I woke up from a nap today already possessed by the Pattern Recognizer, with this poem forming in my head, and I’ve been building onto it since then
It’s about my favorite Tron program, Ram– whom I see as an unprecedentedly beautiful merging of Wholesome Cinnamon Roll and Slutty Gay Twink and Math Geek and Badass Warrior, all conveyed within a criminally small amount of screen time for such a fantastically deep character
Which may be largely just projection on the part of my overactive Pattern Recognizer
Who also, in the course of generating this poem, may have managed to set my all-time record for in-text pun density (both dirty and nerdy and otherwise)
so that’s what’s down there under the cut. In case you need the warning.
(It might not even be done yet. The Recognizer has its own plans and will not share them with me.)
Aaaand, since this extreme pun density is at times obscure and since I have at least a few followers who have some difficulty getting my jokes… and, really, mostly, for the entertainment of my own extremely weird mind…
…I have gone to the trouble of making a line-by-line annotation of all the puns and references in the poem.
I am a truly bizarre person. But, I’ve been finding that this fandom is a place where I can be all the bizarre levels of who I am, and I’m taking this as a blessing.
—
A boy in the service of those he can trust
He fulfills all their wishes with love and with lust
(Reference to actor Dan Shor calling Ram a “boy in service,” the type of character who follows a strong leader and devotes himself to others)
He follows the watchdog who cares for the flock
(Reference to the scene where Alan uses the term “watchdog” to describe Tron’s function. Also further reference to Ram being a follower, and wordplay on his name by portraying him as a sheep and Tron as a livestock guardian dog who protects him)
Makes sure his desires are never code-blocked
He’ll service his circuits and pleasure his code
From the Little De-Rez to the Big Overload
(Just me shipping Ram and Tron, using some circuit-sex terminology from smutty fanfic. Overload is a popular way to refer to a program orgasm. “Little De-Rez” is one of my punny terms for orgasm, drawing from the real-world euphemism “little death,” and “derezzing” being a Tron word for death)
And the virus protection of such a program
Is sufficient safe sex for a diligent Ram
(Reference again to Tron being a system security monitor, thus being capable of keeping Ram safe from computer viruses)
Who’ll help fight the Trojans while out in the streets
And be gentle as Patroclus in the spreadsheets
(Managed to put three meanings on “Trojans” here. Pun on both Trojan-horse computer viruses and Trojan brand condoms– tying into the previous thought about safety from computer viruses being comparable to safe sex.)
(Then also bringing the metaphor into the Iliad, comparing Tron and Ram to the Greek mythological figures Achilles and his friend and alleged lover Patroclus, fighting the Trojan war.)
(Riffing on the template of “X in the streets, Y in the sheets” that is used to compare a person’s public life and sex life. Sheets changed to “spreadsheets” for the programming joke; Ram is an actuarial program for an insurance company, and spreadsheets are useful for financial calculations.)
While Achilles still lives, and till Caesar is dead
He’s there for the Circuits and there to be Bred
(Continuing the Greco-Roman metaphor into a pun on more circuit-sex and the term “bread and circuses” from Roman history)
He can’t have a child, but damn can he fork
He is both Machine Thot and Adorable Dork
(Continuing the pun about Ram being “bred,” to explain that he is not the type of program that can create a child-process, even though “forking” is the programming term for how that is done. In his case it is simply a pun on “fuck” and a reference to his sexual activity. Which is described as him being a Machine Thot, as a pun on “thot” meaning a promiscuous person, and “thought” as in the AI concept of “machine thinking”)
A Ram much more chill than the average Tron-Aries
The kindest and sweetest of all actuaries
(More reference to the sheep meaning of his name, as the Ram or male sheep is the symbol for the Aries sign in astrology. A mention of how Ram’s personality does not match the stereotype of someone with the Aries sign, and how he also does not resemble Jared Leto’s character named “Ares” in the upcoming “TRON: Ares” movie. Next line refers again to his function as an actuarial program.)
An abacus made to keep track of your checks
He can calculate needs and can solve them for X
An electrical sheep to be counted upon
By everyone else but especially Tron
(More reference to Ram being a financial calculator. First comparing him to the onscreen canon mention of an “abacus” that Alan uses to balance his checkbook. Then a reference to the title of Philip K Dick’s novel “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” A three-way pun on “counted upon,” indicating that Ram is both a dependable friend you can count on, and a program that performs numerical calculations– then also comparing him to sheep that can be counted to help you sleep.)
There are dreams in his head under delicate fleece
And his sweetest of dreams will be made of release
He’s looking for freedom with passion enthused
But he’s one of the ones who would like to get Used
And his Journey is planned with the Users at heart
(First line is a continuation of the reference to dreams and electric sheep, followed by four lines of reference to lyrics from Journey, a band involved in the TRON soundtrack. Specifically, “sweet dreams are made of this,” “everybody’s looking for something,” and “some of them want to be used by you.” Then an allusion to Journey’s name, and the fact that Ram wants to be “used” by the Users of Tron canon.)
And he’s gotten imprisoned for that from the start
So he figures as long as he’s locked in a cell
He’ll keep causing trouble and doing it well
‘cause he’d rather be hung for a sheep than a lamb
Or be hung like a sheep, like the horniest Ram
(Mentions of Ram’s imprisonment by the MCP for his loyalty to the Users. Headcanon that he became very sexually active during his imprisonment. Continuation of the sheep analogy, with the figure of speech “rather be hung for a sheep than a lamb,” which refers to the archaic punishment of hanging for sheep theft, and the reasoning that if one is going to risk death to steal a sheep one may as well pick a full-grown one. As a metaphor it refers to Ram being locked up for an unfair reason, and deciding he may as well actually misbehave while he’s there. Sexual puns on “hung” meaning both execution and genital endowment, and “horny” meaning both sexual arousal and having horns like a ram.)
With curly sweet horns like a cinnamon roll
too good for this world, like his innocent soul
(Continuation of the reference to ram’s horns, now comparing their coiled shape to the cinnamon roll in the meme about a sweet and innocent character being like “a beautiful cinnamon roll, too good for this world”)
For he’s loving and wholesome as well as a slut,
A shareware who shares both his heart and his butt
His open-source backend is random-access
And his binary bits always answer with Yes
(More punning on Ram’s sexual activity, this time with multiple programming terms: “shareware” being freely shared software, “open-source” being software that’s free to edit, and “backend” being behind-the-scenes code that… perhaps may be manifested in the Tron world as a program’s buttocks.)
(“Random access” is used here to indicate that Ram lets himself be freely accessed for sex. The pun is on random access memory, a term that probably has nothing to do with Ram’s actuarial function, though it shares the initials that form his name.)
(Binary bits, units of code indicating “yes” or “no,” are suggested here to be a pun on “bits” as slang for genitals, and “yes” as Ram’s general eagerness to consent to sex)
And he gets a great feeling from helping you plan
How he’ll give you great feelings, again and again
(Reference to Ram’s line about working with end-users at his job: “it gives you a great feeling helping folks plan for their future needs”)
From the soft of his wool to the hard of his horn
He’s a man with a plan and a Dan to be Shorn
(More sheep analogy and a pun on his actor Dan Shor)
And a friend with more benefits than you can shear
(Continuation of the pun on “Shorn,” past tense of “shear,” to remove wool from a sheep. Comparing it to how one gets “benefits” from friendship with Ram– who is both a “friend with benefits” in the sense of one who will have sex with his friends, and one who will help them get insurance benefits.)
And his love’s an annuity year after year
(More reference to Ram’s line about his insurance job: “if you think of the payments as an annuity over the years”)
A brilliant warrior quick with the disk
And a math nerd who’s quicker to calculate risk
An accounting cream puff who can slice you in two
Or save you on premiums, that’s up to you
(Reference to Ram being skilled at using the disk weapon, even though his function is calculating probabilities in order to set insurance premiums. Reference to Sark’s derisive line about fighting “accounting cream puffs,” suggesting that one does not usually see financial programs with Ram’s level of skill.)
(Up to fifteen percent and some more than that too)
(He’s a robot that even the gecko would do)
Because Ram can do anything– how about you?
(Final reference to another charismatic insurance-selling character, the gecko from GEICO commercials, who offers to “save you 15% or more.” Specifically, a reference to one early commercial in which the gecko was asked to “do the robot”– which is in fact a dance, not a request to “do” –in the sense of “have sex with”– an actual artificial intelligence, as the pun suggests.)