Tron 3 — is the franchise’ ascension still happening?

It’s been a while since we last heard about a possible Tron 3, also known as Tron Ascension.

People have been tight-lipped ever since Legacy came out in 2010 even though the movie started to pick up steam again in 2015. Now there’s a statement by filmmaker Joseph Kosinski himself, who insists the third movie is still alive, albeit frozen.

In a recent interview with Collider Kosinski was very open on the movie and its possible, more literal ascension:

“I guess I can say that Tron 3 is in cryogenic freeze. So, it’s there. It’s not dead. It’s alive, but it’s sitting there, waiting for the right time to move forward. I mean, you have to remember that when we made Tron: Legacy, Disney did not own Marvel. Disney did not own Lucasfilm … they own everything now.

But this was before they owned everything, so from the studio point of view, they have a certain number of slots and a certain amount of money to make movies and if you can make a Star Wars spin-off or another Marvel movie, which are all doing incredibly well, a Tron movie, even though I think it would do very well, the question is: Would it do as well as one of those? That is more the reason we haven’t seen another Tron is that Disney stock is flushed with really successful properties right now. But that doesn’t mean we won’t see one at one point.”

He’s totally right on Disney making tons of money from their uber-successful franchises and Tron isn’t exactly the kind of mainstream experience capable of moving merchandise the way any given Marvel or Star Wars entry is programmed to.

After confirming that a third entry indeed would have been called Tron: Ascension, Kosinski also talked about the plot:

“I think we got the script to about 80%. We were in good shape. We were probably eight or nine months out, which is still a good amount of distance from being ready to shoot it, but I think the script was in good shape. What I’m excited about is the concept, which is an invasion movie from inside the machine coming out as opposed to one we’ve usually seen.

So we hinted at that at the end of Legacy with (Wilde’s character) Quorra coming out, but the idea for Ascension was a movie that was, the first act was in the real world, the second act was in the world of Tron, or multiple worlds of Tron, and the third act was totally in the real world. And I think that really opens up, blows open the concept of Tron in a way that would be thrilling to see on screen. But there’s also a really interesting character study in Quorra and a ‘Stranger in a Strange Land,’ trying to figure out where she belongs having lived in the real world for a few years, and where does she fit in.”

So, after all — Tron 3 might be on the horizon once again, but as always: “It’s just a matter of the right time and the right place and the stars aligning as they have to do for movies like that.” Until then — you can at least dive into some of the Daft Punk music from Tron Legacy:

This article was originally published on pionic.