They enter the video rental store.
“You can each pick out one movie,” Sam says.
Tron’s already looking at the rom-coms. After he caught the last hour of Failure to Launch on TV last Thursday, he’s been curious about the “strange” and “insufferable” ways Users court each other. And even after Sam carefully explained to him that Failure to Launch is fictional and not, in fact, a realistic examination of heterosexual relationships, Tron had insisted that he needed to understand the romantic rituals of these terrible people.
Quorra, however, glances around the store with a frown, and she turns to Sam with barely concealed dissatisfaction. “Where are the VHS tapes?” she asks.
“VH—? Oh my god,” Sam says. “Oh my god.” Of course she doesn’t know what a DVD or Blu-Ray is. Some of his dad’s last points of reference to home entertainment were the format wars and the Sega Genesis. Quorra’s most up-to-date information about User cultures includes Betamax cassettes and Arnold Palmer Tournament Golf. “Quorra, no one really uses VHS tapes anymore. It’s kind of an outdated format. You’d have better luck looking in a Goodwill than here.”
“Then let’s go to a Good Will,” Quorra says.
Before he can reply, Tron returns with movies—plural.
“I want to rent these,” Tron says.
He holds the cases up for Sam to examine. Ghosts of Girlfriends Past. How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. The Wedding Planner. And, for some reason, Surfer, Dude.
“These are all Matthew McConaughey movies,” Sam points out.
Tron gets a Certain Look in his eyes. “Yes. I know.”
“Oh, god—fine, we’ll get all of them. But you better finish them before the two weeks are up.”
Something in the way Tron grins tells him that that won’t be a problem.
“Can we go to Good Will now?” Quorra asks.
They rent the movies at the counter and then go to the nearest Goodwill. Quorra immediately zooms toward the VHS tapes when she sees them. Sam follows her as Tron wanders toward the clothes.
She kneels on the floor and gazes at the assortment of tapes before she pulls a clamshell copy of Shrek from the shelf. She holds it almost reverently, awe apparent on her face, and she carefully opens it to reveal the cassette within.
“It’s beautiful,” she quietly says.
“Do you wanna get it?” Sam asks.
She looks at him, tears in her eyes. “Yes,” she replies.
They go to the checkout line. Tron meets them there, several obnoxiously patterned button-up shirts of varying sizes in his arms. As they wait, Sam realizes that the only choices Tron and Quorra will approve of for movie night tomorrow are either a Matthew McConaughey film or Shrek. This trip was a mistake.