The Social Reckoning: reviews

What the critics say average 5.6 from 68

• 8.3 ConsequenceLiz Shannon Miller Sorkin does have a real knack for making complex topics like this palatable on screen. And in this case, these topics are incredibly important. Read
• 8.0 The TimesKevin Maher The Social Reckoning is not as good as Fincher's film. That was a slick, rolling machine, a tour de force. This is mainly a thrilling polemic — furious, invigorating and timely. Read
• 8.0 The Hollywood ReporterDavid Rooney But this nominal sequel makes for sharp entertainment, even if it sticks you with the depressing takeaway of a cautionary tale addressing a blight that's too late to fix. Read
• 8.0 Screen DailyNikki Baughan Pacey and incisive, it pulls absolutely no punches in its observations about the mechanics of the company and the ethos of founder Mark Zuckerberg. Read
• 8.0 EmpireDan Jolin Even if you miss Fincher's style, Sorkin's witty storytelling is enough to keep you fully engaged with a recent-events-based story that takes aim at Zuckerberg's not-so-pretty hate machine. Read
• 8.0 NMEVictoria Luxford The Social Reckoning is not the same instant classic as its predecessor but it is a fine follow-up that places the role of big tech at the heart of many recent headlines. Read
• 8.0 FotogramasLaura Pérez The Social Reckoning suffers from certain artistic limitations, but Sorkin's love of language, his faith in the importance of what is said and how, and the precision of his dialogue make up for that lack of visual vigour. Read
• 7.5 San Francisco ChronicleG. Allen Johnson If Zuckerberg did things by the book, and prioritized his customers, he'd still be rich. Just less rich. "The Social Reckoning," therefore, is simultaneously an indictment of hubris and an admission of our submission. Read
• 7.5 The PlaylistRodrigo Perez "The Social Reckoning" can be exasperating, but as a forceful distillation of what the reporting uncovered, it makes the case that far more people should know about it while remaining remarkably watchable. Read
• 7.5 The Boston GlobeOdie Henderson My biggest problem with "The Social Reckoning" is that it feels like too little, too late. Read
• 7.5 Roger EbertMatt Zoller Seitz It's an involving drama with lots of humor (mostly ironic). Read
• 7.0 Next Best PictureCody Dericks With "The Social Reckoning," Sorkin serves up yet another delicious piece of writing. But as has consistently been the case since he took up directing his own screenplays, the lack of an outside party to act as a second pair of eyes on his more indulgent tendencies as a writer is a notable problem. Read
• 7.0 ColliderTaylor Gates The Social Reckoning is a clear downgrade from The Social Network, but Sorkin fans will still find it enjoyable enough to watch. Read
• 7.0 VultureBilge Ebiri While very little in The Social Reckoning will feel like news to any of the extremely online, the film's power to infuriate should not be undersold. Read
• 7.0 IGNJim Vejvoda The Social Reckoning tells a valiant David vs. Goliath story but one where, sadly, David brought a slingshot to a gunfight. Read
• 7.0 TimeStephanie Zacharek Frances Haugen is the conscience and the true hero of The Social Reckoning, and Sorkin knows it. Read
• 7.0 New York TimesManohla Dargis It's reliably satisfying to watch David take down Goliath or, at least, hurl a few pebbles in the giant's direction. It helps if David looks the part. Read
• 7.0 The Film VerdictAlonso Duralde The greatest flaw of The Social Reckoning is that David Fincher isn't directing, but its greatest strength is Sorkin's script... Read
• 7.0 El PaísCarlos Boyero The plot is well developed and even better written. I'm not bored, despite my ignorance of the world it describes. Read
• 6.7 The Austin ChronicleKimberley Jones The Social Reckoning isn't going to be confused for Great Art, especially when considered beside David Fincher's exquisite predecessor. But as a super-timely drama hovering its cursor somewhere between entertainment and agitprop, it makes for a nippy, gripping two hours. Read
• 6.7 Original-CinKim Hughes Despite its many strengths, The Social Reckoning shows that it's very hard to out-chill a genuinely chilling story playing out in real time in the headlines and seemingly getting more shadowy by the day. Read
• 6.3 Associated PressLindsey Bahr The film itself might not be The Social Network, but it also may be an important piece of its moment: Here is a major studio movie that is taking on an unfathomably powerful figure in a smart and truthful way that was not dropped by its distributor. Read
• 6.3 Chicago TribuneKatie Walsh It might not be artfully executed, but his argument about the dangers of algorithms and the men who make them is loud and clear, and there is value — and valor — in wrapping a message that important in easily digestible mainstream entertainment, too. Read
• 6.3 The Seattle TimesMoira Macdonald It's Strong's performance that stays with you, though White has an engaging dog-with-a-bone quality that works for his character, and he and Madison occasionally click amusingly. Read
• 6.3 LarsenOnFilmJosh Larsen The Social Reckoning would have been more compelling if it had leaned in to the bitter irony. Read
• 6.3 ReelViewsJames Berardinelli As a movie chronicling the investigation of a journalist, this falls considerably short of All the President's Men... Read
• 6.0 Screen RantGraeme Guttmann It's funny, then, that the movie can't outrun the feeling of being dated, even just five years or so after the depicted events have taken place. Read
• 6.0 The GuardianPeter Bradshaw The resulting drama rattles along at an entertaining clip, although there are false notes. Read
• 6.0 The Irish TimesTara Brady The dark motivations underpinning the platform's algorithms remain as unsettling as they were when Haugen first leaked the documents. And Madison and White are engaging, even if the film often feels more like a classy TV special than an Oscar contender. Read
• 6.0 Time OutPhil de Semlyen The stakes have increased but The Social Network is still the more propulsive film. The dream of social media has turned into a nightmare and Sorkin's sequel is too late and too polite to wake anyone up. Read
• 6.0 Radio TimesMax Copeman Audiences looking for more of the same from 16 years ago will find something serviceable, but a sequel in subject matter more than spirit. Read
• 6.0 The Arizona RepublicBill Goodykoontz The good news is that Aaron Sorkin once again writes the screenplay; he won an Oscar for "The Social Network." The bad news is that Sorkin also directs. Read
• 6.0 CinemaníaAndrea G. Bermejo The Social Reckoning is not The Social Network. Cinematically, it doesn't measure up. But what it tells is so important, so deserving of our attention, that you wonder whether it is wise to focus on form over substance. Read
• 6.0 La VanguardiaSalvador Llopart Everything is brighter than in Fincher; also more sentimental, more didactic and, if you like, more pedestrian visually. More naive, certainly. Read
• 6.0 El MundoLuis Martínez As things stand, The Social Reckoning ends up offering a pale, overly orthodox and somewhat old-fashioned, if entertaining and very didactic, imitation of The Social Network, but, given our level of enshittification, it is welcome. Read
• 6.0 El PeriódicoQuim Casas The main problem is that there is little tension in the conflict and an excess of explanation that partly cancels out the film's dramatic credibility. Read
• 5.8 AwardsWatchJosh Parham Escaping the long shadow of The Social Network was always going to be a difficult task for this film, and in a direct comparison, there's no question it comes up short. Read
• 5.0 The Film StageKent M. Wilhelm The Social Reckoning is a project that makes a lot of sense for him to tackle, and while his penchant for conflict and discovery is a winning match for a biographical thriller, his affinity for classical Hollywood storytelling is so off-key for this moment as to feel tone-deaf. Read
• 5.0 The A.V. ClubMonica Castillo At best, The Social Reckoning is a tribute to people trying to do the right thing, to journalists fighting one of the largest companies in the world. Read
• 5.0 USA TodayBrian Truitt The movie squanders the timely premise and a formidable cast, which includes Emmy and Oscar winners alike, for a dull, half-baked journalism flick. Read
• 5.0 VarietyGuy Lodge A diverting-enough, clever-enough, true-enough examination of how Facebook and its CEO Mark Zuckerberg, well, lost face, it covers events between the years 2019 and 2021 — and winds up playing as a veritable period piece, so drastically have the tech-wars stakes shifted and expanded in the half-decade since then. Read
• 5.0 The New YorkerRichard Brody Sorkin's story is assembled with precision, its information dispensed to yield pieces that fit together exactly and without excess. Read
• 5.0 Film ThreatBradley Gibson The film does click along smartly and will keep your attention, but there are fatal flaws. Read
• 5.0 The Travers TakePeter Travers There's a cinematic story to be told about the aftershocks of Facebook, but director Aaron Sorkin lets his words get in the way. Read
• 5.0 Libertad DigitalJuan Manuel González It is an entertaining film, with performances worth seeing, but it falls far short of the intelligence and punch of The Social Network. Read
• 5.0 EspinofRandy Meeks It is always entertaining, yes, but this mush, as such, tastes of nothing we haven't seen before. Read
• 4.5 The WrapWilliam Bibbiani The film technically conveys the information Sorkin needs to tell his story, but his story is an exercise in dry data analysis and heavy-handed banter, leading up to a historical tragedy Sorkin isn't brave enough to dramatize with any meaningful context. Read
• 4.5 The Daily BeastNick Schager By inflating Zuckerberg into a one-note boogeyman, The Social Reckoning exaggerates to the point of reduction, all while ignoring Facebook users' own culpability in contributing to the online sphere's toxicity. Read
• 4.2 The Film MavenKristen Lopez It's entertaining for about two-thirds of the movie, even if the dialogue is so dense with tech speak you'll wonder what the actual plot is, before running out of steam in the final act as, historically, nothing really changed for anyone. Read
• 4.0 SlashfilmChris Evangelista But "The Social Reckoning" fails to make a case for itself. In the end, even the title is a misnomer — there was no real reckoning. Read
• 4.0 The IndependentClarisse Loughrey Sorkin seems reluctant to integrate much of the world outside his trio of players, but neither is he all that invested in what makes any of them tick. Read
• 4.0 The TelegraphRobbie Collin This sleek, sanitary sequel to 2010's The Social Network – a dramatisation of the 2021 leak that showed Facebook had prioritised profits over reducing the various personal and civic harms it knew it was wreaking – is an exasperating case of right time, wrong film. Read
• 4.0 The Wall Street JournalKyle Smith The Social Reckoning lands like a signal from a distant corner of the solar system that reaches us long after the star in question has burned out. Read
• 4.0 SlateSam Adams Sorkin doesn't direct with anything like the visual mastery that David Fincher brought to The Social Network, and his love of people talking in rooms, be they hotel, conference, or chat, gives Reckoning an airless feel that blunts its alarmism about what Facebook is doing to the non-virtual world. Read
• 4.0 Little White LiesHannah Strong It feels like a diluted version of a far better film, down to its watery colour palette and Alexandre Desplat's score which is trying very hard to not rip off Reznor and Ross. Read
• 4.0 Screen CrushMatt Singer Serving as his own director in The Social Reckoning, Sorkin hasn't made a good movie, but he did produce one hell of a commercial for David Fincher's talents. Read
• 4.0 Rolling StoneDavid Fear It's a compilation of the best and the worst of Sorkin, bellowed into a microphone that's giving off a tad too much feedback. Read
• 4.0 Los Angeles TimesAmy Nicholson The movie's problems go beyond arriving simultaneously too slowly and too soon for Zuckerberg's endgame, where his emptying social media empire has him gambling his fortunes (and ours) on AI. Read
• 4.0 BBCNicholas Barber Ironically, Sorkin's main theme is the alarming power that social media platforms have to influence us, but The Social Reckoning itself is unlikely to influence anyone. Read
• 4.0 The RevealScott Tobias The Social Network plumbed into the hidden soul of Facebook as if it were a film noir; The Social Reckoning lays it out with the plain language of a laminated book report. Read
• 4.0 La RazónSergi Sánchez It is surprisingly flat, and stands out neither for its actors nor for its dramatic force. Read
• 4.0 ABCFernando Muñoz There is none of the clever malice with which he portrayed the Zuckerberg of The Social Network. Read
• 3.8 Slant MagazineJake Cole Even when the writing clicks, Aaron Sorkin the director proves surprisingly unable to capture the cadence of his own words. Read
• 3.8 New York PostJohnny Oleksinski This is an awful screenplay: A jargon-obsessed, limp, rudimentary bullet-pointed rundown of unexciting events marred further by lame jokes, ugly cinematography and Sorkin's most self-indulgent tendencies. Read
• 3.3 IndiewireRyan Lattanzio The ensemble and production around her, from Jeremy Allen White as Wall Street Journal investigative reporter Jeff Horwitz to Jeremy Strong Method-acting the practice out of business as a robotic, Caesar-cut Mark Zuckerberg, is a chemistry void that offers little of substance to chew on. Read
• 2.5 The AtlanticDavid Sims Sorkin's enterprise has very little excitement to it and instead feels like a perfunctory coda to a point he made more poetically many years ago. Read
• 1.5 The Globe and MailBarry Hertz It is almost as if Sorkin is actively testing his audience's tolerance for self-righteous didacticism. Read
• 1.0 LooperNina Starner It's a poorly performed, directed, and written slog of a film. Read