Early concept art of Tron from "Art of Tron" by Michael Bonifer (1982)
it's astounding to me how simultaneously the early concept art shares a lot of aesthtics with the final designs (esp the weird football-like padding) while being. so vastly different. tron's so hilariously macho in this. HES HOLDING A GUN.
we've also got the 3 hit combo of armor abs + design motifs that resemble nipples + CODPIECE. it's an interesting relic, but good god is it a mess. I do wonder if the helmet inspired some of syd mead and moebius's later concepts.
3/10 glad they didn't go with this.

Blip Magazine Issue 05 (1983)
what is up with people giving him the most sculpted jaw line. calm down!
Rating: 4/10

TRON SPINNER, Disney Channel Magazine Issue 1 (1983)
Straight from the inagural issue of Disney Channel Magazine! I'm going to share a link to the archive dot org scan of this magazine because it's such a weird time capsule of tron stuff. It's worth a look if you're weird in the same way I am and like to find obscure media for the niche shit you like.
Anyway! back to this. It's a spinner from the cut out board game that was included in the magazine. sure. that's a tron alright. pretty good one too. Honestly, not much more to say beyond that.
Rating: 7/10

Tron, 20th Anniversary Edition DVD release (2002)
I am so ridiculously excited about this entry. It seems like Disney did do a little advertisement push to celebrate it, as evidence by little remnants like the fake advertisement banner at the top of this page and things like this random news clip. However, the most fascinating thing to come from it I've found so far is this: the DVD Opening/Menu for the 20th Anniversary edition. I am in love with this thing. There's a lot of effort and detail put into it! I actually wasn't able to fit the full clip above (I had a lot of trouble getting the recording uploaded to places, fsr), so I encourage people to check out the Archive dot Org upload as it includes audio, a stylish, cool advertisement for Tron 2.0 and a few seconds of extra animation from the DVD menu I had to cut out.
but to the rating: what a good tron. very impressed with this model considering it's absolutely unnecessary. there was no reason they needed to make something this nice and polished in 2002 for a dvd menu. and yet...!!! the proportions on this tron are good. outfit is accurate. the face is a little bit funky and he's got some weird head animation going on that's giving him a bit of nerd neck. to my untrained eye it looks like they did some sort of motion tracking or rotoscoping for the throw but didn't animate the head (or the fingers, for that matter). also, tragically, they nerfed his ass. always a tragedy to see hank hill ass tron.
HOWEVER, i am so impressed by this hidden gem I cant help but adore it.

Rating: 8.5/10!! Also, this is the 69th entry on my list. Nice.

Tronçonneuse Thermique 25cm³
Saviez-vous que le mot français pour "chainsaw" est tronçonneuse ? Je ne l'ai pas fait, jusqu'à ce que je cherche dans Archive dot Org d'autres Trons à classer et que je sois inondé de manuels d'utilisation de tronçonneuse. Les hyperliens ont mutilé la cédille, il m'a donc fallu un peu de temps pour comprendre qu'il n'y avait pas de fabricant de tronçonneuse appelé "tron" mais que "tron" est dans le mot tronçonneuse. Vous apprenez quelque chose de nouveau chaque jour ! Soit dit en passant, ceci est traduit par une machine. Je m'excuse, mon français est limité à "ça va", "merde", et comme une poignée d'autres phrases. La plupart d'entre eux grossiers. Je suis sûr que Google Translate va mutiler ça. Quoi qu'il en soit, où en étais-je ? Oh oui. Les tronçonneuses sont la putain de règle.
Rating: 9/10

Tron Action Figure Prop from Tron: Legacy (2010)
Now, this is a prop of the Tron from Tron: Legacy which IF YOU REMEMBER, I gave a 6/10.... however. I think this looks a LOT better LOL. like it feels like it captures bruce's likeness more accurately, to be honest! also I love it. I would have paid miss michael mouse money for this. Where can I cop it, Disney. I need more plastic versions of my special boy....
Rating: 7/10

Tron Deadly Discs for the Intellevision (1982)
wow! there he is. in all his pixelated glory. its THE trong.
Rating: 1/10

Poster for the Thai release of Tron (1982) by artist Tongdee Panumas. Poster scan/image credit to Film on Paper
This poster is utterly gorgeous. I'm in love with how vivid the color pallet is, its so rich. Like the composition is just really well done. I've heard of Thai film posters as a cool thing before, but admittedly I dont know much about how or why they were made (versus just using the promo posters from Disney or whatever). But they're incredibly unique, and in this case, really beautiful. Sure, the likenesses aren't 100%. Yori's face in the center shot looks PARTICULARLY messed up... but the composition really steals the show and gives any other wonkiness a pass, in my opinion. There's so much subtle detail - like did you notice the faint red accents on Tron's circutry in the zoom in? Really stellar stuff. I like this quite a bit, even if the faces are funky. And if there's a random, unrelated sexy shot of Cindy Morgan that has nothing to do with the movie. The most important part is that there's heart, effort, and a good vibe here that gets a thumbs up from me.
Rating: 9/10

Poster for the UK release of Tron (1982) Poster scan/image credit to Film on Paper
This one impresses me less so. It's not as creative as the Thai poster, more just an interpretation of the standard poster design. It's not terrible, i quite like the general composition and how it blends together. But i just don't find it as compelling. Vibes aren't there. Maybe because this one has a slightly more "airbrushed" quality to it which I personally don't care for. It's not bad though, like I'd hang this up in a room if I had a print. Tron's got a case of the funky face tho. He looks more like the MCP than he does Bruce...
Rating: 7/10

Mattel Aquarius Cartridge instructional booklet for Tron Deadly Discs (1982)
look at this fuckin guy. he's in eternal pain and anguish, etched on his stony face. hes got club elbow. the strange rendering of shadows in the crotchal region is giving him egg-dick. hand is exploding into a supernova.
Rating: 4/10

Japanese Laser Disc release of Tron
so. at first glance you may think like i did "isnt that purple backlit tr-" no its not. this one's its own illustration. i think it might be used elsewhere, idfk, but that is one of the scariest fucking trons i have ever seen. ive seen a LOT. this tron came out so wrong. im so scared of him. also the T isnt even remotely right.
Rating: -1/10 ive seen this man and his super smooth eyebrow ridge in my nightmares.

Mercury in TRON: The Ghost in the Machine (2006-2008)
I kept this off the list for a while because technically this isn't Tron -- it's Mercury from Tron 2.0 appearing with some of Tron's motifs. But then I put a literal chainsaw on this list and was like okay let's stop being silly.
This isn't the best picture showing off her outfit, I know, but you're going to have to deal with it because I hate this fucking comic SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO much I'd rather eat glass than read through it again. Even going through my screenshots I took from it got my blood pressure to rise. Anyway. Mercury. I do have a soft spot for her. Especially since [SPOILERS FOR A VIDEO GAME THAT CAME OUT NEARLY 20 YEARS AGO] she's in some ways a spiritual sister to Tron and I think that's cute. So its cute that this SHIT comic did put her in this little Tron-like oufit. Unfortunately, I think the coloring for the outfit is quite bad, though the lineart of the outfit isn't atrocious. Unfortunately it is from a comic i despise, I'm the pettiest bitch alive, and so I am deducting further points due to association.
Rating: 2/10

D23 Expo Collectable Tron Pin (2011?)
PIN TIME!!! I see this one on Ebay a lot. From what I gather, it was some collectable merch sold at early D23 Expos (one listing said they found it in 2011, but there's a chance it could have been present in 2009 as well). Anyway, its cute! I like the packaging. I think this is a really iconic motif from the poster to make pins out of. It's a bit hard to get a great look at the pins since the enamel outline is a little mirror-y. I will say I don't think Yori looks all that great - her head seems a little too big to me. But we're not rating Yori! We're rating our special little electronic boy. The outfit looks... okay... but difficult to see how the face is doing because of that reflection. I'm giving this a tentative:
Rating: 5/10

DisneyShopping.com -Disney Movies Proof Series (2005?)
Yeah okay so this is basically the same pin as above but shittier. Tron looks a little too lanky. Details on the circuitry aren't as good. Face? There is no face. That's not a face thats just like. An image arrayed in a way that causes the cluster of neurons in ur brain that recognize patterns associated with faces to light up very dimly. Not awful, but pretty bad.
Rating: 3/10

Small English Tron Domed Pin (Date Unknown)
Yes you read that right! English Tron! No but for real, I could find barely anything about these pins. I was able to find an entry for one of them on PinPics, which is a Disney Pin trading/documenting website, but there's very little info there besides that these do seem to be legitimate Disney pins and they were made in England - hence the "Small English Tron" name.
Yeah so these pins.. theyre scary. Like especially the one with Tron standing w/ his hands on his hips. His eyes are scary. This is not the nice program that fights for the users. That Tron is gonna kill me in my sleep. That SAID... for being Tiny English Domed Pins with representations of Tron on them... not the worst thing ever? Or maybe I'm losing my mind.
Rating: 4/10

Countdown to the Millennium Pin #29 (1999)
Ahh Y2K! I love fun celebratory stuff like this from the 90s. I find this really intriguing too. According to one apocryphal ebay listing, this line of pins was one of Disney's first attempts at a pin collecting + trading type format. Which, if true, is neat. Though for full transparency: I did not check any sources about the history of Disney Pin Trading so I can't verify the authenticity of this. (A note: Unless its specifically Tron related, I am not really pressed to verify info. I will try my best to verify anything Tron related I post here, though!)

ANYWAY I digress. Back to Tron. Here's the deal: this pin rules. I like it a lot. If you have this pin and want to sell it I mean hey please drop me a line. Seriously, my email address can be found on my home page. Let me know what you think of this list too while you're at it!
Unfortunately for the Tron on this pin, he looks quite bad. Circuitry's all messed up. Colors aren't right. His face looks like.. well to invoke the language of the old gods, "derpy." Yep, that's a bad Tron alright.
Rating: 2/10

Disney Catalog - Tron Commemorative Pin Set (2003?)
MORE PINS! Okay so I have a lot to say more about the pinset than this particular pin itself. Let's just go ahead and review the Tron. he sucks. face is bad. Circuitry isn't the worst though, tbh it's better than the above example. But overall, you and I both know this is mid.
Rating: 2/10

Okay let me just take a moment to talk about the entire release. There's not too many good pics of it online, which is why all the pictures for this entry look a little funky, I grabbed them from an ebay listing. But this is a super cute collectable! Its release date seems to be 2003 from the few listings I've found (unfortunately unable to find primary/verified info of its release date)... and if this was released in 2003, it makes me wonder if this release was related to the 20th anniversary of Tron's release (which occurred in 2002) or Tron 2.0 (releaed in 2003). Unsure! Either way, this is a cute little set. I especially LOVE that it says "A Product of ENCOM" on the back. Oh my gosh I love when Encom is treated like a real company. Sparks joy. Neat little release!

Tron Assault on MCP Board Game by Ideal Toy Company (1981)
PIN TIME IS OVER. Now for something I find REALLY interesting...
This is the cover to the board game created by a toy company named Ideal... in 1981. That's right! This came out before the movie! I find this super interesting, especially since Tron came out in July of 1982. I'm not sure the exact date this board game came out on, but checking a scan of the included instruction booklet -- yep, published date is indeed 1981. That's neat. COOL even.

Well, cool if you're a weird little guy like me that is endlessly fascinated by how the media you like is produced and reproduced. This board game offers a little glimpse into how the movie was developed. There's a few quirky things about this board game I noticed. For example, the playable characters are Tron, Flynn, Yori and Dumont. Tron and Flynn I understand, Yori I'm surprised (only because its 1980s and any inclusion of a woman in a toy/frannchise almost certainly considering boys as their main demographic is surprising, but appreciated), and Dumont which is super weird since he's in his weird penis chair for most of the movie. Or strapped to a wall. Why not Ram? Shrug, we'll never know.


Notice that the light cycles look different from the movie?

The other thing that stands out to me is the art on the cover. We'll get to ranking that tron in a moment. But for now, focus on Sark. His face is really stylized, even compared to the other characters on the box art. If you're really into Tron he might even look a little familiar. That's because the Sark on the board game's cover is a straight copy of the concept art Mœbius produced for Sark, lol. Here's a crop of it for comparison:



Yori's depiction looks familiar to me as well, though off the top of my head I can't place where else the pose has been produced. If I find it, I'll add an update here. Tron's pose looks really familiar as well -- I swear I've seen it on an Atari of Intellevision box before. But a quick search of my resources yielded nothing so again, I'll leave my speculation here and provide an update later should I have one. Dumont is the only one of the four on the box that does not resemble any art I've come across previously, though I wouldn't be surprised to learn all of them are from reused concept art considering this was produced before the movie was released.

Which brings us to our Tron. He's not great. We have return of the insane cheek bones and very square jaw which I dislike. However, I'm a little more lenient with this entry than others since it very well could have been made without anyone on the game's production team having access to actual content from the movie. Though partially traced, I find the box overall to be very appealing, colorful, and visually striking. I'm a fan! I don't hate this Tron.
Rating: 5.5/10

Kubrick TRON, by MediCom Toy Inc (2002)
Oh my god I forgot to rank the Kubrick Tron. I'm going to use the excuse of "I'm very sad I don't own these" to handwave why it took me this long into my list to rank them. These are very good. I like them quite a bit. I like that the plastic isn't solid white so it gives them this "glowy" effect. I like that they painted on all the circuits. This is. really cute. And I want one quite badly. I'm also biting my knuckle looking at the light cycles, I know they're not the point of this list, but oh my gosh I love how they look AND they come with jet walls AND the jet walls have a little 90° angle in them to represent a turn like in the movies..... this whole set is so good.

I think this is also a great example of how you can stylize Tron and still make it look good/capture his vibe. Contrast this with the Minimates Tron, which has a similar blocky appearance. Ignoring the jaundiced appearance, the Minimates Tron is very lanky looking. The abdomen is very blocky, but the limbs have more roundness to them that leaves the figure looking weird. Meanwhile this Kubrick Tron has a shape that flows a lot better thanks to the "brick"-like silhouette. There's ample room to recreate his circuitry details, and the determined look on his face fits the character quite well. I think this goes to show you don't need a Tron to be "accurate" for it to be appealing or fit the character. Anyway. Somebody please buy this for me I'm begging yo-
Rating: 8/10

Bonus points: 1) The inclusion of an "ENCOM" logo on the packaging, once again acting like it's a real company, 2) this "wireframe" variant that I think is REALLY neat. That light cycle is gorgeous.

Movieland Vinylmation series (2016)
Oh my god oh my god oh my god oh my god this fucking thing is legitimately so fucking FUNNY to me that when i saw it I had to grit my teeth until tears started flowing out of my eyes because I was trying to choke back laughter. Its so bad its so bad I love it its so awful I have to own one of these. I'm obsessed. It's all down to its squat little face and body. The detail here is actually passable but oh my GOD it looks SO bad shoved onto the chode-like body of the Vinylmation sculpt. AND THAT FAAAACEEEEE THAT FUCKING FACE. Every time I look at it I start laughing. My fiance just left to go pick up dinner so I can finally laugh outloud and i keep minimizing and unminimizing the widow for this thing and looking at it and laughing really hard. Its so fucking bad! But hold on, there's a semi-transparent colored plastic varaint. Hold on guys. maybe this thing can redeem the entry. Let's take a look:



AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Rating: 1/10

I am going to give a shoutout to Steven Miller, Senior Manager of the WDW External Affairs and writer for the official Disney Parks Blog whose 2015 post is what made me aware of the Vinylmation Tron releases. If you want to see something even more horrifying than this, look up Castor's Vinylmation release. It's nightmareish.

Tron Jewelry Pins (1982)
O-Oh jesus christ are those... are those supposed to be TRON??? These are very scary and I dislike them. Those do not look like Tron. He doesn't even have a nose in one of those pins. For some reason, they look like they would taste like fruit gummies. That said, pease keep these away from me.
Rating: 1.5/10

Disney Mirrorverse (2022)
Okay bear with me as I work through this, the edible is starting to kick in.
This is very interesting looking. At first I was going to write off this Tron right off the bat, but friend and twitter mutual Brie explained that the dramatic redesign is part of Disney Mirrorverse's style. So I will not be regarding this entry in the same way I did the Disney Heroes: Battle Mode Tron. Instead, I will judge it by the super duper objective, 100% scientific, "Trust Me I'm A Scientist IRL" criteria of if I feel the costume adequately captures Tron's vibes (and does it look good doing it). In some ways, this combination feels a little reminiscent of Tron 2.0's design aesthetics as well, though this is not to imply there's much else in this design that seems directly inspired by the game (nor would I expect it to). I will note it feels more "robotic" than his other iterations (note what appear to be seam/welding lines just below his collar bone area), but I quite like this interpreation.
On the aspect of vibes, yes I think this Tron captures the vibes tremendously. I find this redesign quite impressive. It has a clear mix of the original 1982 suit design (Note the back circuitry, disc attachment area, and im not kidding when i say this but his butt), with the volume and shaping of his "legacy" outfit (note the front of the helmet and padding around the chest and back in particular), while still being unique and new (the color scheme, back of the helmet, and identity disc in particular are all unique to this design).
However, I think it falls just short in the looks department. While I think the outline and design of the suit is compelling, I think the all-navy color scheme looks kind of bad. I would have liked to see a more contrasting color chosen for the suit's accents or have different textures to break up the pattern like many of the outfits in Legacy. Also man that identity disc looks like someone took an aluminum pie tin and dipped it in blue radioactive sluge. Not a fan.
Overall, I find this a refreshingly unique take on Tron that captures his general vibe as a character, while paying homage to the Trons that have come before it.
Rating: 9/10

Now that the ratings are finished, heres a few other things I saw about his character in Mirrorverse that tickled me:

I'm glad to see the classic disc holding pose has once again made a return as icon art :)

huh? tron can control like bug swarms now? fuck yeah dude sure whatever. love that for you.

Tron costume from TRON: The ISO War (Roblox Game) (2021)
I decided early on I wouldn't include fan created content for this list, for a few reasons: 1) I don't feel comfortable judging fan created content because, to me, it can easily verge into bashing skill which I don't want to do to any genuine form of artistic expression, 2) Reposting fan art/content without permission is wrong, 3) I think its funnier and more interesting (for the context of this list) to review shit that was produced under some faucet of marketing/capitalism (that is, Disney official/sanctioned depictions, professional images like magazine covers or movie posters, or parodies of Tron) than an expression of pure interest/investment by a fan, 4) theres too much fan content to sift through.
*INHALES*
THAT SAID
My dear friend Gecko requested this personally. Who am I to refuse a request from a dear friend?
Oh god okay so this is a costume in a Roblox game. I dont know anything about Roblox, because unfortunately I am an out of touch late-millennial. So I'm judging this on visuals alone. We're going to have to ignore the :D head as well btw, as much as I want to include it in the ranking, apparently its just some default preview face. Not Tron-exclusive. Shame! All I can really say about this, the only phrase my mind will let me say, is "why do the circuits on this outfit give him a camel toe?" Happy Pride.
Rating: (N/A)/10

Inflatable Tron from Walt Disney's Magic Kingdom On Ice (1983)
The noise I made when I saw this thing on twitter. I adore him. This is so cute its unreal. He looks so fucked up, but in an indescribable way that I find ridiculously endearing. Maybe its the pose - the iconic little triumphant hoist of his identity disc attempted to be recreated in soft plastic and given depth with air. Maybe its the fact that he's entirely this pastel, desaturated baby blue. But probably it's his face. His off-putting round head and painted on facial features, with way too sculpted cheek bones and soft eyes that stare into your soul. I'm not kidding I love this fucking thing so much I'm typing it in to ebay as we speak and if I cant find him and buy him for myself I may cry, scream, throw up, etc.
Rating: 3/10 He's terrible, and I love him with my whole heart.
Additionally, I want to share some of the pages from the Walt Disney's Magic Kingdom On Ice traveling show's 1983 booklet, originally posted to twitter by user @bioreconstruct. I just found out about these but I'm obsessed. I HAVE to know more and see more. The costumes for this are so good it's making me go crazy. If you have any info you'd care to share, well, you can find ways to contact me plastered all over this website so drop me a line!

Walt Disney's Magic Kingdom On Ice Souvenir Pennant Flag (1983)
So, bad news, couldn't find an inflatable Tron. Crying, screaming, throwing up. Ecetera. HOWEVER my search DID reveal this to me! A souvenir pendant flag displaying Tron trying to derezz Captain Hook. Funny, laughed. Also trying to be very normal about the fact they put little ice skates on him. That's so cute. Anyway rating time! He really looks like a robot here with the way his face is drawn. I think the general design is pretty cute and accurate, however I will have to deduct points for nuking his ass like they did. He's as flat as Hank Hill back there. Regardless of the posterior, overall this is a good, if overall average, Tron.
(also i hope this isn't against neocities TOS oopsies if it is but i'm gonna strangle the person listing this for $130 on ebay. They are keeping this tron from me and its honestly quite homophobic)
Rating: 4/10

Walt Disney's Magic Kingdom On Ice Souvenir Inflatable "Magic Zoom Disc" (1983)
Heyyy I know that Tron! Or at least, I think I do? That looks very similar to the art from Tomy's Tron figurine/handheld toy. I doubt it's by the same artist, but its interesting that they share the same style. Anyway, your guess as to what a "Magic Zoom Disc" is will be as good as mine. What. What the hell is a magic zoom disc?
Rating: 2/10

Tron Pop-Up Book (1982)
Every time I think I've exhausted all sources of new Trons, I find something that makes me go "oh, duh, of course Disney made a Tron promotional thing out of that." Here we have a pop-up book from 1982! While I don't think the Tron in it looks particularly.... let's say "good" in the face department, I think the art for this is really nice! The color pallets are really pretty, and I like how stylized it is. Gets a thumbs up from this weirdo!
Rating: 5/10

Bearbrick Be@rbrick Series 6 100% Tron SF, by MediCom Toy Inc (2003)
Swear to god I had this one on the list -- but looking back nope! I got the standard Kubrick by MediCom, but totally missed the Be@rbrick. Anyway look at these cute lil guys! The packaging of the purple-clear version is so good. I'm a sucker for packaging that's made by someone who clearly loves Tron. Obviously, this is a case where I can't judge this Tron based off how similar it looks to the lil guy because the Be@rbricks have a stylized mould that's meant to be.. well. A little bear! I think this is a really great translation of Tron, a better adaption than other stylized vinyl toys (COUGH VINYLMATION COUGH). Yeah, don't know what else to say here besides "lookin good"
Rating: 6/10

Tron Pook-a-Looz (Unreleased, ~2010-2011)
Here is a rare find from friend and frequent supplier of rare Trons, MewtwoWarrior!! And what an interesting find it is. According to this Jim Hill post from 2010, the Pook-a-Looz were a line of plushies styilized in a cute, blocky way. A few different lines with different characters seemed to have been released until the line was retired... well, I'm not sure when the line was retired, but I can't find much (emphasis on much, we'll get back to that later) information about Pook-a-Looz post-2010. Okay. Now where this gets more relevant to my interests is regarding the unreleased Tron plushies, shown above.
From the same Jim Hill post linked above, a quote by Pook-a-Looz lead designer Jose Zamora and John Mallett, director of plush for Disney Consumer Products:

“Come this Fall, we’ll be introducing some new characters,” Mallet explained. “And then – if those sell well and everything goes according to plan – after that, every eight weeks or so, there’ll be a new assortment Pook-A-Looz hitting store shelves.”
And given how popular those “Alice in Wonderland” Pook-A-Looz became just as Tim Burton’s “Alice in Wonderland” was rolling into theaters … Well, is it any wonder that – just as “TRON Legacy” makes its debut in Disney Digital 3D this December, that there should be some TRON-themed Pook-A-Looz hitting store shelves?
“Those plushes were a lot of fun to design,” Zamora said. “To show that these Pook-A-Looz were supposedly made up of pixels, I actually made the eyes of all of the TRON plushes square-shaped.”

So, according to Jim's article, which covers the release of Pook-a-Looz in Spring of 2010, Tron Pook-a-Looz were being planned around the the line's original release. And, oestensibly, it would have been coming out shortly - after all, they're going to release Pook-a-Looz every eight weeks! .... Right?
Clearly, that did not happen. I'm unsure how many, if any, new Pook-a-Looz were made after the initial release. The tumblr post that contains the above images of what I'm guessing are prototype Pook-a-Looz Tron and Sark is time stamped as being posted on April 2011 - one year after the above interview. While the original link in the post is broken, I was able to find a semi-archived webcrawl capture from 2013 of the website it links to. There, it lists the Tron Pook-a-Looz under "Other Future Releases".
Thinking of it now, one part of the Jim Hill interview stands out to me. Jim asks about the possibility of Tron Pook-a-Looz releasing in the future, but Zamora responds in a way that implies the plushies might be visible to the public. Like he's refernecing the plushies in the past tense. Does that make sense? I bring this up because it makes me wonder if the Jim Hill Article is the source of the prototype plushie picture. Unfortunately, embeds for pics on the page are all broken and there's no internet archive backup so I shall never know. These little Pook-a-Looz will remain a mystery...

...wait what was I doing? RIGHT shit oh my god I was supposed to rank this Tron. Well obviously, this is so stupidly cute. I would pay good money for this little bastard (DO YOU HEAR ME, POWERFUL RAT?). I'm screaming, crying, throwing up, etc over the fact that I can't get this little guy. I love his shiny circuits and "face with one eyebrow raised emoji" expression. Mostly, I just want a cute lil tron plush. There's still time to release this, Disney. Someone get Zamora on the phone!
Rating: 7/10

EDIT/UPDATE!
The wonderful MewtwoWarrior coming in clutch yet again! She was able to find some more concrete evidence that implies the Tron Pook-a-Looz were likely scrapped in early 2011. In this blog post from April 2011, the author writes the following:

Disney Living’s Facebook Page held a poll of five contenders for the newest Pook-a-looz. Tron was one of them. The picture is from a fan taken at a Disney sale of prototypes. Meaning that they most likely either scrapped the idea or made new designs. Let’s hope for a release with the DVD / Blu-Ray!

The link to the blog that found the prototype isn't archived.... except psych! MewtwoWarrior found the messy RSS feed that details how the Pook-a-Looz prototype was discovered! Link to the RSS can be found here, though note the text is white on white so you will need to highlight to see. I've copied the relevant information from the relevant entry (with HTML removed to display properly here):

At a recent sample sale, I managed to find a very unique Pook-a-looz. I'd actually seen it before when I visited my friend working in Toys. It was pinned up to the wall, and was a candidate to be sent to the production line.
I was digging in giant pile of plush, when my friend pulled out a Tron Pook-a-looz. She threw it at my face and I quickly snatched it up. I showed this to my co-w0rker, a giant Tron fan, and he instantly became enraged as I told him that it might possibly be the one out of two samples that existed in the world. He went straight to the sample sale, and managed to find the other Tron pook-a-looz. So there you have it, Clu and Master Controller together at last.
*Edit : I don't think these Tron Pook-a-Looz will go into production. A source has told me that these were never picked up by a retailer. I can see why.

Well folks, there you have it! Unfortunately, the embedded image of what the poster found is broken (of course) but looking at the URL the image was posted in December 2010, meaning the Tron Pook-a-Looz was axed before the end of the same year the plush line began. Harsh, too, considering Tron: Legacy released that same month!

That brings this mini-mystery to as much of a close as we can muster. ExperimentalElegance, if you're out there, please sell me your Tron Pook-a-Looz prototype. And MASSIVE thank you again to MewtwoWarrior for finding all of this information - you rock, Sarah!!

The Pointer Sisters: Neutron Dance (1985)
HELL OKAY from what I could make out of the grainy footage I don't think Tron himself is technically in it, but to be honest this is so unique and weird I would feel remiss if I didn't share. It's such a strange mish-mash of stuff, of course it could only be from a Disneyland 30th Anniversary Special. But WOW look at all those people in Tron costumes. And in 1985! That's kind of late for Tron stuff. Combing through the footage, most of the outfits seem to be based on Ram's costume design and some of the Guards. Anyway, really cute!! Get down you funky little Programs!
Rating: N.A/10
Thank you to MewtwoWarrior for recommending this video!

TRON Uprising - Opening animatic (~2010) animatic by Stephane Coedel; art by Alberto Mielgo and Rob Valley
Counting this one separate from your standard Uprising Tron because he looks different - a lot more like Bruce than the final model does. I think that's cool! Though, I'll be honest, I'm not super in love with this stylization. Purely a personal preference thing. I can't bring myself to be too harsh on it, though.
Rating: 8/10

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