatar. I'm still shocked that Tron: Legacy didn't get Oscar nominations for visual effects (while Hereafter and Iron Man 2 did) or original score (while How to Train Your Dragon and King's Speech did).

Conveniently, this argument breaks down into five simple points:

1. The story
This one is very, very basic, and I already touched on it above. Once again, Avatar is Pocahontas with Smurfs in space. If you were to give someone the basic elements of the film along with the instructions to make the most predictable movie possible, that person would make Avatar. There is nothing original to it. There are no shades of gray. Good guys are good guys. Bad guys are bad guys. Here's the reluctant hero. Here's the greedy businessman. Here's the savage military man. James Cameron clearly spent his time on the special effects.

Tron: Legacy isn't something brand new. It's not Inception. But it made a very strong attempt at telling a new story. In fact, it went beyond telling a new story. Tron: Legacy had the complicated task of introducing a generation to an old story while moving that story forward. Sequels aren't always that. Anyone who has seen the trailer for The Hangover: Part II knows that sometimes sequels are just the original film again but in a new setting. Tron: Legacy was an evolution.

2. The special effects
Regardless of my issues with Avatar, I will give it this: The special effects in the film, especially the 3D, raised the bar for what we should expect in movies. Companies are often eager to rush movies into 3D or convert them post-production just to make a few extra dollars. Avatar's use of 3D was immersive and added to the experience. The Clash of the Titans? Yeah, that just muddied up the film, washed out the colors, and sucked an extra three bucks out of your pocket.

The problem in Avatar's special effects is that they were the entire show. Accepting the fact that the movie's plot and characters were on worse than something you'd see in a Joel Schumaker Batman film, the quality of the 3D was all that Avatar had left. Once you take that film out of theaters, that chip is gone. I can't' even tell you how many times I've told people that if they didn't see Avatar in theaters they shouldn't even bother now. There's no point.

Tron: Legacy didn't rely on 3D. It used it as a tool to tell it's story. You entered The Grid, things shifted to 3D. It wasn't blatantly in your face. Creepy CGI Tom Hankses weren't there throwing magical bells into the audience. It was clean and smart. When I watched it on Blu-ray, I didn't miss the 3D. The film wasn't built around it, so its absence didn't hurt my enjoyment of the movie upon home viewing.

And when it comes down to it, Tron: Legacy was full of drop-dead awesome visual effects. I've read some reviews knocking the fact that they stuck to the black/blue/orange color scheme, but I loved it.

3. Overall douchiness
Yup, I'm using douchiness as a word. Spellcheck doesn't want me to, but I'm going to go ahead and use it because it's exactly the word I need here. Everything about Avatar was douchey. The message, the 3D and James Cameron. Avatar wasn't about the movie – it was about how great James Cameron is and about how much money his movies make. Just thinking about Avatar makes me want to punch the entire movie in its Smurfy face. Come Oscar time, the entire thing was about Cameron and Avatar. What could stand in his path to Oscar glory? He made a $2 billion movie. The Hurt Locker was a competitor for Best Picture? Kathryn Bigelow was a competitor for Best Director? The Academy does know that she's a girl, right? I can't tell you how happy I was when The Hurt Locker and Bigelow wiped the Oscar floor with Avatar and Cameron.

Now try this: Quick, who directed Tron: Legacy? Joseph Kosinski. You never saw him out preening for the press, talking about how great he is, about he directed Titanic and Avatar.

4. Daft Punk
I have no idea who did the score for Avatar. Nor do I care. It wasn't special, original or memorable. Tron: Legacy though? Daft Punk. How this score didn't get an Oscar nomination baffles me. I have two movie soundtracks from 2010 films on my iPhone/iPad/iTunes. Trent Reznor's brilliant The Social Network score is one of them. And Daft Punk's Tron: Legacy score is the other. Depending on the mood I'm in, I go back and forth between which one was the year's best. Reznor's was haunting while Daft Punk's is bombastic. I saw King's Speech, a film that had its score nominated for an Oscar, and I couldn't tell you one thing about its score. There's a very good chance that if you asked me if it even had a score, I would tell you that I don't remember it having one.

5. Jeff Bridges
This is the ultimate trump card. Some movies have one Jeff Bridges. True Grit did a great job working with one Jeff Bridges. Tron: Legacy had two, even three Jeff Bridgeses, depending on how you count them (early Kevin Flynn, current Kevin Flynn, Clu). To me, one Sam Worthington is equal to one Sam Hedlund. An Olivia Wilde obviously beats a Michelle Rodriguez. Avatar was without a Jeff Bridges counterpart. Thanks to The Dude's awesomeness, Tron: Legacy easily wins this one.

Tron: Legacy wins. Based on the Tron: The Next Day featurette on the Tron: Legacy disc, Disney is gearing up to continue the Tron series with another sequel. Without a release date for this sequel, we won't know if it has to go up against the Avatar sequel in 2014 (providing James Cameron can actually hit a deadline with this one). Sadly, I'm sure people will be tricked by the pretty colors of Avatar into thinking it's a great film once again.

EDIT: The Tron: The Next Day featurette, in case you haven't seen it yet.



EDIT 2: Whoa. Just found this. Apparently it's on the US Blu-ray as an Easter egg.



"EDJ" is Dillinger Jr., Cillian Murphy's character in Tron: Legacy. Looks like they're setting up a new villain for the sequel. Considering that Murphy's casting for such a small role in Tron: Legacy seemed odd, this makes sense now.