(Dir. Aaron Sorkin, 2026)
It’s kinda hard to believe that it’s been 16 years since the release of David Fincher’s slick, critically acclaimed, Oscar-winning take on the origin story of Facebook, THE SOCIAL NETWORK. In anticipation of its sequel, I recently rewatched the movie, and found that I think I went a bit overboard back in the day when I picked it as my favorite film of 2010. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still a strong, well-crafted movie, but it feels too routed in the self-righteous style of its screenwriter, Aaron Sorkin, an ethos that has only become more grating in the years since.
Back in 2012, a YouTube video circulated called “Sorkinisms” (please check it out - it's hilarious), which was a supercut of clips showing the many, many times the writer’s characters repeated dialogue, ticks, and mannerisms across his work in such movies and television shows as A FEW GOOD MEN, THE AMERICAN PRESIDENT, Sports Night, The West Wing, and Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. The point that the video, which had two equally insightful follow-ups, proved was that these people all talk like Sorkin, and rather than like actual human beings, each with their own distinct voice.
This is majorly the case in Sorkin’s latest opus, THE SOCIAL RECKONING, which he bills as not a sequel, but a companion piece to the 2010 movie. As he couldn’t secure Jesse Eisenberg to reprise his Oscar nominated role as Mark Zuckerberg, and Fincher passed, Sorkin took on the directing duty with Jeremy Strong now filling in the role as the Facebook CEO. The film covers the website’s controversial activity from 2019 through the pandemic and the January 6, 2021 insurrection through the exposition between its two leads.
Those leads are Oscar-winning ANORA actress Mikey Madison as Facebook employee turned whistleblower Frances Haugen, and Jeremy Allen White (Shameless, The Bear, DELIVER ME FROM NOWHERE) as Wall Street Journal reporter Jeff Horwitz. Both are appealing, talented performers, but here they seem to have prepped for their parts by binge-watching The West Wing, or worse The Newsroom, as they converse in the same strained, relentlessly witty manner as just about every Sorkin character ever.
There’s also the cringey business of Sorkin having Madison spend a considerable amount of screen time in a revealing evening dress, supposedly because she’s on a date rather than acting as an informant. C’mon, Aaron, we all see what you’re doing there. This distraction also makes audiences think the couple might get together, which is so not the direction this movie should try to imply.
Meanwhile, Strong’s Zuckerberg is just an icy corporate figurehead that Sorkin’s screenplay paints as an intimidating figure of power, but doesn’t have anything to say about him as anything other than that. Strong has shown layers in his work on the HBO series Succession, the Trump biopic, THE APPRENTICE, and working with White’s Springsteen as his manager in DELIVER ME FROM NOWHERE, but, as intense as he is here, the character doesn’t have the evil presence that Sorkin seems determined to project on him. However,
Lord knows there’s plenty to hate about the social networking world Zuckerberg helped create, but this kind of melodramatic treatise just backs itself into a narrow corner of commentary. Basically, Sorkin is mounting the argument, which is not without merit, mind you, that Facebook’s largely unregulated, profit-driven policies and algorithms helped fuel the January 6 insurrection - an event the writer/director restages for the film’s overreaching climax - and that we should all be more outraged about it
The only other returning collaborator from the original is cinematographer Jeff Cronenweth, whose work is one of the film’s few bright spots, giving it the same lush, polished look. But after watching these films back-to-back, I don’t think either comes close to capturing the real Zuckerberg or offering any insight beyond the obvious about the sinister role social media plays in our lives.
In THE SOCIAL NETWORK, Zuckerberg was portrayed as a pretentious asshole; here, he’s an icy, diabolical robot—but what’s the point? When I watch the real guy testifying at congressional hearings on YouTube, sure, he comes across as cold and awkward, but he bears little resemblance to either Eisenberg’s or Strong’s portrayal. Sorkin’s take never gets beyond the supposedly clever irony that such an antisocial guy has us all by the balls in our social media-dominated lives. Crazy, isn’t it?
THE SOCIAL RECKONING is a nothing burger stacked with Sorkin-style extra-aged cheese. As with his previous directorial efforts - MOLLY’S GAME, THE TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7, and BEING THE RICARDOS - Sorkin still comes across as more of a television dramatist than a filmmaker on the level of Martin Scorsese, David Fincher, or Rob Reiner, no matter how hard he tries.
But, and this is a big but, his stuff remains irresistibly watchable, even when it’s at its most insufferable. It’s the cinematic equivalent of fast food: overprocessed, loaded with artificial ingredients, and not particularly nourishing, but somehow satisfying enough to keep me coming back for more. So while this may be a bad review, I can’t say I left the table hungry.
More later...
