The Social Reckoning's Failure Can Be Traced Back To One Moment

The second that Jesse Eisenberg declined to join "The Social Reckoning," the standalone sequel to "The Social Network" that brings screenwriter Aaron Sorkin back but also tasks him with pulling double duty as director, the project should have been abandoned. Sadly, it went ahead as planned, and we got ... "The Social Reckoning," which replaces Eisenberg as Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg with "Succession" veteran Jeremy Strong and which, incidentally, is a bad movie.

I'm on record right here at /Film explaining precisely why "The Social Reckoning" doesn't even deserve to be mentioned in the same breath as "The Social Network," and when it comes to the recasting of Zuckerberg, it's one of the film's many, many glaring problems. Sure, I get that Eisenberg chose not to revisit this role, which scored him his first Oscar nomination over a decade ago, for a whole host of reasons. But, truthfully, "The Social Reckoning" failed before it started by bringing Strong in to portray the Facebook creator.

So, what does Mark Zuckerberg do in "The Social Reckoning?" Honestly, not much! While most of the film centers around Facebook employee turned whistleblower Frances Haugen (Mikey Madison) and her work with Wall Street Journal reporter Jeff Horwitz (Jeremy Allen White), we also get glimpses of Strong's Zuckerberg preparing for a Senate hearing about potential issues at Facebook. Zuckerberg spends all of his scenes robotically and frantically insisting that he can't possibly censor any potentially extreme or dangerous groups on Facebook without interfering with free speech, putting him at odds with his outspoken advisor Charlie Garrigan (Bill Burr, delivering the film's only convincing performance). He's a workaholic, kind of a jerk, and bears zero resemblance to the complicated figure Eisenberg created in "The Social Network."

Unsurprisingly, Aaron Sorkin had a lengthy explanation as to why Jesse Eisenberg said no to "The Social Reckoning. Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Sorkin said that Sony Pictures Releasing, the studio behind the film, offered Eisenberg a tidy sum, but "money does not motivate Jesse," according to Sorkin. "If anything, money is a disincentive for him. It's admirable," he continued. "He's very concerned about raising his kids with too much money."

After trying to convince Eisenberg that he could fund other projects with the paycheck, Sorkin then wrote himself an outline, something he claims he never does for his films, to speak to Eisenberg. "It was arguments for why he should do it. They included, 'We already know you're gonna be great because you were already once,'" Sorkin said. "You know, 'Here are the great moments that you're gonna get to play in the movie.' And I laid it out for him." (Having seen the film, I don't know what "great moments" Sorkin is even talking about.) As Sorkin went on to explain, it almost worked. "I do remember Jesse saying at one point during the third or fourth back and forth, 'You have come closer to changing my mind than I thought you were going to,'" he recalled. "So, I was pleased about that."

Eisenberg provided his own explanation to Variety, saying he's "moving in different directions in [his] life" and adding, "I don't want to be associated with that character, but all of my reasons for not wanting to do the movie have nothing to do with how wonderful the movie is, and will be, and I'm sure is already." A diplomatic response, truly.

Spoilers for "The Social Reckoning" ahead.

Not only is Jeremy Strong, an actor of prodigious skill who puts everything (and then some) into his roles, given nothing to do in "The Social Reckoning," I can only imagine that Aaron Sorkin's weaknesses as a director led the actor wildly astray. Not only does he look ridiculous (his makeup and wig combo do resemble how strange the real Mark Zuckerberg looks these days, but it is frankly distracting in the film), but his voice sounds almost exactly like Kermit the Frog, and his dialogue is just repetitions of "I love free speech" rephrased in a myriad of different ways. I'm a huge "Succession" fan, and knowing exactly how gorgeously Strong can handle extremely complex lines and monologues, I was bitterly disappointed to see the Emmy and Tony-winning actor perform some of Sorkin's weakest dialogue to date. (This movie doesn't so much explain things to the viewer as it whacks them over the head about every issue it's tackling.)

Then there's the film's ending, which might just be the worst movie scene of 2026. We watch as Strong's Zuckerberg watches footage of the insurrection at the United States Capitol that occurred on January 6, 2021, as legislators attempted to certify the 2020 election for President Joe Biden. As his employees beg him to take down the current president's inflammatory Facebook posts, Zuckerberg just stares, gaping and utterly panicked. This is not a good use of Strong, and the entire movie is beneath him (and the rest of its cast, for that matter). "The Social Reckoning" should have been permanently shelved when Eisenberg refused to return as Zuckerberg. Unfortunately, that didn't happen, and the film is in theaters now.