Directed by David Fincher from a script written by Aaron Sorkin, The Social Network is one of the greatest films of the 2010s. Framed by the multiple lawsuits thrown at the young and arrogant Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg) over the founding of Facebook, the film is a razor-sharp, impeccably directed and eternally rewatchable masterpiece that has every element firing on all cylinders. Recently, its enduring success and its 10-year anniversary coinciding with the release of recent projects from Fincher and Sorkin (Mank and The Trial of the Chicago 7, respectively), has caused renewed calls for a sequel. Sorkin himself has even expressed interest in making one, so long as Fincher returns to direct.

Beyond the strength of The Social Network as a film, most sequel-wishers point towards the increasing relevance of Facebook in current events. The network service has been implicated for both breaching user’s private data, and for assisting in the spread of fake information to radicalize behavior and influence elections. Social media sites like Facebook appear even more ominous and ever-present than they did in 2010. Zuckerberg himself has risen in public notoriety, testifying before Congress in 2018 about Facebook’s involvement with Cambridge Analytica, and in 2019, over creating the crypto-currency Libra. Such headlines seemingly provide amble recognizable events to base a sequel around.

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However, this “recognizability” would only be a hindrance to The Social Network sequel. The first film is based upon Facebook’s behind-the-scenes creation, detailing the late-night coding and backroom deals that took the site from Harvard campuses to a world-wide phenomenon. It had more merit in bringing this “origin story” to the big screen. Now, Zuckerberg’s testimonies are televised and an attempt to dramatize them would only invite comparisons to how well the film mimics real-life, rather than how it works on its own. While these public proceedings are too well-known, there is not enough known about the precise details of Facebook’s involvement. It seems apparent that the platform was harnessed for targeting voters with “fake news,” but Zuckerberg’s personal involvement potentially ranges from wilfully ignorant to active compensation. To make another Social Network around Zuckerberg requires more knowledge of the human components than is currently known.

The lack of individual human involvement is another hurdle, given the prevailing issue with modern Facebook is how algorithms are overtaking human agency. Stripped down, The Social Network is a “creation myth,” the same way Joy is for the Miracle Mop or Rocketman is for Elton John’s music. However, a sequel would be about people “using” this product, showing their data being harvested or being fed misleading information. And the whole troublesome concern is that such events are not dramatic. They are not obvious actions, but imperceptible and granular ones that build up without users even noticing. The Social Network was anchored by Zuckerberg and the founding of Facebook, but now the platform and its algorithm have become so decentralized from its creator that a film would struggle to depict its societal effects.

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jesse eisenberg as mark zuckerberg in The Social Network

Such effects are important, and it's understandable that filmmakers would want to create stories about them. Documentaries like The Great Hack and The Social Dilemma have outlined both the data-harvesting and intentional addiction within social media, although they are not beholden to a cinematic narrative. The UK TV-film, Brexit: An Uncivil War, recently dramatized how Dominic Cummings (Benedict Cumberbatch), the architect of Brexit’s Vote Leave campaign, harnessed the power of online targeting through AggregateIQ to sway the British electorate against the European Union. But again, Brexit benefited by having a clear protagonist in Cummings and a narrative timeline of the EU Referendum to structure itself around. Even then, Brexit was still criticized for being made “too soon,” trying to summarize current events when Brexit itself was not even finished.

Making a film about modern Facebook is both too soon and too opaque. The Social Network is not strictly factual, slyly admitting to being “85 percent exaggeration” and “15 percent perjury." Regardless, it used the foundation of Facebook to speak about the self-entitlement of Silicon Valley and the desire for everyone to be connected, especially when that connection is exclusive -- be it in Finals Clubs or with Facebook Friends. Fincher's called it “the Citizen Kane of John Hughes movies,” and as with Citizen Kane, The Social Network follows a man achieving great success, and then futilely trying to get back what his success left behind. In that way, audiences don’t need to return to The Social Network, as the first film said everything it needed to.

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