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TheTron franchise, including the film trilogy andanimated series feature characters created bySteven Lisberger andBonnie MacBird. This article covers notable characters of theTron franchise, including its various cinematic, literary, and video game adaptations and sequels.
For the first film, Richard Rickitt explained that to "produce the characters who inhabit the computer world, actors were dressed in costumes that were covered in black-and-white computer circuitry designs....With coloured light shining through the white areas of their costumes, the resulting characters appeared to glow as if lit from within....optical processes were used to create all of the film's computerized characters..."[1]Frederick S. Clarke reported thatTron: Legacy would "combine live action withComputer-generated imagery (CGI)," adding that "several characters...will be completely digital..."[2]
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Kevin Flynn is a giftedsoftware programmer and video game designer who serves as the protagonist of the originalTron film. A former employee of the software corporation ENCOM, Flynn owns and operatesFlynn’s Arcade, where he entertains patrons by excelling at the very games he once developed for ENCOM, includingSpace Paranoids,Matrix Blaster,Vice Squad, andLight Cycles. In 1982, following his dismissal from the company, Flynn seeks proof that ENCOM executive Edward Dillinger plagiarized his creations to advance his own career. With assistance from programmers Alan Bradley and Lora Baines, Flynn infiltrates ENCOM’s computer system, where he is unexpectedly digitized and transported into the digital realm known as the Grid.
Inside the system, Flynn befriends Tron and Yori—the program counterparts of Bradley and Baines, respectively—and discovers that, as a User, he possesses abilities surpassing those of ordinary programs, enabling him to manipulate the laws of the digital environment. Together, they overthrow the authoritarian Master Control Program (MCP), freeing the system’s inhabitants. Flynn then returns to the real world with evidence of Dillinger’s misconduct, ultimately assuming the role of CEO at ENCOM.
Intrigued by his experiences within the Grid, Flynn later creates a second system on a private server located beneath his arcade. He transfers Tron to this new Grid and generates a digital doppelgänger of himself, Clu, to help construct a virtualutopia. Over time, Flynn becomes increasingly absorbed in his discoveries related to genetic algorithms and quantum teleportation, confiding only in Alan Bradley about his work. In 1988, this new Grid spontaneously gives rise to a unique class of self-generating programs called Isomorphic Algorithms, or ISOs. The following year, Clu stages acoup, defeating Tron, eradicating the ISOs, and trapping Flynn within the system when he fails to reach the portal back to the real world.
Forced into exile, Flynn rescues and protects Quorra, the last surviving ISO. Over the ensuing decades, his prolonged absence leads many programs torevere him as a divineCreator. In 2009, Flynn’s estranged son, Sam, is transported into the Grid and reunites with his father. In the ensuing conflict, Flynn sacrifices himself by reintegrating with Clu, seemingly destroying them both.
Fifteen years later, Flynn reappears as a digital construct within the original 1982 Grid, where he grants the Permanence Code to Ares.
Clu (short forCodifiedLikenessUtility) is a hacking program that Flynn created in his likeness to expose Dillinger's plagiarism by searching for evidence.
While searching for the stolen data, the Master Control Program captures and absorbs him, using the information he gained against Flynn as he attempts to escape the game grid on a light cycle.
An updated version of Clu serves as the main antagonist to the second film and its tie-in media.
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Alan Bradley is a computer programmer and Flynn's partner at ENCOM.
He is the creator of Tron, who monitors communications between the MCP and the real world and addresses him by the username 'Alan-One'. However, after finding his progress to be limited, he assists Flynn in exposing Dillinger. InTron, he is depicted as being in a relationship with Lora Baines. With Kevin Flynn's return to ENCOM in 1982, Bradley works closely alongside Flynn on his projects. After Kevin Flynn's disappearance in 1989, Bradley remained chairman of ENCOM and acted as a surrogate father to Sam Flynn. In 2009, Bradley remained a part of the ENCOM board of directors. Upon returning to the company, Sam restores Bradley's chairman role.
Tron, is a security program that Alan created in his likeness to monitor communications between the MCP and the real world. He is the main digital protagonist of the first film.
The MCP captures him and forces him to play on the Game Grid, but Flynn frees him and helps him shut down the MCP, which Alan ordered him to do. InTron: Legacy, Flynn brings Tron in to work security on the new Grid; Clu 2.0 stages a coup and reprograms him intoRinzler, who hosts the Games before remembering his true identity as Tron and sacrificing himself to help defeat Clu 2.0
Lora Baines (portrayed byCindy Morgan) is a research engineer at ENCOM and one of Gibbs' assistants, as well as Flynn's ex-girlfriend and Alan's current girlfriend.
She assisted in designing the laser that teleports Flynn into the digital world and created Yori, who assists in the derezzing procedure.
Yori is an input/output program that Lora created in her likeness to handle the creation of digital simulations, such as the Solar Sailer, and assist with the derezzing procedure.
Tron and Flynn's romantic interest, she reunites with Tron after he rescues her from the MCP and helps him and Flynn reach its core to destroy it and its factional programs.
Walter Gibbs (portrayed byBarnard Hughes) is the founder of ENCOM, where he and Lora work as scientists and helped develop the digitizing laser. After voicing concerns about the limitations of the company's grid in a meeting with Dillinger, Dillinger threatens to dismiss him.
Dumont is a "guardian" program that Gibbs created in his likeness to protect the ENCOM grid's I/O Tower. He has a similar bond with Yori as Gibbs has with Lora.
Ed Dillinger (portrayed byDavid Warner) is the Senior Executive Vice President of ENCOM and father of Elisabeth Dillinger and Ed Dillinger, Jr. He is the overarching antagonist of the first film.
A programmer at ENCOM, he rises through the company's ranks and becomes its senior executive by plagiarizing Flynn's work and contributes to the rise of the MCP by creating the program Sark to act as its second-in-command. After learning of Flynn's investigation into his plagiarism, Dillinger authorizes the MCP to tighten security controls, but it threatens to expose his actions after he questions its intent to defy his plans of capturing other programs from government facilities likeThe Pentagon. Following the MCP's destruction, he is disgraced from the company and Flynn becomes its CEO.
Commander Sark (short forSystemAnalytics andReportingKernel[3]), is a command program that Dillinger created in his likeness[4] to serve as the MCP's chief lieutenant. He is the secondary antagonist of the first film.
He oversees the training of new programs that the MCP kidnaps and brings to the Grid, offering them a chance to join his elites if they renounce their belief in the users. While guarding the way to Master Control, Tron destroys him.
TheMaster Control Program (MCP) (voiced byDavid Warner) is the main antagonist of the first film.
An artificial intelligence created by Gibbs and improved by Dillinger, it rules over ENCOM's gaming grid, enslaving programs and forcing them to play games against its henchmen. Dillinger uses the MCP to manage ENCOM's computer network, but it turns on him and threatens to expose his theft of Flynn's creations. Empowered by Dillinger and seeking information, power, and control over other corporations and governments, it steals data from other systems before Flynn and Tron destroy it.
Roy Kleinberg (portrayed byDan Shor) is one of ENCOM's first computer programmers and Alan's coworker, as well as the creator of the Ram program, which makes connections between ENCOM and an insurance company. When Alan goes to Dillinger about being blocked from the system, Kleinberg asks if he can have some of his popcorn, which Alan agrees to. As a result, he is credited as "Popcorn Co-Worker".
Kleinberg also appears in the short film "The Next Day," included on the Blu-ray edition ofTron Legacy, which reveals his name. Along with Alan, he is shown to be the leader of the "Flynn Lives" movement.
Ram is an actuarial program that Kleinberg created in his likeness to "work for a big insurance company" before being captured by the MCP and forced to play on the Game Grid.
While participating in the games, Ram goes beyond his original programming and becomes a skilled player. Though he expresses confidence in his abilities between games, he also takes pride in his work as an insurance program, which he seems to associate with humanitarian causes. After escaping the game grid with Flynn and Tron, he dies after being injured by a game tank.
Crom (portrayed byPeter Jurasik) is a compound interest program that full branch managing savings and loan bank programmer Mr. Henderson created in his likeness.
After the MCP captures him and forces him to play on the Game Grid, he and Flynn battle in the ring game. Flynn gains the upper hand, but disobeys Sark's orders and refuses to kill the defenseless Crom. However, Crom falls to his death after Sark removes the piece of the playing field he is hanging from.
TheBit is a representation of abinary digit, and as such can provide only yes (1) or no (0) answers to questions, through which it conveys emotional states. It has a limited role in the film, acting as a companion to Clu and Flynn; though intended to have a more extensive role, it had only two minutes of screentime due to scheduling reasons.[5] Despite this, the co-creators ofMax Headroom, in their bookCreative Computer Graphics, called it "one of the most memorable characters in the film."[5] At the time of the film's release, the character represented an innovative use ofvector graphics[5] andmorphing.[6]
Physically, the Bit was represented by a blue polyhedral shape that alternated between thecompound of dodecahedron and icosahedron and thesmall triambic icosahedron, the first stellation of the icosahedron.[7] When it answers "yes", it changes into a yellowoctahedron, and when it answers "no", it changes into a red 35th stellation of an icosahedron; these resemble prismatic forms or "3-D versions" of the Latin letters 'O' and 'X', respectively.
The video gameTron 2.0, released in 2003, serves as a sequel to the original film, but its events became non-canon with the release ofTron: Legacy in 2010. The comic bookTron: The Ghost in the Machine further explores its characters and storyline.
Jet Bradley is the son of Alan and Lora and the protagonist ofTron 2.0. Following Alan's disappearance, Jet searches for him before being digitized and transported to the digital world, where he is tasked with finding the Tron Legacy Code.
Jet is the basis for the experimental program that is the central character ofTron: The Ghost in the Machine. This version of Jet is a digital backup of him, copied and stored within the system. Due to the complexities involved in creating a copy of a human being, it is corrupted and split into three separate aspects before they are united and given the choice to ascend from the digital world into the real world.
Mercury (voiced byRebecca Romijn) is a female humanoid computer program, known within the digital world as a champion lightcycle racer. She also appears inTron: The Ghost in the Machine as one of the leaders of the resistance against the red version of Jet, who is masquerading as the MCP.
Ma3a (voiced by Cindy Morgan), short forMathAssistant3Audio, is a female computer program who is similar in personality to Lora, who improved her from Yori. When Lora originally improved her in March 1988, she was known asMa1a (short forMathAssistant1Audio), followed byMa2a (short forMathAssistant2Audio) in June 1996 and Ma3a in 2003. Some ENCOM employees have come to believe that part of Lora was digitized into Ma3a's code following her death in the 1994 digitizing accident. In March 2003, Alan Bradley received the "Digital Pal" award for Ma3a.
J.D. Thorne was an executive from fCon who was corrupted after being improperly digitized into the computer and spread like a virus throughout the system, with corrupted programs known as Z-Lots following him as "The Master User". Thorne is derezzed after a battle with the Kernel and gives vital information about fCon to Jet before dying.
TheKernel is a security program that commands the system's ICPs before Jet destroys him during a battle with Thorne.
TheByte resembles the Bit, but, unlike it, can speak in full English sentences.
Data Wraiths are digitizable, elite hacker users that fCon employs to create havoc in computer systems, steal top-secret data, and destroy the databases of fCon's competitors. After being derezzed in the digital world, they are kicked out and return to their original human form.
Seth Crown,Eva Popoff, andEsmond Baza are fCon executives who attempt to transfer themselves into the digital world, but are unaware that the correction algorithms necessary for proper transfer had been disabled. Without the algorithms, the digitization process goes awry and they are merged into a monstrosity. After Jet defeats them and pushes them out of the digitizing stream, as their corrupted state would have killed them in the real world, they are stored in a hard drive so Alan can fix their code.
Tron: Legacy, its comic book tie-inTron: Betrayal, the animated television prequelTron: Uprising and the video game tie-inTron: Evolution serve as direct sequels toTron. Several characters appear in all four parts, while others are specific to one part. All four parts establish a specific timeline of theTron universe.[8]
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Samuel "Sam" Flynn is the son of Kevin Flynn and a controlling shareholder at ENCOM. He is the protagonist ofTron: Legacy.
Twenty years after Kevin's disappearance in 1989, Sam is lured into the Grid, where he reunites with Kevin and helps him destroy Clu 2. Deciding to take responsibility of ENCOM, he names Alan the Chairman of the Board and takes Quorra to see her first sunrise.
By the events ofTron: Ares in 2025, Sam has resigned from ENCOM for personal reasons, being succeeded by Eve Kim as CEO.
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Quorra is a skilled warrior and the last remaining member of a group of "isomorphic algorithms" destroyed by Clu 2.
She is a confidante to Kevin, who saved her from Clu 2's purge of the ISOs. Anxious to experience the outside world, Quorra accompanies Sam to escape the grid and enter the real world, ultimately succeeding.
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Clu 2 short forClu 2.0, is anupdated version of Clu that Kevin created to oversee the development of the Grid. He is the main antagonist ofTron: Legacy.
Programmed with the command of creating a "perfect system", Clu 2 grew to resent Flynn, particularly his fondness for the "imperfect", spontaneously generated Isos, or "isomorphic algorithms". Clu 2 betrayed Flynn and Tron to seize control of the Grid and enacted genocide upon the Isos, forcing Flynn into hiding for twenty years after he rescued Quorra.
During this time, Clu 2 reprogrammed his opponents as soldiers for his army, led by a reprogrammed Tron under the name Rinzler, while seeking Flynn for his "identity disc", whose contents would allow Clu 2 to cross into the real world. He later lures Kevin's son Sam into the Grid and attempts to kill him before using him to draw out Flynn and obtains his identity disc, but is defeated when Flynn 'reintegrates' him into himself, apparently destroying them both.[10]
TheISOs (short forIsomorphic algorithms) are a race of complex programs that spontaneously arose on the Grid. Clu 2 saw them as an obstacle to his creation of a perfect system, while Kevin saw them as the next stage of evolution. After Clu 2 betrayed Flynn and committed massgenocide of most of the ISOs, Kevin saved Quorra, the sole surviving ISO, who later enters the real world with Sam.
Castor (portrayed byMichael Sheen) is a supermodel program and the owner of theEnd of Line club in the tallest tower on the Grid.[11]
Originally named "Zuse", he was an ally of Flynn and the ISOs. However, he betrays Sam and Quorra to bargain with Clu 2; he wishes to control the Grid once Clu 2 leaves for the real world. However, though Clu 2 seems to agree to the bargain, he traps Castor in his club, setting off explosions that kill him and his associate Gem.
Zuse is most likely named afterKonrad Zuse, whose Z3 was the first automatic programmable digital computer constructed, in 1941.
Rinzler (portrayed by Anis Cheurfa, voiced by Bruce Boxleitner) is a security program that serves as Clu 2's right-hand man. He is the secondary antagonist ofTron: Legacy.
Considered a master warrior for his strength and acrobatics, he wields dual identity discs. This may come from the two-disc DVD edition ofTron, which revealed that in the late 1970s, Lisberger Studios produced an early demo animation showing Tron armed with dual "exploding discs". It is later revealed that Rinzler is Tron; although it appears inLegacy that he was defeated at the beginning of Clu 2's coup,Tron: Uprising reveals that he escaped capture and served as a mentor to the program Beck in inciting an uprising against Clu 2's regime before Clu reprogrammed him into serving him as Rinzler. ThroughoutLegacy, he has several encounters with Sam, culminating in an aerial pursuit during which he remembers his true identity and turns against Clu 2 before falling into the Sea of Simulation.
Rinzler is named afterLucasfilm executive editorJ. W. Rinzler, who authored several books, includingThe Making of Star Wars,The Complete Making of Indiana Jones, andMaking of The Empire Strikes Back. Director Joseph Kosinski chose the name during a working session with the writers when one of Rinzler's books happened to be on the table.[12]
Jarvis (portrayed byJames Frain) is an administration program who serves as Clu 2's chief bureaucrat.
Though efficient in his function, he is sycophantic and cowardly and seeks to impress Clu 2 and win his approval. After Jarvis fails to prevent Sam from taking back his father's disc, Clu 2 derezzes him.
Bartik (portrayed byConrad Coates) is a basic program and the leader of a rebel faction in TRON City.
InTron: Uprising, he and his friend Hopper join a task force that Paige formed to hunt down the renegade after witnessing workers standing up to Pavel. InTron: Legacy, he demands to Castor that Zuse have an audience and later fights the Black Guards when they attack the club, but is derezzed.
Edward Dillinger Jr. (portrayed byCillian Murphy; uncredited) is the son of Ed Dillinger and lead programmer on the ENCOM operating system.[13]
InTron: Legacy, he attends an ENCOM board meeting, having earned a reputation for making the ENCOM operating system more secure and harder to copy than previous versions. When Sam releases the software for free, Dillinger Jr. attempts to defuse the situation by suggesting that the company take credit and claim that it was a gift to their customers.
Anon is the main protagonist ofTron: Evolution. He is a security program that Kevin owns to maintain order in the Grid and investigate conspiracies. He teams up with Quorra to stop Clu 2 from taking over the grid, but is derezzed saving her from falling debris.
Abraxas (voiced byJohn Glover) is the main antagonist ofTron: Evolution. He was once an ISO namedJalen before being re-purposed by Clu 2 as a computer virus to justify the purge of the other ISOs from the Grid.
Beck (voiced byElijah Wood), also known as Renegade, is a vehicle maintenance program and Games warrior. He is the main protagonist ofTron: Uprising.
Through the series, Beck leads a revolution against Clu 2 and his armies from the Grid while being trained by Tron, who he looks up to as a mentor. Beck eventually becomes as powerful as Tron and opposes the tyranny of Tesler and his forces.[8]
General Tesler (voiced byLance Henriksen) is a command program that serves as one of Clu 2's generals and is the main antagonist ofTron: Uprising.
He is in charge of the forces occupying Argon City and is the boss of Pavel and Paige, having recruiting Paige after claiming that the ISOs derezzed her friends, when in reality he ordered that they be executed. He believes that Tron is dead and that Beck is Tron, after which he calls him Renegade and attempts to stop him from helping the people of Argon. Tesler does not hesitate to derezz his men for their failures and dislikes Dyson, as well as failing Clu should the Renegade free Argon and the Grid. He has the ability to extend his arms and derez others with his hands.
Dyson (voiced byJohn Glover) is Clu's highest-ranking officer, who is sent to spearhead the apprehension of the Renegade. He is a recurring antagonist inTron: Uprising.
Dyson was once a friend of Tron and member of his security force until half of his face was derezzed when he tried to stop a riot between programs and ISOs. Believing that Flynn betrayed the Grid after siding with ISOs, he joined Clu and participated in the coup against Tron and Flynn. During the coup, he scarred Tron's face with his own code and believed Tron to have died after the recognizer carrying him was shot down. During the series, he is sent to Argon to deal with Renegade and Tron sends Beck to capture him. When Tron arrives to face him, Dyson believes that he is Renegade until Tron reveals himself to him. Dyson offers Tron the opportunity to join him, but Tron refuses and nearly derezzes Dyson before deciding to spare him so he can deliver a message to Clu. Afterwards, Dyson flees to report Tron's survival to Clu.
Ares (portrayed byJared Leto) is a program created by Julian Dillinger to serve as the Master Control Program of the Dillinger Grid. He is assigned to retrieve the Permanence Code, a critical line of coding created and hidden by Kevin Flynn before his disappearance, but betrays Dillinger and allies himself with Eve Kim to locate the code. He is the protagonist ofTron: Ares.
Eve Kim (portrayed byGreta Lee) is the current CEO of ENCOM following Sam Flynn's resignation. She is in search of Kevin Flynn's Permanence Code, and winds up allying with Ares.
Julian Dillinger (portrayed byEvan Peters) is the CEO of Dillinger Systems and the grandson of Ed Dillinger, who created Ares as the perfect soldier. He is the main antagonist ofTron: Ares.
Athena (portrayed byJodie Turner-Smith) is a program second-in-command to Ares. She ends up opposing Ares when the latter defects from Dillinger.
Ajay Singh (portrayed byHasan Minhaj) is the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of ENCOM and an ally of Eve Kim.
Seth Flores (portrayed byArturo Castro) is a colleague and an ally of Eve Kim.
Elisabeth Dillinger (portrayed byGillian Anderson) is the former CEO of Dillinger Systems, daughter of Ed Dillinger and mother of Julian Dillinger. She is ultimately killed by Athena when she opposes Julian's actions.
Unfortunately, Bit's extensive role in the film was curtailed to two minutes for scheduling reasons, but it remains one of the most memorable characters in the film - not bad for a pint-sized polyhedron.
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