Tron Legacy is one of the most anticipated movies of the year, which is pretty surprising considering the massive amount of marketing material that Disney has put out for the film.

Between all of the trailers and posters, you would think that moviegoers might be getting over-stimulated. Instead, each new item that comes out only gets people more excited.

Take this new one-sheet for example. Not only does it look awesome on its own, but it’s also a throwback to a poster for the original Tron (hat tip to io9 for putting the two side-by-side). That’s not just cool, it’s cool on top of cool. In Tron terms, it’s like riding a light cycle while you’re having a disc battle.

Anyway, you can check out the new poster (via Yahoo) below, along with the side-by-side comparison to the original.

It’s kind of a surprise that Disney waited so long to put out a new take on the original poster, but the result is clearly a success. Tron Legacy was one of the biggest hits at this year’s San Diego Comic Con, and it’s no wonder why. The movie has some of the best looking 3D we’ve seen yet, not to mention a top-notch cast and a killer soundtrack.

There’s been some grumbling in the fanboy community about the quality of the CGI used to make Clu 2.0, aka the younger version of Jeff Bridges’ character, but I’m comfortable that director Joseph Kosinski has done everything in his power to make those sequences work. When you consider that Kosinski and his team have been at work on this film for over three years, you have to give them the benefit of the doubt.

Tron Legacy comes out December 17th 2010. That’s pretty great timing, because if you think about it, it’s like Disney is giving nerds across America a totally awesome Christmas present.