Escape Characters

He fights for the users...

You know, I've spent two hours last night and today trying to figure out why I liked "TRON." I watched it, amazingly, for the first time all the way through yesterday. My normal reaction to movies that have anything to do with computers is to throw my hands up in disgust. But not with "TRON." And it was made three years before I was even born. And I'm trying to figure out why.

My attempt at solving this problem led me to revisit (and I list them here because I had written paragraphs on each before I gave up): "I, Robot," "A.I.: Artificial Intelligence," and "2001: A Space Odyssey."

I can find issue with any film that has to do with computers. No really: ask me about "Transformers" and quantum computers if you ever see me at a party. Extra points if I'm intoxicated. You will not be disappointed.

But what is important about these four films is that rather than exploiting computers as plot devices or comic relief, they are instead characters unto themselves, either fantastical personifications thereof, or physical implementations given shape and sound to be everything except for human.

So, in all my confusion and frustration, I'm finding that the movies I like best about computers are the ones that show me computers not as they are, but as I dream the could be, or as I sometimes think they are. Because honestly, if somebody made a movie about how they really are, it would be me, and whoever I convinced that it was a prequel to "Transformers."