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“The entire situation stinks like a cheap TV movie,” observes an opportunistic commentator during the chilling follow-up Influencers. At that point, his tone is manipulatively dismissive of a guest with an outlandish story he once said he trusted. But his description of the events in the movie isn't inaccurate. Superficially, two films on demand about a woman who worms her way into the worlds of social media stars before killing them feels like the 21st-century equivalent of a lurid yet network-approved Movie of the Week. The surprising aspect about Influencers remains just how superior it proves to be compared to much of its competition, irrespective of screen size. It’s the kind of suspense film that should give other movies a bad case of FOMO.

Recapping the Original and Establishing the Scene

2022’s Influencer tracks the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) while she methodically selects traveling alone social media targets, entices them to their doom, and covers up those deaths (at least temporarily) by seizing control of their socials. The movie leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW marooned on an uninhabited island near the coast of Thailand, after her most recent mark, Madison (Emily Tennant), turns the tables against her.

This lends 2025's Influencers some early mystery, when returning writer-director Kurtis David Harder picks up with the character CW contentedly residing with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. During a trip to celebrate the couple’s first anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW’s eye and ire.

CW comments to her partner that a person should try leaving a phone-addicted online personality in a place without any devices and see whether they can make it. Are we witnessing an origin-story prequel? Was CW radicalized by seeing the special treatment afforded one clout-chaser?

Evolving Viewpoints and Global Pursuits

The story’s perspective changes multiple times, ultimately revealing those early scenes’ chronological position. The story revisits Madison, now cleared of committing CW’s crimes, yet still encounters doubt over her version of what happened, which includes the killing of her boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali and trying to boost his profile as half of a right-wing-influencer duo with Ariana (Veronica Long), although his preferred medium involves masculine-focused livestreams, rather than the Instagram photos that normally attract CW’s attention.

Naud remains immensely captivating in the part, which seems especially custom-fit to her strengths. (She also designed CW's eye-catching wardrobe.) Although the sequel’s screentime balance leans heavily into CW — the first film felt more equally divided between her and Madison — it still functions as a story of rival amateur detectives, as Madison and CW both use fabricated profiles, social media surveillance, and a seemingly unlimited travel budget to pursue and/or escape one another. Then again, maybe the vast resources aren't needed. Online personalities possess a talent for gaining access to posh places without paying much, an ability that CW echoes through her more blatant scheming.

Ingenious Filmmaking and Visual Wanderlust

The creative team for Influencers seem similarly ingenious in locating beautiful places to film, though they were likely less nefarious in their methods. Most of the movie seems to be filmed in real places, giving it a real-world weight that remains even as many scenes involve a handful of actors of characters staring at digital devices.

It’s the same principle which allowed the James Bond movies appear so persistently lavish for decades: Yes, big action and special effects can show off large spending, but simply offering a travelogue of sorts for the audience also feels inherently cinematic. It’s also particularly appropriate for a story so dependent on the coexisting surface-level allure and try-hard grind of creating envy-inducing online content.

Every character visiting Bali, like those staying in Thailand in the first film, appear to enjoy entry to impossibly chic modern bungalows; there are movies concerning beach rescuers that don’t show off as much overhead swimming-pool footage. These individuals have to convincingly inhabit these lush, remote places to highlight the uneasy irony of how frequently each person — even the woman wreaking vengeance upon the online stars' narcissistic falseness — nonetheless spends plenty of time under the light of their screens.

Balanced Depictions and Digital-Age Suspense

At the same time, the director has not crafted a rant against the vacuousness of the influencer industry. Though it can be gratifying to watch CW exploit various online personalities, and a sense reminiscent of Hitchcock of alignment allows us to wish she doesn’t get caught, the filmmaker is somewhat understanding of the key influencer figures. In the first movie, he tapped into the loneliness Madison experienced during supposedly envy-worthy vacations. In this film, the director appears confident that just observing Jacob in action will reveal that he’s peddling snake-oil masculinity to other doofuses; he resists turning into a caricature the character. He even grants Jacob a measure of dignity through depicting his genuine loyalty to his girlfriend; he is two-faced, yet Ariana is a partner in his hypocrisy, not a victim by it.

The flip side of this balanced approach is that it may occasionally seem that he is acknowledging elements of modern online life without deeply exploring them. This is particularly evident regarding how he introduces artificial intelligence into the story, an intriguing development which misses the psychosexual kick it should have. The retitled sequel of Influencers might give devotees of the original hope for an Aliens-style escalation, and the film does eventually provide exactly that, with an appropriately wild final act. But before that, it resembles more a polished Hitchcock thriller than an frenzied, tech-addled Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ extensive use of real-world locations may also be what keeps it from coming across like utter horror. Our society might be saturated with always-online creators, online fraud, and exploitative travel, but the world itself remains present, at least for now.