Emmy winner Evan Peters, who is expected to win his second Emmy this fall for his turn as serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, is set to join Oscar winner Jared Leto in Disney’s Tron: Ares.
Joachim Rønning will direct the sequel, which was written by Jesse Wigutow and Jack Thorne. THR broke the news of Peters’ casting, and the trade reports that Ares will move the Tron franchise out of the computer realm, as it’s said to focus on the emergence of a sentient program that crosses over into the human world.
Leto will play Ares, the physical manifestation of the program, while Peters will play the film’s villain, according to sources.
Leto is producing Tron: Ares with Emma Ludbrook and Jeffrey Springer, while Russell Allen is executive producing. Disney has been trying to mount a new Tron movie for more than a decade, with Tron: Legacy characters slated to return at one point before the studio pivoted away from that idea. Ares is now poised to finally start production in August in Vancouver.
Steven Lisberger directed the original Tron movie starring Jeff Bridges and Bruce Boxleitner, while Garrett Hedlund and Olivia Wilde starred in Joseph Kosinski‘s Tron: Legacy, which grossed $400 million worldwide.
It’s a bit odd that Peters would take all the goodwill he earned with his Dahmer performance and “spend” it on a new Tron movie that audiences seem fairly indifferent toward, but perhaps the script offers him the chance to play some new notes as an actor. After all, he has already tackled superhero movies, having played Quicksilver in three X-Men movies.
In addition to Dahmer, which won him a Golden Globe and will surely bring him another Emmy nomination next month, Peters recently won both an Emmy and a Golden Globe for his supporting turn as Kate Winslet‘s partner in HBO’s acclaimed limited series Mare of Easttown. He’s represented by CAA.
