Fifteen years after The Social Network helped define how a generation thought about Facebook, Aaron Sorkin is returning to Silicon Valley’s biggest story — this time with a much different focus.
The first trailer for The Social Reckoning dropped Tuesday, offering a look at the filmmaker’s follow-up to his 2010 Oscar-winning drama. While The Social Network chronicled Facebook’s creation, the new film centers on the fallout surrounding “The Facebook Files,” the 2021 Wall Street Journal investigation that revealed the company knew its platforms could contribute to harms including teen mental health struggles, misinformation, political polarization — basically everything the platform is known for today.
Jeremy Strong stars as Mark Zuckerberg, portraying the Meta CEO as he prepares to face growing public scrutiny and congressional hearings.
“I’m not two years out of a dorm room anymore,” Zuckerberg says in the trailer, later describing himself as a “free speech absolutist.”
Mikey Madison, who won an Academy Award for Anora, plays former Facebook employee Frances Haugen, the whistleblower who leaked thousands of internal documents to reporters and regulators. Jeremy Allen White plays Wall Street Journal reporter Jeff Horwitz, whose reporting helped bring the documents to light. The film’s ensemble cast also includes Wunmi Mosaku, Betty Gilpin and Bill Burr.
Sorkin wrote and directed the project, a key difference from the first film. 2010’s story was directed by David Fincher; this time, Sorkin takes the helm.
Speaking about the film last year, Strong said the script “touches the third rail of everything happening in our world” — a description that feels reflected throughout the trailer’s focus on social media’s influence on culture.
The Social Reckoning opens in theaters Oct. 9.