I still haven't seen
Tron Legacy but
I understand that I didn't particularly miss much. To be honest, I never became accustomed to the original Tron until well into the 90's, which is probably why the franchise has always felt dated to me rather than nostalgic, and attempts to jazz the franchise up with glossy CGI and special effects just seemed desperate. But the double feature Blu-ray landed at my door today and maybe I will give it a shot before I hand it over to Simon for review. Maybe. Despite not pleasing all Tron fans and even less critics,
Deadline are reporting that commercials helmer
Joseph Kosinski will get his chance to direct
Tron 3, and that Disney already have him at work with original screenwriters
Edward Kitsis and
Adam Horowitz to work on the concept. A potential sequel was previously
reported in January. The reason for the Disney's trust in Kosinski for a second roll of the dice? Well, Deadline have worked out that Kosinski has broken records to become the 'highest-grossing first-time director of a live-action film in Hollywood history' after the $399 million global worldwide taking overtook
J.J. Abrams' $397.5 million for 2006's
Mission: Impossible 3. Of course this is 'profit' and not 'gross' as many more first time directors have delivered bigger profits to their financiers than Tron Legacy and the near $300 million (when marketing is considered) it cost to get it into theatres which meant that the box office didn't necessarily overwhelm or guarantee a sequel, least not directed by it's helmer. But when all was said and done, despite costing more to make, it out-grossed
Batman Begins ($373 million),
Star Trek ($386 million) and
X-Men Origins: Wolverine ($373 million) so if they can trim that budget for the sequel, the thinking is it could become a profitable cash for the Mouse. Add to that, Tron is a cross-platform property and when a movie can sell well over half a million soundtracks worldwide (thanks to Daft Punk of course) and the new ElecTRONica, a featured attraction at Disneys California Adventure theme park that opens next year and probable high DVD sales, perhaps sequel was more of a guarantee than we thought. So when will Tron 3 become a reality? Well, Fleming suggests that Kosinski is still hopeful of helming an adaptation of his own comic book
Oblivion next despite
Disney's dropping the project with three backers now showing 'serious interest', including Universal, but even with
Tom Cruise interested to star - we've already seen with At The Mountains of Madness (which also had Cruise committed) that star power doesn't always guarantee greenlights for expensive, obscure tentpoles. And if this weekend's Your Highness, another risky project, becomes another 'Scott Pilgrim' for Universal, we can't imagine they would the money for it. We are also reminded that Kosinski also has a remake of
The Black Hole at Disney, scripted by
Travis Beacham (writer of Del Toro's new project Pacific Rim) which he also hopes to make. Also...
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Below image, there be spoilers... article over for those who haven't seen Tron Legacy.
OWF's Owain Paciuszko wrote that the movie could go in this direction...
Tron geeks may have noticed an uncredited
Cillian Murphy popping up in early real-world scenes as a character named Edward Dillinger, who it is to be assumed is the son of
David Warners Dillinger the villain from the original film (who also cropped up on the Grid as Sark and Master Control Program), so it seems fair to assume that Murphy has signed some sort of agreement that might see him taking up baddie duties in any potential Tron sequels.