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Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Fri Dec 24, 2010 1:36 am
by CarlBrannen
The first Tron was released in the summer of 1982. At the time I was working at the neutrino (experimental high energy) group at UCI as a "pre-graduate student", designing electronics for a couple experiments.

I saw the movie that summer and it made so little of an impression on me that I had to go to wikipedia to look up the plot details. Since I was a digital electronics enthusiast, the movie should have made more of an impression on me. Heck, my first big contract was as a consultant to Burrough Corporation working on replacements for their B-series mainframes. These were the computers that ran the Master Control Program (MCP) that was the subject of the movie (though this seems to be not well known outside of Burroughs computer designers). See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burroughs_MCP

My contract with Burroughs was handled out of an office in Santa Ana that had a few hundred computer programmers in cubes, all working on the MCP. I recall this as the contract that separated me from physics grad school; for a digital hobbyist like me, designing computer logic was like going to heaven without dying. And it seemed a better career choice; more pay, more benefits, stock options, more opportunities, and work that was a lot of fun. See Tracy Kidder's "Soul of a New Machine" to get an idea what computer design is like:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Soul_of_a_New_Machine

The Burroughs B-series was unique in that they executed a high level language at the binary level. For example, there was an 8-bit opcode for "add". It added the top two elements on the stack whether those two elements were integer or real, or pointers to integers or reals. It was intended to allow efficient compilation of a language called Alogol, that was sort of the precursor to Pascal.

Anyway, the first Tron had bad plot, bad dialogue, bad science, bad special effects, bad technology, bad psychology, bad music, bad computer science, bad color choices, bad art, bad acting and bad game play. The new one follows in the tradition but adds the feature of bad 3-d effects. By the time it was over my eyes hurt, partly from the beat-up and dirty (bad) 3-d glasses (I saw the I-max version at a cost of $13) and partly from the effect of 2 hours and 7 minutes of rolling my eyes.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Fri Dec 24, 2010 2:20 am
by grae313
CarlBrannen wrote:Anyway, the first Tron had bad plot, bad dialogue, bad science, bad special effects, bad technology, bad psychology, bad music, bad computer science, bad color choices, bad art, bad acting and bad game play.
Sounds like the stuff of a cult classic! (Haven't seen either movie and don't plan to)

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Fri Dec 24, 2010 2:33 am
by CarlBrannen
grae313 wrote:Sounds like the stuff of a cult classic! (Haven't seen either movie and don't plan to)
I should probably add that the two friends who paid for my ticket enjoyed the film immensely, this despite my being a "downer". Their enjoyment of the movie made a good case for the use of marijuana (thought it's not enough to convince me to try it).

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Fri Dec 24, 2010 3:10 am
by twistor
The first Tron was released in the summer of 1982. At the time I was working at the neutrino (experimental high energy) group at UCI as a "pre-graduate student", designing electronics for a couple experiments.

I saw the movie that summer and it made so little of an impression on me that I had to go to wikipedia to look up the plot details.
This could mean two different things.

Thing the first: You expected yourself to remember a movie from 28 years ago. Even if I saw a great movie 28 years ago I wouldn't remember the details. That's why we buy movies -- to watch them over and over again.

Thing the second: You saw the movie, didn't get it, and then immediately looked it up on Wikipedia. Initially I was sure this was what you meant, expect that Wikipedia didn't exist until 2000 and web access wasn't widely available until the mid-90's. This implies you were working on some kind of time machine. Please share this technology.

What I don't get is why you'd pay $13 to see a sequel to a movie you hated. Did you think it would suddenly become awesome? OoO.. just read the below quote.... scratch that....
I should probably add that the two friends who paid for my ticket enjoyed the film immensely, this despite my being a "downer". Their enjoyment of the movie made a good case for the use of marijuana (thought it's not enough to convince me to try it).
You're missing out on the enjoyment of many other movies, too, in that case: The Big Lebowski, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Friday, Half Baked, Don't be a Menace 2 South Central While Drinking your Juice in the Hood, Waking Life, and every Will Ferrell movie ever made.

Incidentally, the TRON games were really bad. I had TRON MAZE-A-TRON and TRON: Deadly Discs and both sucked royal ass. In the disc game you go to throw the discs and you were basically limited to 8 throwing directions so you better hope your opponent was at the right angle to be hit. The maze game sucked even more. I couldn't last more than 30 seconds and I still don't know what the *** the point of it was. Inevitably I'd revert to playing Asteroids or some other decent game.

And don't even ask what I'm doing up at this late hour...

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Fri Dec 24, 2010 5:00 am
by axiomofchoice
twistor wrote:And don't even ask what I'm doing up at this late hour...
It's safe to conclude that twistor has too much time at his hand at this precise moment, and thus as corollary PhysicsGRE.com is lately infested by post-rabies-exposure cats. The straightforward proof is left to the readers as exercise.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Fri Dec 24, 2010 11:06 am
by twistor
Well, you don't rack up more than 1300 posts by having too little time...

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Fri Dec 24, 2010 5:19 pm
by HappyQuark
twistor wrote:
The first Tron was released in the summer of 1982. At the time I was working at the neutrino (experimental high energy) group at UCI as a "pre-graduate student", designing electronics for a couple experiments.

I saw the movie that summer and it made so little of an impression on me that I had to go to wikipedia to look up the plot details.
This could mean two different things.

Thing the first: You expected yourself to remember a movie from 28 years ago. Even if I saw a great movie 28 years ago I wouldn't remember the details. That's why we buy movies -- to watch them over and over again.

Thing the second: You saw the movie, didn't get it, and then immediately looked it up on Wikipedia. Initially I was sure this was what you meant, expect that Wikipedia didn't exist until 2000 and web access wasn't widely available until the mid-90's. This implies you were working on some kind of time machine. Please share this technology.

What I don't get is why you'd pay $13 to see a sequel to a movie you hated. Did you think it would suddenly become awesome? OoO.. just read the below quote.... scratch that....
I should probably add that the two friends who paid for my ticket enjoyed the film immensely, this despite my being a "downer". Their enjoyment of the movie made a good case for the use of marijuana (thought it's not enough to convince me to try it).
Your missing out on the enjoyment of many other movies, too, in that case: The Big Lebowski, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Friday, Half Baked, Don't be a Menace 2 South Central While Drinking your Juice in the Hood, Waking Life, and every Will Ferrell movie ever made.

Incidentally, the TRON games were really bad. I had TRON MAZE-A-TRON and TRON: Deadly Discs and both sucked royal ass. In the disc game you go to throw the discs and you were basically limited to 8 throwing directions so you better hope your opponent was at the right angle to be hit. The maze game sucked even more. I couldn't last more than 30 seconds and I still don't know what the *** the point of it was. Inevitably I'd revert to playing Asteroids or some other decent game.

And don't even ask what I'm doing up at this late hour...
I agree with twistor. Having a different director and 28 years of improved special effects should have no bearing on how good a movie turns out. As a physicist you should know, by the transitive property, that the quality of a movie is determined by its title and theme and therefore if Tron (1982) = *** and Tron (1982) = Tron (2010) then Tron (2010) = ***. It's simple math.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Sat Dec 25, 2010 2:40 am
by grae313
twistor wrote:Aqua Teen Hunger Force
I've never been high before and that's my favorite show ever :shock:

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Mon Dec 27, 2010 3:32 pm
by twistor
grae313 wrote:
twistor wrote:Aqua Teen Hunger Force
I've never been high before and that's my favorite show ever :shock:
Maybe you're not inhaling properly?

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Tue Dec 28, 2010 6:06 am
by CarlBrannen
twistor wrote:You expected yourself to remember a movie from 28 years ago. Even if I saw a great movie 28 years ago I wouldn't remember the details. That's why we buy movies -- to watch them over and over again.
Yeah, I had to go to wikipedia (after seeing Tron: Legacy) to look up the plot of Tron, but I relied on my memory to know that it was shoddy. I still remember the disappointment. In general, I expect to remember the basic plot of memorable movies even if they're bad. For example, "Event Horizon".

I think life's too short to watch movies over and over again. Same with reading books. There are a few exceptions. My favorite movie for describing digital design engineering on the West Coast is the 2006 comedy "Grandma's Boy" which I've seen twice (but paid for zero times). I could probably watch it a 3rd time maybe:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grandma%27 ... 06_film%29

I can remember being dragged to see the original "True Grit" movie by the family unit at a drive-in. I turned 11 that year and I hated it. Don't recall a thing about the plot except that it was a western without enough action. It's put me a little off my feed about seeing the remake, but I'll probably watch it if I can borrow it from a friend for free. Maybe my taste has matured in 41 years. On the other hand, I still like your basic low brow humor movie such as "The Nutty Professor" (which I'd be willing to see again) so maybe not.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Tue Dec 28, 2010 12:05 pm
by twistor
So apparently your problem is that you have really shitty taste in movies.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Tue Dec 28, 2010 3:58 pm
by HappyQuark
CarlBrannen wrote:
twistor wrote: I think life's too short to watch movies over and over again. Same with reading books. There are a few exceptions. My favorite movie for describing digital design engineering on the West Coast is the 2006 comedy "Grandma's Boy" which I've seen twice (but paid for zero times). I could probably watch it a 3rd time maybe:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grandma%27 ... 06_film%29

I can remember being dragged to see the original "True Grit" movie by the family unit at a drive-in. I turned 11 that year and I hated it. Don't recall a thing about the plot except that it was a western without enough action. It's put me a little off my feed about seeing the remake, but I'll probably watch it if I can borrow it from a friend for free. Maybe my taste has matured in 41 years. On the other hand, I still like your basic low brow humor movie such as "The Nutty Professor" (which I'd be willing to see again) so maybe not.
I'm going to have to agree with twistor on this one, and not even sarcastically. You had your chance to show off your knowledge of high quality "low brow" humor and you came up with "Grandma's Boy" and "The Nutty Professor" both of which were painfully bad even at the time they were produced.

For low brow but well made, any of the following would have been acceptable

- Clerks
- The Big Lebowski
- Supertroopers
- Dogma
- Little Nicky (The last movie Sandler made before jumping the shark)
- Me, Myself & Irene (last movie before Carrey jumped it aswell)
- BASEketball
- Half Baked
- Mars Attacks!
- Kingpin

Or if you really wanted to show us that you know your deep cuts, how about some Pootie Tang

Image

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Tue Dec 28, 2010 8:04 pm
by CarlBrannen
Hey! I believe I have perfectly normal taste.

I buy cheese in a can -- when it's on sale of course. And if it didn't taste good, they wouldn't be able to sell it.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Wed Dec 29, 2010 10:20 am
by twistor
I'm gonna have to disagree with you, HappyQuark. Jim Carey's movies have improved immensely.

Both "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" and "The Number 23" were great movies. Sure, they're a lot different from "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective" but they're two completely different types of films. "Liar Liar" has some classic lines, as well.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Wed Dec 29, 2010 4:35 pm
by HappyQuark
twistor wrote:I'm gonna have to disagree with you, HappyQuark. Jim Carey's movies have improved immensely.

Both "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" and "The Number 23" were great movies. Sure, they're a lot different from "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective" but they're two completely different types of films. "Liar Liar" has some classic lines, as well.
I probably should have clarified, but I was specifically referring to his work in comedies. I never did see the Number 23 but Eternal sunshine is still one of my favorite movies. In terms of comedies, however, these are his movies post "Me, Myself and Irene"

Yes Man
Horton Hears a Who!
Fun with Dick and Jane
Bruce Almighty
How the Grinch Stole Christmas

Each of which were, "Meh" at best.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Wed Dec 29, 2010 5:30 pm
by twistor
HappyQuark wrote:
twistor wrote:I'm gonna have to disagree with you, HappyQuark. Jim Carey's movies have improved immensely.

Both "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" and "The Number 23" were great movies. Sure, they're a lot different from "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective" but they're two completely different types of films. "Liar Liar" has some classic lines, as well.
I probably should have clarified, but I was specifically referring to his work in comedies. I never did see the Number 23 but Eternal sunshine is still one of my favorite movies. In terms of comedies, however, these are his movies post "Me, Myself and Irene"

Yes Man
Horton Hears a Who!
Fun with Dick and Jane
Bruce Almighty
How the Grinch Stole Christmas

Each of which were, "Meh" at best.
I've seen Bruce Almighty. While I do remember enjoying it I think Steve Carell's performance was the crowning point of the film. As for the rest of them, I haven't seen them.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Wed Dec 29, 2010 9:13 pm
by midwestphysics
I don't remember the first Tron very much, but I thought the previews for this new one looked good, liked the Jeff Bridges double role cgi.

As for "low brow" comedies.
For low brow but well made, any of the following would have been acceptable

- Clerks
- The Big Lebowski
- Supertroopers
- Dogma
- Little Nicky (The last movie Sandler made before jumping the shark)
- Me, Myself & Irene (last movie before Carrey jumped it aswell)
- BASEketball
- Half Baked
- Mars Attacks!
- Kingpin
I have to add "Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back", "Eurotrip", and even "Broken Lizard: Club Dread" just to name a few.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Wed Dec 29, 2010 10:45 pm
by twistor
midwestphysics wrote:I don't remember the first Tron very much, but I thought the previews for this new one looked good, liked the Jeff Bridges double role cgi.

As for "low brow" comedies.

I have to add "Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back", "Eurotrip", and even "Broken Lizard: Club Dread" just to name a few.
Yes! I love Kevin Smith movies!

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Fri Dec 31, 2010 7:20 am
by CarlBrannen
I just remembered, I'd be willing to watch "8 Mile" over again, but mostly because of the music. And as far as comedy goes, it's hard to beat "Something About Mary".

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Fri Dec 31, 2010 10:54 am
by twistor
CarlBrannen wrote:I just remembered, I'd be willing to watch "8 Mile" over again, but mostly because of the music. And as far as comedy goes, it's hard to beat "Something About Mary".
You don't strike me as the type to listen to Eminem.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Fri Dec 31, 2010 5:25 pm
by WhoaNonstop
twistor wrote:You don't strike me as the type to listen to Eminem.
Ditto.

-Riley

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Fri Dec 31, 2010 5:39 pm
by midwestphysics
CarlBrannen wrote:I just remembered, I'd be willing to watch "8 Mile" over again, but mostly because of the music. And as far as comedy goes, it's hard to beat "Something About Mary".
8 Mile was okay, obviously not a comedy, but I'm from that area so I'm bias. I don't mind there's something about mary, but actually just watched "The Other Guys" and that was pretty funny.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Fri Dec 31, 2010 6:01 pm
by kroner
WhoaNonstop wrote:
twistor wrote:You don't strike me as the type to listen to Eminem.
Ditto.

-Riley
CarlBrannen's taste is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Sat Jan 01, 2011 11:22 pm
by CarlBrannen
kroner wrote:CarlBrannen's taste is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.
Nah, it's just that I used to run juke boxes (and pin ball machines, dart machines, coin-op pool tables, and cigarette machines) in taverns in the Seattle area. Uh, in Washington State, a "tavern" is a business that sells nothing stronger than beer and is typically used as a place where adults play various games such as pool, darts, chess, etc.) My juke box locations had a black clientele. I don't remember putting Eminem on any juke boxes so I must have left the business before he became famous. Or maybe he didn't develop a black following at that time, I don't know. By the way, did you know that if you have cigarette machines in black and white bars they will sell almost completely different brands of cigarettes? I didn't. I learned the hard way.

I didn't find the latest from Mathers as impressive as his previous. My favorite rap album is the double album "All Eyez On Me" by Tupac Shakur, though I'm also fond of all the albums by my local (Seattle) star Sir Mix-a-lot. One of my dreams would be to be invited to one of his parties. For R&B, I pick TLC which got a lot of cross-over hits.

P.S. I can kick your ass in pinball.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Sun Jan 02, 2011 3:35 am
by WhoaNonstop
CarlBrannen wrote:P.S. I can kick your ass in pinball.
I can kick your ass in making pinwheels.

-Riley

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Sun Jan 02, 2011 11:23 am
by schwiss
I'm probably the delivery guy of cartwheel ass-kicking at this forum.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Sun Jan 02, 2011 4:48 pm
by HappyQuark
schwiss wrote:I'm probably the delivery guy of cartwheel ass-kicking at this forum.
I agree with this statement only in the sense that a delivery guy delivers his package, in this case the ultimate and supreme kicker off ass (me) and then leaves, at which point I burst forth from my envelope and commence with the kicking of asses.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Sun Jan 02, 2011 4:54 pm
by WhoaNonstop
HappyQuark wrote:I agree with this statement only in the sense that a delivery guy delivers his package, in this case the ultimate and supreme kicker off ass (me) and then leaves, at which point I burst forth from my envelope and commence with the kicking of asses.
Sometimes I aspire to the things you do.

-Riley

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Mon Jan 03, 2011 12:34 am
by HappyQuark
WhoaNonstop wrote:
HappyQuark wrote:I agree with this statement only in the sense that a delivery guy delivers his package, in this case the ultimate and supreme kicker off ass (me) and then leaves, at which point I burst forth from my envelope and commence with the kicking of asses.
Sometimes I aspire to the things you do.

-Riley
You certainly wouldn't be the first. Of the people that I inspired to greatness, Napoleon Bonaparte came the closest. Last I checked, he achieved approximately 7.43% of my total potential.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Mon Jan 03, 2011 1:51 am
by twistor
kroner wrote:
WhoaNonstop wrote:
twistor wrote:You don't strike me as the type to listen to Eminem.
Ditto.

-Riley
CarlBrannen's taste is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.
Tupac was the greatest rapper. I love that CD also, but my all time favorite rap CD is Snoop Doggy Dogg's "Doggystyle", which also happens to be the only good rap album he ever made outside of a few other songs with Dr. Dre.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Mon Jan 03, 2011 3:37 am
by HappyQuark
twistor wrote: Tupac was the greatest rapper. I love that CD also, but my all time favorite rap CD is Snoop Doggy Dogg's "Doggystyle", which also happens to be the only good rap album he ever made outside of a few other songs with Dr. Dre.
I've always felt that Tupac was horribly overrated. Not that he's bad, just barely above average as far as popular hip-hop goes. His rhymes were rarely very clever, his image in pop culture was mostly manufactured and his music was super hypocritical. Are women beautiful people worthy of our respect or are they sex objects? Make up your mind!

Image

It always amazed me how so few of the truly clever artists always got almost no attention. Jurassic 5, KRS-one, Jedi Mind tricks, Del the funky Homosapien, Aesop Rock, Immortal Technique, etc are always stuck flying under the radar.

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Mon Jan 03, 2011 11:23 pm
by CarlBrannen
As far as with respect to other rap, I liked Tupac's incredible voice. Another amazing voice is the guy who does the vocals for Broken Bells, which is what is currently on my CD player more than anything else. An amazing album:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNl0Jw9_Z5A
HappyQuark wrote:It always amazed me how so few of the truly clever artists always got almost no attention. Jurassic 5, KRS-one, Jedi Mind tricks, Del the funky Homosapien, Aesop Rock, Immortal Technique, etc are always stuck flying under the radar.
I listened to one song each from these and wasn't amazed. If there's a particular song you think represents them it would be nice to link it. Uh, it is 2011.

Here's an appropriate obscure college cut from the year I finished my MS in math (rather poorly recorded):

"Bad Year at UCLA"
by Game Theory (Blaze of Glory, 1982)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OO_rGYl4fM

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Tue Jan 04, 2011 12:59 am
by HappyQuark
CarlBrannen wrote:As far as with respect to other rap, I liked Tupac's incredible voice. Another amazing voice is the guy who does the vocals for Broken Bells, which is what is currently on my CD player more than anything else. An amazing album:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNl0Jw9_Z5A
HappyQuark wrote:It always amazed me how so few of the truly clever artists always got almost no attention. Jurassic 5, KRS-one, Jedi Mind tricks, Del the funky Homosapien, Aesop Rock, Immortal Technique, etc are always stuck flying under the radar.
I listened to one song each from these and wasn't amazed. If there's a particular song you think represents them it would be nice to link it. Uh, it is 2011.

Here's an appropriate obscure college cut from the year I finished my MS in math (rather poorly recorded):

"Bad Year at UCLA"
by Game Theory (Blaze of Glory, 1982)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OO_rGYl4fM
Del the Funky Homosapien - Love Story: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNgPwTcM6ek
Lyrics to Love Story: http://www.leoslyrics.com/listlyrics.ph ... cLRIrvI%3D

Aesop Rock: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEBGCOCxLgA

KRS-one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJDO-NyNIKc

Jurassic 5: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkjTM4AfYdU

Jedi Mind Tricks: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgAR1Dgpg_U

Ugly Duckling: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h80mY-7mPvI

Blackalicious: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HS6YuujSSPY

Re: Another bad Tron movie.

Posted: Tue Jan 04, 2011 1:24 am
by WhoaNonstop
In comparison to modern rap, this stuff is actually enjoyable and the lyrics are mostly intelligent.

Ironically enough, even though I don't listen to the genre much, my favorite "Hip-Hop" artist is The Streets:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8BHL5SWX0Q

-Riley