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“The entire situation smells of a cheap made-for-TV,” states a cynical podcaster midway through the chilling follow-up Influencers. In the moment, his tone is dismissive in a calculated way of a guest whose bizarre tale he previously claimed he believed. But his description of the events in the movie isn't inaccurate. Superficially, two films on demand chronicling a young woman who insinuates herself into the lives of online influencers and then murders them feels like the 21st-century equivalent of a lurid but network-approved weekly TV movie. The surprising aspect about Influencers remains how much better it is compared to much of the competition, regardless of where you watch it. It’s the kind of suspense film capable of giving its peers a bad case of FOMO.

Revisiting the Original and Setting the Stage

The 2022 film Influencer tracks the mysterious CW (Cassandra Naud) while she quietly chooses traveling alone social media targets, entices them to their deaths, and covers up those murders (at least temporarily) by taking control of their socials. The movie leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW marooned on a deserted island near the coast of Thailand, following her most recent mark, Madison (Emily Tennant), turns the tables against her.

This provides the 2025 Influencers some early ambiguity, when returning writer-director Kurtis David Harder resumes with CW happily living alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey marking their first anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW's attention and ire.

CW comments to Diane that a person ought to attempt stranding a device-obsessed online personality somewhere with no technology and see whether they can survive. Are we witnessing a backstory prequel? Did CW become extremist after witnessing the preferential treatment given to a single fame-seeker?

Shifting Perspectives and International Chases

The narrative viewpoint shifts several more times, eventually clarifying those early scenes’ place in the timeline. Harder catches up with Madison, now exonerated for carrying out CW’s crimes, yet still encounters suspicion regarding her version of the events, including the killing of her boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali attempting to juice his career as part of a right-wing-influencer duo with Ariana (Veronica Long), though his preferred medium involves masculine-focused livestreams, rather than the curated images that typically capture CW's interest.

The actor continues to be terrifically magnetic in the part, which seems especially custom-fit for her talents. (She even created CW's eye-catching wardrobe.) While the sequel’s screentime balance tips heavily toward CW — the original 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 unlimited travel budget to chase and/or escape each other. Then again, maybe the vast resources aren't needed. Influencers have a talent for gaining access to luxurious locales at little cost, an ability which CW mirrors with her more overt scamming.

Resourceful Production and Cinematic Travelogue

The creative team for Influencers appear equally resourceful in locating stunning locations to film, although they were presumably more legitimate in their methods. The vast majority of the film seems to be filmed in real places, providing it an authentic gravity that remains even as numerous sequences involve a handful of actors of people staring at digital devices.

It follows the same logic that made the Bond franchise appear so consistently opulent over the years: Yes, explosive action and special effects can show off a big budget, however simply offering a kind of visual tour to viewers also feels deeply filmic. This is especially fitting for a story so dependent on the coexisting surface-level allure and desperate hustle of creating envy-inducing digital content.

Every character in Bali, similar to those who were in Thailand in the original, appear to enjoy access to impossibly chic contemporary villas; there are movies concerning beach rescuers which don't feature this much overhead swimming-pool footage. These individuals have to convincingly inhabit these lush, far-flung locations to emphasize the uncomfortable paradox of how frequently each person — even the woman exacting revenge upon the online stars' self-centered phoniness — nonetheless spends plenty of time under the light of their devices.

Nuanced Portrayals and Tech-Savvy Tension

At the same time, Harder hasn’t authored a screed targeting the vacuousness of online fame. While it can be satisfying to see CW manipulate different internet celebrities, and a Hitchcockian sense of identification lets us to hope she evades capture, Harder is somewhat sympathetic to the key influencer figures. In the first movie, he keyed into the loneliness Madison experienced while on supposedly dream getaways. In this film, Harder seems to trust that just observing Jacob at work will reveal that he’s peddling snake-oil masculinity to other doofuses; he resists caricaturing the character further. He even grants Jacob a degree of respect through depicting his genuine loyalty to his girlfriend; he’s a hypocrite, yet Ariana is a partner in his double standards, not someone exploited by it.

The other side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation is that it can sometimes appear as if he’s nodding at bits of modern online life without investigating them further. This is particularly evident of the way he brings AI into the story, a fascinating turn that lacks the psychological edge it should have. The retitled sequel for the film could offer devotees of the original expectations of an Aliens-style ante-upping, and the film ultimately delivers that, with an appropriately wild final act. However, initially, it’s more like a sleek Hitchcock thriller than a frenzied, tech-addled De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ heavy use of actual places may also be what keeps it from coming across like utter horror. Our society might be saturated with content-churning influencers, digital deception, and exploitative travel, but reality itself is still here, for now.