New entries in the “Indiana Jones,” “Die Hard,” and “Rambo” franchises can attest, not to mention recent revivals of The A-Team, Karate Kid, and Smurfs, that Hollywood is high on an ’80s revival train right now. As a child of the eighties it is certainly strange to see so many of your formative icons being mined for box office dollars, but when we all sat down in the Tron Legacy production office we were greeted by something quite apropos of the period…VIEW-MASTERS! The same little red ones every ’80s kid had, and when we took a peek through them we got our first taste of the full-fledged world Joe Kosinski & company had been creating here in Vancouver…

Jeff Bridges kneeling meditatively in a safe house room with lit glass floors like something out of the end of Kubrick’s 2001.

The same laser machine that originally catapulted Flynn into the computer, now in a cobweb-infested attic.

Little touches like the View-Masters are meant to make a set visit more pleasant and enjoyable, but also to send off a very clear message: “We know EXACTLY how to tickle your nostalgia bone!”

Inside the War Room we saw lots of artwork, including a look at Flynn in two opposing outfits, and also his ageless digital avatar Clu, who unlike Flynn is clean-shaven and whose suit glowed a neon orange, indicating a possible antagonist. They will be using the “Benjamin Button” technology to de-age Jeff Bridges for his scenes as Clu, some of which were briefly glimpsed in the trailer (watch below). Other characters seen in artwork on the wall include Quorra (loyalist), Castor (fixer), Siren (gem), Rinzler (Clu’s primary attack dog), and so on.

It is very clear that Kosinski is aiming for realism in the design work, not a stylized look ala 300. Things look PRACTICAL. There is atmosphere, rain, fog, distant mountains. The streets are shinier, there’s more grime and reflections. There is a real-world shipping crate that reads “Dumont,” a nod to David Warner’s villain character. An updated Solar Sailor. There are new, updated Recognizers, black and sleek. When asked if they still come apart into separate pieces, the producer answers, “not on purpose.”

Everything is the same but evolved, as if the universe was still on an old Cray computer like a contained Galopagos, disconnected and evolving. They even brought in Syd Mead, the great visual futurist who was on the original’s design team, for a day to inform these new worlds. Some new additions to the arsenal are also glimpsed, including a four-wheeled dune buggy, Clu’s throne ship, a giant crane on the roof of Encom, and some other vehicles which were only hinted at that really let our imaginations FLY.

There is still an ’82-era light bike in Bridges’ safe house, but whether it will be used or not remains to be seen. Unfortunately, for those of you hoping for a return of the cute “YES” & “NO” companion, we are “sad” to report “BIT” will not be returning.

One of the biggest criticisms leveled at the original TRON, from critics to even vocal supporters like Pixar’s John Lasseter, is that the film did not engage the audience enough emotionally. Given this widely-held opinion, it’s no wonder the producers Justin Springer and Sean Bailey, who have been on the project since 2004, give us a pep-talk about the emotional direction the film will take, with Sam Flynn going into the computer to search for his father. This is a far better anchor for an audience than the first one, where everything hung on Flynn searching for a piece of information.

After having our run of the War Room we made our way to The Quantum Room, which is where all the wardrobe are kept. As some readers pointed out after our previous article, the lit-circuit look on the 1982 costumes was not achieved with computers but rather through painstaking frame-by-frame optical backlit compositing. It is no secret that studios farm out more time-consuming work like this to Asia as a standard cost-cutting measure, which explains the large number of animators literally credited in Taiwanese!

These new suits, however, are lit practically. The costume repair shop had many of the distinct character suits (136 costumes total), all of which have paper-thin, radio-controlled lights integrated into the black molded rubber. The wiring is safe, and is described as being almost like silkscreening with light, run on nanolithium batteries that can power an electric car. The “lamps” are all Velcro so they can come off and be replaced when necessary. Sean’s suit also has a built-in light disc, a parachute, and the legs have little round grenades in them, in case you’re curious.

Neville Page, the brilliant young creature designer responsible for, among other things, the Cloverfield monster, ventured out of his usual beastly wheelhouse to design these new suits. With his head shaved bald for an appearance related to his Romulan designs for Star Trek, Page explained the new suits for which light was “the glue” that held them together.

“The thrust of my efforts were really the specialty costumes,” he said. “This is considered specialties to a degree because of the lighting but it’s still kind of sewn together and fabricated in that respect. But the ones that are the foam suits so the black guards, Rinsler, Jarvis, those kind of costumes are the ones I had the most time spent on.

“As you know the original was leotards with black tape, and the helmet was a hockey helmet with black tape on it. So it’s risky to homage it and have it work. Particularly since the technology that we had to use was going to be practical lighting within the suits. In the first one, where the technology is nowhere near what we have today… we weren’t able to do the thin precision lines that they were able to do, simply because of the fact that our lights had to be bright enough for the camera to pick them up. So our lines kept getting bigger and wider, and when it got bigger and wider the potential for them to break was higher so we’d have to break it at the legs. It was an interesting awareness that we couldn’t do as much as they could do back then graphic design wise. But clearly we’re able to do more in terms of sculpture.”

We got to really see these suits in action entering the soundstage housing the massive set for the End-Of-Line Club, a bustling bar filled with many colorful denizens of the electronic world. The whole set must have been at least 3-stories high, with huge diagonal columns. There is a big LED panel under the floor connected to a laptop running footage of clouds to surreal, trippy effect. There is a bar stocked with blue liquid in large bladders, a partially-bluescreened staircase (the steps will float) leading to a stage, and a DJ booth housing none other than French house music duo Daft Punk, who are also creating the soundtrack for the film. Guy and Thomas were wearing Tron-World iterations of their usual black-helmet outfits, and piping in a droning, rhythmic cut they had created for the scene that completely fits the New Wave cyber-punk, proto-fascist vibe.

Michael Sheen walked (or rather WAS walked) onto the set looking like Ziggy-era David Bowie, with shocking white hair, tight-white leather outfit, pale skin, piercing white neon contacts, and, of course, a pimp cane! His suit was so tight he had to be assisted to merely lean on a tall stool to talk about his nightclub impresario character, Castor.

“Well I remember when I first met Joe he was saying that this character is a showman,” said Sheen in his chipper English accent. “Wants to have big energy, for it to be very colorful and vivid and very different than everything else that has come before in the film. He’s a kind of chameleon character so you’re never quite sure who the real him is and keeps changing all the time. There’s a little bit of Frank-N-Furter, a little bit of Ziggy Stardust, a little bit of Joel Grey from ‘Cabaret,’ there’s all those kind of things in here.

“He owns this club and he’s supposedly the coolest cat in the city. He entertains in the club as well as being the owner of it. Apparently he’s also part of a resistance movement within the world of Tron, and Sam Flynn gets sent my way because there’s some cackle who might be able to help him, and if you want to get to him you have to go through me so that’s about all I’m going to tell you.”

In the scene being shot, Sam Flynn is being given a flamboyant tour of the club by Castor, who ascends the staircase, exclaiming “Have a drink, courtesy of the End-Of-Line Club. Libations for everyone! Change the scheme, ELECTRIFY THE BOYS AND GIRLS!” A tall, statuesque female clubgoer grabs Sam and sleekly directs him towards the bar, where TRON creator Steven Lisberger is bartending. Castor points his cane at Lisberger and gives him a little salute. An appropriate cameo.

The suits look glorious onscreen, but clearly painful in real life.

“I like the way it looks, and that is it,” Sheen explained. “There is nothing else I like about it. There is not one bit of it that is comfortable, but it looks fantastic and the work that’s gone into it… all the work on the wardrobe department on this film has just been incredible. You know, they’ve worked so hard and I’ve had about six costume fittings over a series of, you know, a whole slew of months. Each time it gets tighter, each time I think I have to lose a little bit more weight. The fact that it lights up, all that kind of stuff is incredible.”

Olivia Wilde, who plays Quorra, was also on hand during the shooting, and while she was not as agitated by the costume, she also happened to not be in hers at the moment, appearing in her street clothes and looking very at-ease.

“I won’t complain ’cause we’re really lucky to get to wear them,” she said, “but they’re not easy. So whenever we’re sitting there straining or, you know, figuring out how to move in them, Jeff says, ‘Well, you know, in the first film, we wore basically white, you know, white leotards.’ Not easy for any man or woman.”

Apparently her character does more than her fair share of ass-whupping in the film, which required a lot of acrobatics and martial arts training. She also trained on a flight simulator at the U.S. Air Force base in Arizona for the A-10.

“I play Quorra,” she continued. “I’m a close confidant of Jeff Bridges’ character Flynn. Close, personal confidant. I don’t think it will give anything away to say that Joan of Arc was a major inspiration for my character. As far as other films I think there’s something to be said for Natalie Portman’s character in ‘The Professional.’ So I don’t know if you can imagine a mixture between that little girl and Joan of Arc…”

The camera glides through the crowd and around the set on a long crane running on an electric track hanging from the ceiling. A Sony F-35 dual lens camera is contained inside a single metal box on the end of the crane, to enable the 3D shooting. Unlike many recent films that have opted to cheat and post-convert to 3D, Kosinski is shooting with the same Cameron-Pace system used to shoot “Avatar.” It is actually on a motion control rig, the first time its been used, which was mainly installed for a big fight sequence so they could get clean plates.

As each take happens, Kosinski watches the realtime footage on a polarized 3D monitor set up in video village. We got to try out the glasses ourselves, and all agreed the 3D delineates the levels of foreground, middle ground, and background in a way that adds depth and realism. The 3D will only be used in the Tron World, the transition to which will be very similar to the transition from black & white to color in “The Wizard of Oz.” When the director is not there he casually talks shop with his actors and crew, a very calm, assured presence on the set. Occasionally he will consult with Lisberger, who in his costume is enthusiastic, smiling, clearly enjoying himself and in his element.

This is a fully populated sequence, giving the appearance of a speakeasy. You will get to see a cross-section of different inhabitants/programs. Just from the few shots we see, the elegance and restraint of Kosinski’s style is evident. “Lots of energy on this one, lots of crosses… lights on!” he bellows. The lights are controlled by radio, and it is fun to watch everyone’s costume turn on at once.

After the debut of the trailer, and what we saw on set, there is no longer any doubt Tron Legacy will be a milestone visual achievement. Whether this film will ultimately have the emotional impact on audiences the original missed the mark on remains to be seen, but Wilde is very hopeful.

“The first one was more of a cautionary tale,” she says. “So this one is sort of what happens when that cautionary tale has not been heeded. When there’s been 30 years of technology becoming increasingly powerful, where are you left at that point?

“Just in the three months I’ve been working on this, I feel what I’ve learned is like I was saying to Jeff, you have to treat it like it’s a character piece, like it’s any other film. And that it’s fun. I mean this movie should feel like a ride. It should feel like an adventure, and that’s what I think what we’re making, something that people will want to see again and again because it’s enjoyable. It does have emotional weight to it, but it should still feel like a fantastic ride. So I think that’s what we’re doing. And I think — God I’m just so excited!”

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Olivia Wilde is getting ready to escape the shadow of her breakout role in “House.”  She’s already shooting Jon Favreau’s upcoming “Cowboys and Aliens” alongside Daniel Craig, but she was well aware of her new standing in Hollywood almost a year ago when she spoke to HitFix on the set of “Tron Legacy” in Vancouver.  The 26-year-old New Yorker has done action before – sort of – in the horror-thriller “Turistas,” but wielding futuristic weapons is a far cry from engaging with the crotchety Dr. Gregory House on Fox’s venerable drama.

“I use the sword.  I’m the only one who uses the sword and then we have the disc and shields as well as weapons,” Wilde reveals excitedly. “So, it’s kind of cool.”

And then, of course realizing it’s a Disney movie, Wilde smiles and adds, “You will be able to buy them soon.”

Stopping by with co-star Garrett Hedlund in skintight black suits highlighted by electric and glowing looking accents before shooting a major action scene, Wilde says she was “amazed” at how the original “Tron” filmmakers were able to be so forward thinking way back in 1984.

“It’s really amazing to me that they didn’t know what they were talking about when they said programs or bits, bits or anything like that,” Wilde insists. “It was all gobbledy-gook for them.  And they were able to make it sound fluid.  So, that’s pretty impressive to me even when they’re using the desk, the flat computer with the touch screen thing.  That to them must have just been so insane and implausible and to us now, it sort of holds up as well.  I’d still like a desk that could do that.”

Not much is known about Quorra, Wilde’s character in the long awaited sequel except that she’s connected to the missing Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) and teams up with Flynn’s son, Sam (Garrett Hedlund), to take down an out of control Master Control Program.

Secrecy is important even on an embargoed set visit and Hedlund admitted its easier to keep his lid shut than he expected, “I find it’s a little more therapeutic not being able to talk about it.  Cause it’s harder always trying to– like we’d love to share everything.  But when you’re constantly– you got the mouse behind you.”

That “mouse” is Disney of course, the studio that was willing to take a big chance that a return to the virtual world of “Tron” could work over a quarter century after the first film became a cult phenomenon.  Luckily, director Joseph Kosinski’s vision is aligning for exactly the sort of experience audiences are looking for after James Cameron’s immersive “Avatar.”  That’s made “Legacy” one of the most anticipated films this holiday season, but even pre-“Avatar,” Wilde was awed by the 3-D technology the production was using.

“I think what’s cool is that we’re going so far beyond the 3-D,” Wilde says. “[They are] really utilizing all the new technology, technology people haven’t heard of yet so it won’t just be the 3-D that makes it special.  I think that’s kind of exciting.  We’ve been saying that the movie should– the movie will feel like a ride, which is what people expect now from a film. I mean, people’s home entertainment systems are now so advance why do go to the movies?  But ‘Tron’ will be a great reason to go. And I think that’s really fun.”

Audiences will have to judge for themselves with “Tron Legacy” opens nationwide and in IMAX on Dec. 17.

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Garrett Hedlund only got as far as his plan A, which was to drive his Chevy S10 to LA and be cast in his first film before the age of 19. All went according to plan, and by the time he flew off to Malta to shoot for Troy, he had already put plans B and C behind him, along with the life on his parents’ farm in Minnesota. Now at 25, Garrett is onto his second blockbuster film, but this time as the lead character in the film Tron Legacy.

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While set visits are usually embargoed until a month or two before a movie gets released, you’ve got to give Disney a lot of credit, as they’re letting us run some of our on set interviews from Tron Legacy nine months before the film gets released. But I think it’s an awesome strategy, as this way you get little “bits” of Tron Legacy throughout the year. Also, the cast is probably going to Comic-Con this summer, and almost everything in these interviews will be old news by that point.

Anyway, last June I was invited – along with a few other online journalists – the set of Tron Legacy when the film was in the middle of production. If you checked out my set report, you know how excited I was to be on the set and how amazing everything looked. As I said, I grew up watching Tron. It was one of my favorite films as a kid and never in my wildest dreams did I think Disney would make a sequel. So getting to stand on set and watching Jeff Bridges play Kevin Flynn was a dream come true. And while I was able to do a lot of on set interviews, Disney did two set visits and on the first one, the journalists had a lot of time with Garrett Hedlund. Since our visit didn’t have much time with him, they’ve provided me with that interview to run in it’s place. So if you’d like to read what Garrett Hedlund had to say about making Tron Legacy, hit the jump:

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t was confirmed with the green band at the beginning that Disney was only screening a trailer. What a trailer though! From this trailer we get the first glimpse of what the story of Tron: Legacy will actually be. From what I gathered from the very brief 2 and a half minute trailer, the story will revolve around Kevin Flynn’s (Jeff Bridges) son, Sam, played by Garrett Hedlund. The whereabouts of Flynn are unknown but a cryptic message (delivered by Bruce Boxleitner) is left for Sam bringing him to the old Flynn’s Arcade. His search for his father is inside the video game, Tron, where we last saw him 28 years ago. Once in the game, we (the audience) were amazed by the 3D images of this world. Expanding and updating this video game world is simply amazing, especially in 3D and in IMAX.

All of the old favorites were there: the light cycles, light discs, the battle ships and the spectacular recognizers. Can I use the word “sexy” to describe this trailer? Yes, I can! It is as if, the director of Tron Legacy, Joseph Kosinski, physically took the cast and crew into this video game and began to shoot a movie. It looks that good! A world that is a mix between The Matrix meets, well… Tron. This got the audience really excited for the upcoming sequel. But the audiences excitement quickly turned into disappointment when the release date was revealed at the very end. December 17th 2010 is the official release date for Tron Legacy.

This begs the question: Why did Disney have this event in the first place? The trailer was going to be released next week in front of Tim Burton’s Alice In Wonderland. The movie isn’t coming out for another 10 months. How soon is too soon to create hype? I guess it’s never too soon to create hype considering this movie was featured at The San Diego Comic Con for the last 3 years. And with the success with Avatar and Avatar Day, maybe Disney would benefit from the very early buzz. Even if it was for only 2 and a half minutes. And only played once. I guess any press IS good press.

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Icy, frozen streets could not keep me or Matt Patches from getting to the Lincoln Square IMAX theater in Manhattan this morning. I had won a “PitCell” ticket on Tron Legacy’s viral website FlynnLives and even though the rumor was it was “just a trailer” and hardly a replay of Avatar Day, we were stoked.

Yes, it was just a trailer. A teaser trailer. But *what* a teaser trailer.

Spoilers warning!

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The film will use of the same computer technology employed to age and de-age Brad Pitt in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.

“It was challenging, in that I got a little taste of this new technology of acting what they call ‘in the volume’ and making movies without cameras,” Bridges said in a group interview Wednesday in Beverly Hills, Calif., where he was promoting the drama Crazy Heart. “It’s a completely different deal. That was kind of a challenge. It was great getting back with my old buddy, [original Tron director] Steven Lisberger, and Bruce Boxleitner.” Boxleitner, who played the dual roles of Alan Bradley and Tron in the original film, will appear in the sequel as an age-appropriate Bradley.

Fans got a taste of Bridges’ mysterious dual role in the original teaser for Tron Legacy, which screened two Comic-Cons ago (embedded below). The teaser gives a sense of how they’ve updated familiarTron effects, such as the light cycles and flying discs, but Bridges said that’s only the beginning of what’s in store for Tron Legacy.

“All that technology that we were going to use in the movie itself is used in the trailer,” Bridges continued. “It wasn’t as highly polished as the movie is going to be, but it gives you a little peek into what you might find. That teaser was something they do kind of often with movies, and I think it’s a good idea. The Coen brothers told me they did it with making Blood Simple. Before they even shoot the movie at all, they shoot the trailer of the movie, as if it was already made, and then they use that to entice the financiers. So, even though it was a Disney property, Disney wanted them to shoot this pretty expensive trailer. I don’t know how much it cost, but it was pretty expensive.” The teaser footage was actually test footage that won’t likely appear in the finished movie.

In Tron Legacy, Kevin Flynn’s son, Sam (Garrett Hedlund), goes back into the digital world to find his lost father. Olivia Wilde and Michael Sheen co-star as programs living in the world of computer programs. Boxleitner also reprises his role from the original Tron. Lisberger collaborates as a producer. Joseph Kosinski directs the new vision of Tron.

“I used to love to pretend when I was a kid,” Bridges said. “Here’s a movie that they say, ‘You get to play a guy who gets sucked inside a computer.’ Ooh, yeah. Use all the modern technology that’s available today, [and] the same goes with the sequel, except all the technology that we’re using in that makes the old one look like an old black-and-white TV show or something. Gosh, it’s amazing what they’ve got going on this. I can’t wait to see it all pasted together.”

Tron Legacy has completed principal photography but will not be finished with post-production effects until its release, currently slated for December 2010.

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One of the most anticipated films of 2011 is “Tron Legacy,” the sequel to the 1982 sci-fi movie “Tron.” Disney didn’t disappoint fans during their 3-D panel at San Diego Comic-Con on Thursday.

Filmmakers and members of the cast, including Jeff Bridges reprising his role as Kevin Flynn, introduced footage revealing that the story revolves around Kevin’s son Sam.

“I go on search for my father and find myself in this crazy world,” said actor Garrett Hedlund, who plays Sam Flynn.

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Since last year’s geek gathering, fans were teased by the return of Tron, the 1982 film that put Jeff Bridges into a live-action, CG hybrid that developed quite the cult following. 

A sequel is ready to give the fans what they want, and Disney’s Hall H panel provided a sampling of Tron 2‘s Light Cycle goodness. TRON producers Sean Bailey and Steve Lisberger greeted an enthusiastic crowd with concept art, kicking off with a first-look (in 3-D) at the new title treatment.

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Screencrave.com interview with Garrett Hedlund.

For Garrett and Olivia, what was your entry point to Tron? Was it something that you watched growing up?

Garrett Hedlund: It’s kind of unique how I did it because I was working on my first film and I’d ended up watching Tron for the first time in Malta on a balcony in an alley, and you sort of have this slight kind of instinct at some point. There’s something really going on about Watchmen and about working with all the guys, I was really excited that way, I was really moved when somebody introduced me, I was kind of — it was a great time and even more sort of surreal to be working with all these guys, it’s crazy for me.

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