Tron has always been a bit of a gamble. The original 1982 Steven Lisberger-directed sci-fi, about computer programmers entering vast, gleaming software landscapes, was a huge risk, being one of the first films to make extensive use of CGI. Joseph Kosinski’sTron: Legacy, the belated 2010 sequel, was almost as risky, among other things for its early use of de-ageing technology, and for playing with what Jeff Bridges’ Kevin Flynn described as “bio-digital jazz, man!” This third feature-length effort is a gamble, too: another revival of a series that has never quite earned enough critical or box-office love. To nudge it over that line, Disney has hired Norwegian director Joachim Rønning, a blockbuster-sequel specialist for the studio (Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales,Maleficent: Mistress Of Evil) and an apparent safe pair of hands. As groundbreaking as the original was, it’s a shame this latest effort pulls some of its creative punches — but it is, if nothing else, sufficiently pretty and noisy.

A pixelated prologue catches us up on the 15 years sinceTron: Legacy, essentially explaining that Garrett Hedlund’s Sam Flynn will not be returning. (Nor, sadly, does Bruce Boxleitner — this being the firstTron movie without an actual Tron.) In the vacuum Sam has left, a digital arms race for AI supremacy has emerged between two companies: the ENCOM of the original film, and newcomer Dillinger Systems. The former is now led by game design superstar Eve Kim (Greta Lee), while the latter is headed by the circuit-board-tattooed Julian Dillinger (a delightfully yucky Evan Peters), grandson of David Warner’s Ed Dillinger from the original. A proper rotter, Julian would even step over his own mother, it seems, having shuffled mum Elisabeth (Gillian Anderson, bringing some Thatcherite chilliness) out of the top job.

So the race is on between these two mega-corps for creating AI that can be brought into the real world by giant, advanced 3D printers. The only hitch? They need a “permanence code”, an algorithmic MacGuffin which only Eve has managed to track down, having located it on Kevin Flynn’s old server. “Whoever controls the permanence code, controls the future,” intones Julian,à laDune.

Thus begins a hectic and boisterous nerd-off. There was perhaps an opportunity for a smarter take on the current dominance of tech bros and AI —The Social Network, with added lasers, perhaps — but instead we have a fairly lightweight slice of sci-fi silliness, peril upon peril, peppered with leaden dialogue like, “Prepare the particle laser!” As rich as the 3D graphics are, the characterisation and narrative themes are pure 2D, pixel-thin. Don’t expect profound musing on the human condition here. “Being human is hard,” notes one character, sagely. It’s certainly hard for Jared Leto’s Ares, who, like so many movie artificial intelligences before him, must learn to know now why you cry. Ares is the weakest part of this, the script unconvincingly giving this rather empty cipher a goofy love of ’80s kitsch and Depeche Mode.

A few key elements keep this data file from being totally corrupted. Greta Lee, making her blockbuster debut after breaking our collective hearts inPast Lives, is a likably down-to-earth lead, quietly muttering, “Oh myGod,” under her breath when she first enters the Grid, and finding everything that happens to her to be correctly ridiculous. Jodie Turner-Smith, meanwhile, is enjoyably non-human as the program Athena, terrifyingly poised behind smoky eyes.

The real MVPs, however, are Nine Inch Nails, whosestaggeringly brilliant soundtrack dominates the entire proceedings. Not since, well, the lastTron film, with Daft Punk’s masterfully sweeping orchestral-bleeps mashup, has a film score elevated its material so significantly, so impressively. Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross are old hands at this now, but still: by turns twinkly intriguing andbone-rattlingly industrial, tech-noir by way of a grimy Berlin nightclub, it’s an album which deserves far more regular rotation than the film itself.

That, paired with gorgeously rendered CGI and handsome art-direction, gives the effect of a very flashy, very beautifully produced, somewhat shallow two-hour music video. You’ll coo at the fun new things they have added light ribbons to (A wingsuit! A tank! A submarine! Swords!) in the manner of a toddler having some keys jangled at them. Sometimes, on a Friday night at the pictures, that’s all you need.