Temperature Reading is a new feature here at Cinematical where we'll check in with a film months before its release to gauge the audience temperature and see whether or not the early buzz is sticking enough to heat up your anticipation meter.

I decided to choose Tron: Legacy as the first film in our Temperature Reading series because Disney is obviously trying to get way out ahead of this one in the hopes they can turn the sequel to an early '80s cult-ish film into the movie everyone must see come December 17th. Though Tron: Legacy is poised to hit theaters the same weekend as Avatar did in 2009, both studios are taking different approaches to their marketing campaigns. 20th Century Fox didn't truly start marketing Avatar until the middle of the summer, and then by fall they were blanketing the world with Avatar promos -- all of which obviously paid off since the film now holds the all-time record at the box office.

Disney, however, have begun unspooling their Tron: Legacy marketing roughly nine whole months before the film hits theaters. Not only have they already launched a massive viral campaign that spawned an IMAX screening of the film's latest trailer in 3D in various cities across the world this past weekend, but they're also releasing images and announcing TV spin-off cartoons in the hopes of building a Tron brand that will hopefully spread it across the public consciousness enough to at least turn Tron: Legacy into a mega hit and potentially their next big movie franchise.

But is it working ... yet? Take our poll after the jump ...

Chances are most of the "Dark Knight Generation" haven't even seen the original Tron, and unfortunately the sequel doesn't have any big enough names to immediately draw attention to it (and no, Jeff Bridges wasn't a teen idol last time I checked). So I don't blame Disney for bringing out the big guns for this, because they knew it'd be a challenge right from the get-go.

What I am curious to learn is whether or not the early marketing push is working. Is Tron: Legacy now on your radar -- is it something you're really anticipating, or is it just way too early to get excited about a film that's coming out in December? Sound off in our Temperature Reading poll below, and let's see where we're all at with this as of March 4th, 2010.