“The Social Reckoning” is billed as a sequel to “The Social Network,” the 2010 masterpiece written by Aaron Sorkin and directed by David Fincher, starring Jesse Eisenberg as Facebook (now Meta) CEO Mark Zuckerberg – a man who built a massive connection network despite having no idea how to connect with real, actual people.
This time around, Fincher is out, leaving Sorkin to write and direct the film on his own. And “The Social Reckoning,” for all it shares in common with “The Social Network,” doesn’t quite feel like a sequel. Not just because Zuckerberg (now played by Jeremy Strong) barely factors into the film, and not just because it’s a far more straightforward journalism movie than the almost Shakespearean drama of “The Social Network.” It doesn’t feel like a sequel because, like the majority of Sorkin directed projects, it lacks the verve of the films that come out of his creative partnerships.
This is Sorkin’s fourth feature directorial effort since 2017’s “Molly’s Game.” And while not all of those efforts are bad, they have all failed to sing in the way his films do when another director takes the lead (Danny Boyle, Rob Reiner, Bennett Miller, etc.). But “The Social Reckoning” doesn’t just fail in the fact that it’s ill-directed – that, based on previous examples, we could have predicted. This time, the whole endeavor falls flat, from the screenplay, to the casting, to the hollow sense of hope.
“The Social Reckoning” dramatizes the reporting of the Facebook Files, a series of published articles in the Wall Street Journal, and focuses mostly on reporter Jeff Horwitz’s (Jeremy Allen White) relationship with whistleblower Frances Haugen (Mikey Madison). Dismayed by how easily a friend of hers became radicalized online – the film opens with said friend drunkenly yelling at fairly benign police officers for harassing her “because she’s white” – Frances tries to figure out what happened and comes to a horrifying conclusion: the Facebook algorithm is driving people towards radicalization.
This was just the start of Horwitz’s deep dive into Facebook (the articles were filled with evidence that Facebook knew it was causing harm to people, but persisted in the name of profit). And the spectre of Zuckerberg’s evils looms over the film – that is, until he actually shows up on screen. If you’ve ever seen Zuckerberg talk, he does seem a bit like a robot attempting to be human. But Strong’s commitment to the automaton bit makes everything feel a bit more cartoonish than you might want for your very serious journalism movie. He looks ridiculous, and the whole thing often feels like bad Zuckerberg cosplay.
Strong works best when he’s playing off Bill Burr (one of the only actors in the film who finds the right tone), playing a former friend of Zuckerberg’s and Facebook investor who spars with Mark over free speech. At one point, the two battle it out over whether Facebook should fact check political ads or not, and it’s the only time the movie feels like something close to a good Sorkin film – moralizing, sure, but performed with such vigor and passion, it’s hard not to be affected by his belief.
Performance is a problem that persists throughout “The Social Reckoning.” In addition to Burr, Billy Magnussen (playing an evil media relations executive) and Betty Gilpin as bureau chief of the Journal’s San Francisco office are the best at handling Sorkin’s words and style. But the film’s leads have a little more difficulty nailing the tone. White is an interesting pick for this predictably talky Sorkin film. He has presence, but he’s always worked best in quieter, more internal roles, and has trouble finding any humor or gravitas in Horwitz’s crusade. Madison, on the other hand, is a great talker, as proven in 2024’s “Anora,” but the character does her no favors. Both actors feel awkward, stilted – even a little robotic at times.
While it’s easy to blame performance solely on the actors, direction and writing are a huge part of it – and that comes down to Sorkin. The pacing of the dialogue in each scene, something that is so expertly done in “The Social Network,” drags like molasses, and the editing tries to match the pitter patter of that dialogue – except there’s no pitter patter to match.
These actors are asked to be in a Sorkin film – fast-talking, reference-heavy, full of clever banter. But it’s hard to find that energy in your performance with a script that feels far below what Sorkin is capable of. At one point when Frances is trying to talk herself out of giving Jeff internal documents, she says she’s not a character in a Frank Capra movie – an allusion that feels appropriate for Sorkin, but doesn’t actually make a ton of sense, given the context, if you think about it for more than ten seconds. The jokes aren’t very good, and they feel tired – there’s an egregious moment (one of many) where Jeff goes on a side rant about women who use the term “mansplaining.” And if the jokes are good (rare), they’re not delivered with the energy they need. This is not a movie of fast talkers – it’s more a movie of sleepwalkers.
Sorkin’s prowess with a pen is his super power. It’s what has historically allowed his belief in our American institutions – despite everything they’ve proven to the contrary – to not ring false. But, when he doesn’t have someone there to temper his worst impulses – or, I guess, when he writes a bad script – that belief becomes harder to buy into. Without even getting into the Jan. 6 of it all (and there is a Jan. 6 sequence in this film), “The Social Reckoning” takes on the near impossible task of ending on a hopeful note. The film ends with Frances testifying in front of Congress, delivering an impassioned speech about the evils of Facebook to a bunch of people who, in the years since, have failed to make any major change. As she walks out of the building, Frances literally pumps her fist into the air triumphantly – a Sorkin gesture if I’ve ever seen one, but one that rings hollow in the face of the reality we currently live in. Maybe if “The Social Reckoning” was a better movie, it wouldn’t matter. But it’s not, so it’s impossible to ignore.
