Marvel Icons Get Amazing Variant Covers Based On 43-Year-Old Sci-Fi Smash Hit

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Forty-three years ago, the world was introduced to "The Grid," the special reality within the world of a video game in Tron, an iconic Disney science fiction film about a video game software engineer who finds himself transported into the world of his own video game (the grid, of course, was the standard design of most video games at the time). This was basically "What if you could enter the world of a video game?" but it was first conceived in the 1970s, when video games were a good deal less sophisticated than they would later become. Notably, the characters drove "light cycles" in the Grid, with the action involving a good deal of striking light effects.

The world of Tron is continuing with the upcoming Tron: Ares sequel film (the second sequel to the original film), and to celebrate this occasion, Marvel is featuring a series of special variant covers meant to honor and evoke the film's iconic designs (this is the second time Marvel has done a series of Tron variants, as the company also honored 2010's Tron: Legacy with variant covers).

What are the special Tron covers meant to symbolize?

The notable designs of Tron include a good deal of glowing character figures, and in the upcoming Tron: Ares, we see that Jared Leto will play Ares, a character designed within the world of The Grid who actually LEAVES the Grid and enters the "real" world in an attempt to gain the assistance of humanity with problems back in the Grid.

As the first true being of artificial intelligence to meet humanity, Ares is naturally a striking figure, and that will influence the covers. As Marvel noted in its press release regarding the covers:

Marvel’s greatest heroes are digitized and transported to the Grid! Inside this exhilarating cyber realm, Captain America, Scarlet Witch, Spider-Man and more become super powered Programs—racing Light Cycles and fighting for the Users! Drawn by some of the industry’s hottest artists, the covers debut sleek light suit designs that echo the film’s titular character, Ares, a highly sophisticated Program who is sent from the digital world into the real world on a dangerous mission.

There will be ten variant covers, all released in October, and Marvel has revealed a sneak peek at five of the covers ahead of time, including the Stephen Segovia Captain America cover shown above.