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“This whole affair stinks like a cheap made-for-TV,” observes an opportunistic podcaster during the horror sequel Influencers. In the moment, he’s being dismissive in a calculated way toward an interviewee whose outlandish story he once claimed he believed. Yet his description of what’s happening on screen isn’t wrong. Superficially, two films on demand about a young woman who worms her way into the lives of online influencers and then murders them seems like the 21st-century equivalent of a lurid yet network-approved weekly TV movie. The surprising aspect about Influencers remains how much better it proves to be than plenty of its competition, regardless of screen size. It is precisely the suspense film that should give other movies a serious bout of FOMO.

Recapping the First Film and Establishing the Scene

The 2022 film Influencer follows the mysterious CW (Cassandra Naud) as she quietly chooses solo-traveling social media targets, lures 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 stranded on an uninhabited island near the coast of Thailand, after her latest target, Madison (Emily Tennant), reverses their roles on her.

This provides the 2025 Influencers some early ambiguity, as returning filmmaker Kurtis David Harder picks up with CW happily living alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey to celebrate the couple’s one-year anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW's attention and anger.

CW comments to her partner that a person ought to attempt leaving a phone-addicted online personality in a place without any devices and see if they can survive. Is this a backstory prequel? Did CW become extremist by seeing the preferential treatment given to a single clout-chaser?

Evolving Viewpoints and International Chases

The story’s perspective shifts several more times, eventually clarifying those introductory moments' chronological position. The story revisits Madison, now exonerated for carrying out CW's offenses, yet still encounters doubt over her recounting of the events, including the murder of Madison’s boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali attempting to boost his profile as half of a right-wing-influencer power couple alongside Ariana (Veronica Long), though his chosen platform is bro-heavy streams, as opposed to the Instagram photos that typically attract CW's interest.

Naud remains immensely captivating in her role, a role that appears particularly tailor-made to her strengths. (She even created CW's striking outfits.) Although the follow-up's focus leans heavily into CW — the first film felt more equally divided between the two women — it still works as a story of rival investigators, with both women employ fake accounts, social media surveillance, and an apparently limitless travel fund to pursue and/or escape one another. Of course, maybe the unlimited budget aren't needed. Online personalities possess a knack for gaining access to luxurious locales at little cost, a skill that CW echoes with her more overt scheming.

Ingenious Filmmaking and Visual Wanderlust

The creative team for Influencers seem similarly ingenious in locating beautiful places to visit, though they were presumably more legitimate about it. The vast majority of the movie seems to be shot on location, providing it a real-world weight that remains even as numerous sequences involve a handful of actors of characters looking at computer or phone screens.

It follows the same logic which allowed the Bond franchise look so consistently opulent over the years: Yes, big action and special effects can show off large spending, however simply offering a kind of visual tour to viewers also seems inherently cinematic. It’s also particularly appropriate for a narrative so dependent on the coexisting superficial glamour and try-hard grind of creating jealousy-worthy online content.

Every character visiting Bali, similar to those who were in Thailand in the original, appear to enjoy entry to impossibly chic modern bungalows; there are movies concerning beach rescuers that don’t show off this much overhead swimming-pool footage. The characters must believably inhabit these luxurious, far-flung locations to highlight the uneasy irony of how often each person — including the woman wreaking vengeance on the influencers’ self-centered phoniness — nevertheless spends plenty of time under the light of their devices.

Nuanced Portrayals and Tech-Savvy Tension

Simultaneously, Harder hasn’t authored a rant targeting the vacuousness of the influencer industry. Though it is gratifying to watch CW exploit various online personalities, and a sense reminiscent of Hitchcock of alignment allows us to wish she evades capture, Harder is somewhat understanding of the key influencer figures. Previously, he tapped into the isolation Madison experienced during ostensibly dream getaways. Here, the director appears confident that just observing Jacob in action will reveal that he is selling snake-oil masculinity to other gullible men; he avoids turning into a caricature the character further. He even gives Jacob a measure of dignity by showing his genuine loyalty to his girlfriend; he’s a hypocrite, but Ariana is a collaborator in his hypocrisy, not someone exploited of it.

The other side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation means it may occasionally seem that he’s nodding at bits of contemporary digital culture without investigating them. This is especially true regarding how he introduces artificial intelligence into the plot, a fascinating turn which misses the psychological edge it should have. The pluralized title for the film could offer devotees of the original hope for an Aliens-style escalation, and the film ultimately delivers that, with an appropriately chaotic climax. But before that, it resembles more a polished Alfred Hitchcock movie than a wild-eyed, tech-addled Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ heavy use of actual places might also be what prevents it from seeming like pure nightmare fuel. The world might be saturated with content-churning influencers, online fraud, and self-serving tourism, but the world itself remains present, for now.