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“The entire situation reeks like a cheap TV movie,” observes a cynical podcaster midway through the horror sequel Influencers. In the moment, he’s being dismissive in a calculated way toward an interviewee whose bizarre tale he once said he trusted. Yet his assessment of what’s happening in the movie isn’t wrong. On its face, a pair of films on demand chronicling a young woman who worms her way into the worlds of online influencers and then murders them seems like a modern-day version of a lurid yet cable-ready Movie of the Week. The wild thing regarding Influencers is how much better it is compared to much of its competition, irrespective of screen size. It is precisely the thriller that should give other movies a bad case of FOMO.

Recapping the First Film and Setting the Stage

The 2022 film Influencer tracks the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) while she quietly chooses solo-traveling influencer targets, entices them to their doom, and conceals those deaths (for a time) by seizing control of their socials. The film leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW marooned on an uninhabited island near the coast of Thailand, following her most recent mark, Madison (Emily Tennant), reverses their roles on her.

This provides 2025's Influencers a degree of mystery, as returning filmmaker Kurtis David Harder resumes with the character CW contentedly residing alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey to celebrate their one-year anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW’s eye and ire.

CW remarks to her partner that a person should try stranding a phone-addicted influencer in a place without any devices and see whether they can make it. Is this an origin-story prequel? Was CW radicalized by seeing the preferential treatment afforded a single fame-seeker?

Shifting Perspectives and Global Pursuits

The narrative viewpoint changes multiple times, ultimately revealing those early scenes’ place in the timeline. Harder catches up with Madison, who has been cleared of committing CW's offenses, yet still encounters suspicion over her recounting of the events, which includes the killing of her boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), based in Bali and trying to juice his career as part of a conservative-influencer power couple alongside Ariana (Veronica Long), although his chosen platform is bro-heavy streams, as opposed to the curated images that typically attract CW's interest.

Naud remains immensely captivating in the part, a role that appears especially custom-fit for her talents. (She even created CW's eye-catching wardrobe.) Although the follow-up's screentime balance tips heavily toward CW — the first film seemed more balanced between her and Madison — it still works as a tale of dueling investigators, with both women both use fake accounts, social media surveillance, and an apparently limitless travel fund to pursue or evade one another. Then again, perhaps the unlimited budget isn’t necessary. Influencers have a knack for gaining access to luxurious locales at little cost, an ability that CW echoes with her more overt scheming.

Resourceful Production and Cinematic Travelogue

The filmmakers behind Influencers seem similarly ingenious about finding beautiful places to visit, though they were presumably more legitimate in their methods. Most of the film seems to be shot on location, providing it an authentic gravity that remains even when numerous sequences consist of a handful of actors of people staring at computer or phone screens.

It’s the same principle which allowed the Bond franchise look so persistently lavish over the years: Indeed, explosive action and special effects can display large spending, however just providing a kind of visual tour to viewers also feels deeply filmic. It’s also particularly appropriate for a narrative so dependent on the coexisting superficial glamour and desperate hustle involved in producing jealousy-worthy online content.

All of the characters in Bali, like those staying in Thailand in the first film, appear to enjoy entry to unbelievably stylish contemporary villas; there are movies about lifeguards which don't feature this much aerial pool video. These individuals have to convincingly inhabit these lush, far-flung locations to emphasize the uneasy irony of how often each person — even the woman wreaking vengeance upon the online stars' self-centered phoniness — nevertheless devotes much time under the light of their devices.

Nuanced Portrayals and Digital-Age Suspense

At the same time, Harder hasn’t authored a screed against the emptiness of the influencer industry. While it can be satisfying to see CW exploit various online personalities, and a sense reminiscent of Hitchcock of alignment lets us to wish she doesn’t get caught, Harder is relatively sympathetic to the major influencer characters. Previously, he keyed into the isolation Madison felt while on ostensibly dream getaways. In this film, Harder seems to trust that merely watching Jacob at work will make it clear that he’s peddling snake-oil masculinity to other gullible men; he resists caricaturing the character further. He even gives Jacob a degree of respect by showing his genuine loyalty to his partner; he’s a hypocrite, yet Ariana is a partner in his hypocrisy, not a victim by it.

The flip side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation means it can sometimes appear as if he is acknowledging elements of modern online life without investigating them. This is particularly evident regarding how he brings AI into the plot, an intriguing development that lacks the psychological edge it should have. The retitled sequel of Influencers might give fans of the first movie hope for an Aliens-style escalation, and the movie does eventually provide exactly that, with a suitably chaotic climax. But before that, it resembles more a polished Hitchcock thriller than an wild-eyed, technology-obsessed De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ heavy use of actual places may also be what keeps it from coming across like utter horror. The world may be overrun with content-churning influencers, online fraud, and exploitative travel, but the world itself is still here, for now.