Gillian Anderson on Tron Ares (2025): Exploring the Weird Dillinger Legacy of Epic Villainy

In an interview with ScreenRant, Anderson talked about why the Dillinger family is always morally corrupt. In “Tron Ares,” Gillian Anderson plays Elizabeth Dillinger, the mother of Julian Dillinger, whose obsession with using technology to gain power leads to disaster. Anderson discussed why Julian might have ended up the way he did:

“Whether he’s known it or not, historically the Dillingers have not been completely morally sound in their actions . . . That must vibrate somewhere in the family history and dynamics he will have had. For me to have taken over the company and run it for 10 years and brought it up to where it sits profitability wise means that I probably wasn’t very present . . . So any of those things might have a bit of an impact, but he’s got a very fun playground and has taken the reign, so why not take advantage if he’s got the brain that he has and the capabilities that he has? Why not take advantage of it?”

Throughout “Ares,” Elizabeth cautions her son about letting himself get carried away with technology, but he doesn’t listen. Eventually, the corrupted program Athena kills Elizabeth while carrying out Julian’s orders to complete her mission “by any means necessary,” and Elizabeth gives the chilling last words to her son: “You did this.” It’s a moment that demonstrates how easy it is for technology to slip out of control, which has always been a theme in the “Tron” movies.

More About the Dillingers

Anderson’s points about “taking advantage of a fun playground” have always proven true for the Dillingers. In the first “Tron” movie, Ed Dillinger uses the Master Control Program for his own personal gain, but then the Master Control Program grows smart enough to blackmail Dillinger. In the sequel, “Tron Legacy,” the Dillingers aren’t as prominent, but we still have Ed Dillinger’s son running ENCOM with a corrupt hand, charging extravagant prices for an operating system that doesn’t improve on its predecessor and was originally meant to be free.

Final Thoughts

As I discussed in my review of “Tron Ares,” it’s easy to get swept up in technology, especially when greed is involved. While evil corporation heads are nothing new in Hollywood, we could all easily become the Dillingers with our dependence on technology and our attraction to the latest shiny toy. Cell phones, the internet, and AI are all “fun playgrounds,” as Anderson so aptly puts it, but if we aren’t capable, we can all get lost in those “playgrounds.”