Was news of that “Tron 3” teaser deliberately leaked to the Web by Disney insiders?

Jim Hill

14 years ago

Have you heard about this “Tron 3” teaser that Aint It Cool
News & Tron-Sector have been talking up this past weekend?

As the story goes: This “Tron 3” teaser was supposedly shot
back in November before “Tron: Legacy” was released to theaters, with the idea
that it would then be included as a surprise Special Feature on the DVD &
Blu-ray release of “Tron: Legacy.” Studio execs were supposedly hoping that
this teaser would not only help build excitement for the upcoming sequel to
this Joseph Kosinski film but that it would also help spur sales of the “Tron:
Legacy” DVD & Blu-ray.

Now all signs point to this “Tron 3” teaser being legit. Harry
Knowles actually has photos up on his site right now that were supposedly taken
on the set of this shoot. What’s more, he’s claiming to have copies of the call
sheets & location maps for this “Tron 3” teaser. Though — that said — there seems to be some disagreement out there as to whether what was shot back in November was for stuff that was shot for an actual “Tron 3” teaser or (more likely) exclusive new content for the “Tron: Legacy” Blu-ray & DVD>

So given that there’s suddenly all this talk bubbling up about “Tron 3,” does that then mean that the sequel to this Kosinski film has officially
been greenlit? Not exactly. Not yet anyway.

Long story short: Back in April of last year, Disney executives
signed Eddy Kitsis & Adam Horowitz (i.e. the screenwriters of “Tron:
Legacy”) to start work on the script for a sequel. But just because there’s now a “Tron
3″ screenplay floating around the lot in Burbank doesn’t mean that
production of this proposed sequel will ever actually go forward. Just ask the guys who wrote “Good Morning Chicago” (Touchstone’s proposed sequel to “Good Morning Vietnam”), “”Pretty Woman II” (Which covers what happens when the Richard Gere character decides to run for the Senate as well as marry Julie Roberts hooker character) as well as “Roger Rabbit 2: Toon Platoon.”

“so what’s preventing production
of ‘Tron 3’ from going forward now?,” you ask. To be honest, it’s not so much
that “Tron: Legacy” hasn’t performed as strongly stateside as the Studio had
hoped. But – rather – because overseas ticket sales for this Joseph Kosinski
film were a lot softer than expected.

Which brings us now to the conspiracy theory portion of
today’s JHM article. As in: If Disney was able to keep
that two-minute-long “Tron” test that Kosinski & Co. created back in 2008
completely under wraps until it was screened at Comic-Con in July … Well,
why then has word suddenly leaked out about this alleged “Tron 3” teaser?

For those of you who don’t recall the huge sensation that that
“Tron” test caused back in 2008, Justin Springer‘s “The Art of Tron: Legacy” (Disney Editions, November 2010) does a great job of taking you
behind-the-scenes as that footage was being created. Here’s a few
key excerpts from this great making-of book that will give you some necessary background for today’s article:

The idea of revisiting Tron had long gestated at the studio.
Development simmered over the years, outlines and even scripts would be written
and ultimately thrown out, forcing everyone back to the drawing board. It was
longtime Brigham Taylor, a known fanboy and Tron enthusiast, who kept the
project alive through many years of stalled development, maintaining his belief
that Tron was a viable Disney franchise.

After years of starts and stops, in 2007 Taylor heard
first-time director Joseph Kosinski’s bold vision for a new Tron universe and
the character-rich and clever narrative conceit of Lost
veterans Eddy Kitsis
and Adam Horowitz. Immediately, he knew he had something special on his hands.
He quickly put the idea in front of the rest of the executive team at Disney,
and development, under the guidance of producers Sean Bailey and Steven
Lisberger, got underway at an accelerated pace.

Disney was very excited about the filmmakers’ early vision
for the film, and finally serious, if cautious, about proceeding with a sequel
to Tron. However, this movie would come with an event-movie price tag. Kosinski
was a first-timer, and pulling it off would require using a multitude of the
latest filmmaking technologies in concert, something that no one was sure was
viable. The script was underway, but Disney needed evidence that Kosinksi’s
vision, and the production plan, would work.

Keeping this challenge in mind, Bailey and Kosinski came up
with the concept for a two-minute visual test and an extensive visual
development period, which would result in early designs for characters,
vehicles and environments. The studio said yes, and the team began bringing the
visual test to life.

They also knew that they needed (Jeff) Bridges. After a meeting with Bridges at
his home where the visual test and the story for the film were discussed at
length, the actor signed on to play both Kevin Flynn and Clu.

After four months of visual development, filming for the
visual test took places in January 2008 with a scaled-down crew on a small
stage that looked more like mission control than a traditional film set. It was
a grueling one-day shoot, at the end of which, all the live-action and
performance capture needed to create the test piece was completed.

After months of work, an early version of the visual test
was shown to Disney (execs) in March of 2008 and was very well received. It was
continually tweaked over the rest of the spring based on studio notes, and a
half-day reshoot was carried out, resulting in a new opening where the light
cycle combatant runs out of the rocky formation on the Grid and forms his light
cycle … The final version of the visual test was shown to Disney Chairman Dick
Cook in late July 2008, less than a week prior to Comic-Con. He was thrilled
with what he saw and quickly made the decision to add it to the studio’s
Comic-Con line-up, in order to gauge the core audience’s interest in the
property.

The two-minute visual test was shown in 2D after the Race to Witch Mountain
panel in Hall H. The filmmakers were thrilled at the possibility
of surprising the attendees; a crowd of super-informed fans who prided
themselves on knowing everything about what movies are being developed. The
crowd’s reaction to the visual test made it clear they were stupefied that a
movie of this size could be underway without them knowing (what they didn’t
know was that it wasn’t underway yet).

Which now brings us back to the conspiracy theory portion of
today’s article. Jut to recap here: If Disney was able to keep that two-minute-long “Tron”
test under wraps under wraps for months, then why did word of this alleged “Tron 3”
teaser trailer begun to leak out just weeks after it was shot?

Well, from what I hear, this wasn’t entirely a coincidence. Someone
at the Studio supposedly put the word out about this material that was shot back in November because
there’d been recently been some talk about possibly NOT including this footage on the “Tron:
Legacy” DVD & Blu-ray. Because — to be blunt — upper management at the Mouse House seems to be losing its enthusiasm for producing / pursuing a feature film follow-up to this relaunch of the “Tron” franchise.

This news did not reportedly thrill a number of key creatives at the Studio. Which is why a decision was made to prematurely get the word out about the footage that had been shot back in November. With the hope that — once this news leaked — the “Tron” fan community would become electrified. More
to the point, this leak would then put The Walt Disney Company in the position where they’d have
no choice but to include this material as part of the “Tron: Legacy”
DVD & Blu-ray release. Which would then (in theory, anyway) give the “Tron: Legacy” sequel project additional exposure and some increased momentum.

The only problem with this story (at least from my point of
view) is that people seem to automatically assume that just because there’s a “Tron
3″ teaser out there … Well, that then means that the Mouse will just have to move forward with production
of a “Tron: Legacy” sequel. I mean, this is Disney after all. The Studio that tacked a
trailer for “Dumbo II” onto Walt Disney Home Entertainment’s 2001 VHS & DVD
release of “Dumbo” …

[View:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEOs2zR6jD8]

… only to then abandon that project without any explanation.

The way I hear it, the decision to go forward with a “Tron: Legacy”
sequel now depends on how well the Blu-ray & DVD version of this
Joseph Kosinski film sells. And speaking of Joseph … Preproduction of “Oblivion,”
Kosinski’s next film for Walt Disney Studios, supposedly began two weeks ago. And
as for his reimagining of Disney’s 1979 sci-fi epic, “The Black Hole” … Well,
again from what I hear from studio insiders, the future of that film now hangs on the sales of the
Blu-ray & DVD version of “Tron: Legacy” as well.

So long story short here: If you really want to see “Tron 3”
and/or that proposed “Black Hole” remake, you’d better purchase a copy of “Tron: Legacy” Blu-ray
& DVD. A couple of copies, actually. And that’s whether or not this
upcoming Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment release includes that much-talked-about “Tron 3”
teaser.

Speaking of which … Would it really be all that big a sales
incentive if the “Tron: Legacy” Blu-ray & DVD did include this “Tron 3”
teaser? Or would it just be enough if the folks at WDSHE included a Special
Feature that then gave you a detailed look at “Tron: Uprising,” that animated
series which will be debuting on Disney XD in 2012?

Your thoughts?