Succession creator Jesse Armstrong has never been subtle with his commentary on the rich and powerful, but the new trailer for his HBO feature Mountainhead spells out exactly what makes its central characters people you shouldn’t be rooting for.
Set in a remote cabin at the top of a mountain, Mountainhead revolves around a quartet of tech bros whose companies have turned them into obscenely wealthy people. Though Randall (Steve Carrell), Hugo Van Yalk (Jason Schwartzman), Venis (Cory Michael Smith), and Jeff (Ramy Yousef) all have different net worths, they share the same type of worldview that comes with having billions of dollars to your name. The men see their riches as a sign that they deserve some down time relaxing in the snow while their employees keep things running at home.
But the CEOs are given pause when Traam — Venus’ generative AI-filled social media platform — is pointed to as a catalyst for an uptick in violence. And while the men are quick to assure one another that none of their creations can be blamed for making the world a more terrible place, it isn’t long before the friends start pointing out the multitude of ways in which that is absolutely not true.
Especially coming right after X’s recent issues with Grok talking nonstop about “white genocide” in South Africa, Mountainhead’s trailer makes the movie feel unsettlingly tapped into the news cycle. Though the movie is supposed to be funny, the way its characters “joke” about being able to take over the world isn’t all that amusing considering the way actual tech CEOs talk about people. That might make Mountainhead feel more like a dramatic documentary when it makes its HBO debut on May 31st.
