The Cast of Tron: Legacy Appears at the 2010 San Diego Comic-Con

(San Diego, Calif.) For 30 minutes on a dreary Thursday morning, the Hilton Bayfront Hotel hosted the triumphant return of video game wizard Kevin Flynn. Jeff Bridges' alter ego in Tron, the Flynn character has been lost in cyberspace for more than 20 years, but Tron: Legacy, the long-awaited sequel, shows exactly what the eccentric genius has been doing for more than two decades.

Bridges, Bruce Boxleitner and other cast members fielded questions at a San Diego Comic Con press conference. Many new cast members were only toddlers when the original Tron arrived in theaters, which prompted some unusual responses from the actors. "It came out two years before I was born," Olivia Wilde said. "But I knew it was part of the culture. I was aware that videogames were a cool, retro thing. I knew that it was part of the zeitgeist. I always knew it was cool-and now it's getting cooler."

Garrett Hedlund, who plays Flynn's son Sam in the sequel, said he saw the original Tron in 2003 on a laptop somewhere overseas. "I just sat back and watched it and thought it was a trip. It was like nothing I had ever seen before, especially being 20 years old and it still played so well."

Tron: Legacy is a Story of a Son in Search of His Father

Although Bruce Boxleitner reprises his role of computer expert Alan Bradey, his love interest in the original film, Lori (Cindy Morgan), is noticeably absent. Director Joseph Kosinski fielded that question by saying this story really is a father/son story. "This is the story of Sam searching for his father, who disappeared into the ENCOM mainframe years before," he said.

When you make a movie, Kosinski said, you have to make difficult choices about what you are going to focus on. "For this story, we decided to focus on the story of Sam and Kevin Flynn, as well as an instrumental role in the Tron story, played by Alan Bradey. The character played by Cindy Morgan is in the 'Tron Universe,' just not in this particular story," he said.

"I kind of gave up on it"

Jeff Bridges, who finally took home an Oscar this year for Crazy Heart, said he had been hearing rumors about a Tron sequel for many years. "I kind of gave up on it," Bridges said. "Then, all of a sudden, this script showed up and Disney was going to have it on their back burners, but they were not satisfied, so they waited. And I am so happy they did because we got a good script, and they held out to find the right guy to do it-Joe (Kosinski)."

Boxleitner added that to work with Bridges again, to find out where these characters lived after all these years, intrigued him. "When I read the script, I had no idea that Alan Bradey was such a lost soul. It was such a great take on these characters, absolutely real," Boxleitner said,

Upgrades to the Iconic Tron suits

The one thing on everyone's mind was the new look to the classic suits worn in the computer universe. "It was totally revolutionary-it had never been done before," Wilde said. "We were wearing electro-luminescent lamps woven through layers of neoprene and other amazing materials. It was an honor to wear something that was changing the way that the scenes were lit, and opening us up to all these interesting possibilities."

Wilde said the effect for the actors was beautiful. "We would get really excited, once the suits turned on," she said. "You'd look around and say 'Gosh, this is really amazing.' And they made a cool sound, a sound that I loved." Boxleitner let everyone know how really far the Tron suits have evolved over 30 years. "All we had were spandex tights with magic marker," he said with a straight face.

"Tron: Legacy" arrives in theaters on December 17, 2010