When The Social Network debuted, Mark Zuckerberg famously organized a company screening, later describing the project as fun. A corporate outing for its sequel, The Social Reckoning, appears significantly less likely. While the original film was hardly a hagiography, it depicted the rise of a plucky upstart aiming to reach 500 million users and a $25bn valuation. Today, those figures seem microscopic compared to Meta’s 3.6 billion users and $1.8tn market cap. But there was at least an element of the plucky upstart to the rise of Zuckerberg as he takes Facebook to 500 million users and a valuation of $25bn (ridiculously small numbers now – Meta has 3.6 billion users and is worth $1.8tn), the Social Network hardly portrayed the Facebook founder and his company in a hagiographical light (Zuckerberg later described the film as “hurtful” ). Though, a steely CEO is emerging and his company is on the brink of global hegemony, by the end of that film. But another is the scathing portrayal of the company leaders in them, tech is the obvious thread joining these films. It is the most human Zuckerberg moment in the entire film. According to another former employee, Zuckerberg was “unemotional” in meetings (perhaps what you’d expect from a $1.8tn company CEO, admittedly).
By the conclusion of the first film, Zuckerberg was already morphing into a calculated CEO. The Social Reckoning picks up from that trajectory, framing both the founder and the industry at large as modern corporate villains. Tech executives have effectively replaced the classic cinema antagonists—such as deep-state operatives or foreign hoodlums—as the new Darth Vaders of our time.
This shift is emphasized by the performance of Jeremy Strong. Although the 47-year-old actor is older than Zuckerberg was during the 2019-2021 period depicted, Strong uses his experience playing the tortured Kendall Roy to portray a straitjacketed, simmering intensity. Peter Bradshaw, reviewing the film, noted it as a compelling impersonation, comparing his physical movements to a Thunderbird puppet. It serves as a stark, less sympathetic contrast to Jesse Eisenberg’s portrayal. Who looks a touch on the old side to be playing 2019-2021 era Zuckerberg (the Meta CEO was in his mid-30s at the time of the film’s events whereas Strong is 47), but is embedded in our minds as the tortured Roy family scion Kendall in Succession, this is underlined by the casting of Jeremy Strong. One that breaks slightly at the end as he backtracks on being a “free speech absolutist” under intolerable pressure, strong also brings a straitjacketed simmer to the role here.
The film’s tone resonates with real-world criticism. Whistleblower Arturo Béjar called the depiction accurate, while other former staff noted that the portrayal captures the unemotional nature of a leader presiding over a $1.8tn entity. In one pivotal scene, Strong’s Zuckerberg declares that the debate is over, framing Meta as an immovable force.
Public opinion surrounding these figures has soured significantly since the early days of Facebook. The Cambridge Analytica data privacy scandal acted as a primary turning point, followed by Frances Haugen’s 2021 revelations. The 2022 inquest into the death of British teenager Molly Russell, who died by suicide after exposure to harmful Instagram content, further solidified the global push for social media regulation.
The impact of this scrutiny is felt within the theaters themselves. Screenings of The Social Reckoning in the UK include an advertisement for an online safety charity founded by the Russell family, featuring a statement from her father claiming that Instagram helped kill his daughter. While Meta maintains that it has continuously worked to enhance safety, the legal and political backlash suggests a deep-seated erosion of public trust.
This villainous trend in cinema extends beyond Facebook. The upcoming OpenAI drama, Artificial, is expected to present a harsh take on CEO Sam Altman. Meanwhile, Elon Musk’s transformation into a cinematic antagonist is cemented in Alex Gibney’s four-hour documentary, Musk, which examines the world’s first trillionaire. Whether through fictionalized dramas or documentaries, the tech industry is increasingly depicted as standing on the wrong side of global ethical debates.
