Was Jared Leto the death knell for Tron: Ares? Insiders question his star power
The Tron franchise is an interesting property. The movies are box office flops, but seemingly inoffensive in their failures (they are not known for being bad movies per se, just mostly unmemorable). However, it’s a franchise that Disney has now tried to attempt for the third time and Tron: Ares would come up short at the box office, making $33.5 million on opening. That number is far below optimal for a movie that cost at least $150 million. The original movie was something of a flop in 1982, while Tron: Legacy made about $170 million domestically back in 2010, but in the end, only broke even due to its high costs, which included a ton of hype, as at the time Disney seemed to think it would be their next Avatar.
The Hollywood Reporter is questioning whether it was a sequel that people weren’t asking for or if it had been sunk by its star lead — Jared Leto. In a time when there is talk that Hollywood has no stars anymore and movies can attract an audience on IP name alone, perhaps the wrong name on the poster could actually kill interest in a franchise movie? With Tron: Legacy, Disney was banking on the visuals to show that the series had been given a modern upgrade, but Garrett Hedlund, who headlined the film, was a relatively unknown draw; however, Jeff Bridges would be there for the fans of the original.
With Tron: Ares, Leto was also on board as a producer. Early on, the star had been determined to get the movie made when Disney shelved an early version of the script that served as an immediate follow-up to Legacy (which featured Ares as a supporting character). Leto’s passion for the Tron threequel made producer Sean Bailey take notice and since Bailey was hired by Disney to run the live-action division in 2010, he helped champion the film after the goodwill Leto built up with his more dramatic turns in Dallas Buyers Club (which won him an Oscar) and Requiem for a Dream. Bailey gave Leto the producer title, and the direct follow-up to Legacy was now refitted to make Ares the main character and Leto was upgraded to be the star.
However, despite gaining recognition for his dramatic films, Leto’s track record at blockbuster filmmaking has not fared as well. The direction his Joker took in Suicide Squad is often criticized and reports of his method acting on set seemingly rubbed people the wrong way. His image was dealt damage when accusations of inappropriate behavior arose. Then, when he attempted to join the Marvel movie world with Morbius, it may have sealed his fate after the onslaught of memes the movie produced, which led to its ultimate demise at the box office.
One top talent manager asked, “In a world where Michael Fassbender, Ewan McGregor and Benedict Cumberbatch are having a hard time getting lead roles, why would you even go to a person who can’t open a movie and who has question marks around him as a person?” However, with Tron‘s demographics and small legion of fans, another insider claimed, “You could have had Ryan Gosling, it wasn’t going to work. No one asked for this reboot. If you say, ‘Tron: Ares is good, we just needed a different actor,’ you’re deluding yourself.”
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