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“This whole affair reeks of a bad made-for-TV,” remarks an opportunistic podcaster midway through the horror sequel Influencers. At that point, his tone is dismissive in a calculated way toward an interviewee whose bizarre tale he once said he trusted. But his assessment of what’s happening in the movie isn’t wrong. Superficially, two films on demand about a young woman who insinuates herself into the worlds of social media stars before killing them seems like the 21st-century equivalent of a tawdry but network-approved Movie of the Week. The wild thing regarding Influencers is how much better it proves to be compared to much of the competition, regardless of where you watch it. It’s the kind of suspense film that should give other movies a serious bout of FOMO.

Revisiting the Original and Setting the Stage

The 2022 film Influencer follows the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) as she quietly chooses solo-traveling social media targets, entices them to their doom, and conceals those deaths (for a time) 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 against her.

This lends 2025's Influencers some early mystery, when returning filmmaker Kurtis David Harder resumes with the character CW happily living with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey marking the couple’s first anniversary, British influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW's attention and ire.

CW remarks to Diane that someone ought to attempt stranding a phone-addicted influencer somewhere without any devices to 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 International Chases

The story’s perspective shifts several more times, eventually clarifying those introductory moments' chronological position. The story revisits Madison, who has been cleared of carrying out CW's offenses, yet still encounters doubt over her recounting 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 conservative-influencer duo alongside Ariana (Veronica Long), although his chosen platform involves masculine-focused livestreams, as opposed to the Instagram photos that typically attract CW's interest.

Naud remains terrifically magnetic in her role, which seems especially tailor-made to her strengths. (She even created CW's eye-catching wardrobe.) Although the follow-up's focus leans heavily into CW — the original felt more equally divided between the two women — it still functions as a tale of dueling investigators, with both women both use fabricated profiles, Insta-stalking, and a seemingly limitless travel fund to pursue and/or escape each other. Of course, maybe the vast resources isn’t necessary. Online personalities possess a talent for getting to explore posh places at little cost, an ability which CW mirrors with her more overt scheming.

Resourceful Production and Visual Wanderlust

The filmmakers behind Influencers seem similarly ingenious in locating stunning locations to film, though they were likely more legitimate in their methods. The vast majority of the movie appears to be filmed in real places, providing it a real-world weight that remains even as numerous sequences consist of a relatively small cast of characters looking at computer or phone screens.

It follows the same logic which allowed the Bond franchise appear so consistently opulent over the years: Indeed, explosive action and visual effects can display a big budget, however just providing a kind of visual tour for the audience also seems deeply filmic. It’s also particularly appropriate for a story so rooted in the coexisting superficial glamour and try-hard grind involved in producing envy-inducing online content.

All of the characters in Bali, similar to those staying in Thailand in the first film, appear to enjoy entry to unbelievably stylish modern bungalows; there are movies about lifeguards that don’t show off as much aerial pool video. These individuals must believably inhabit these lush, far-flung locations to highlight the uncomfortable paradox of how often each person — including the woman wreaking vengeance upon the online stars' narcissistic falseness — nonetheless spends plenty of time in the glow of their screens.

Balanced Depictions and Tech-Savvy Tension

Simultaneously, the director has not crafted a screed against the emptiness of online fame. While it is satisfying to see CW exploit various online personalities, and a sense reminiscent of Hitchcock of identification allows us to wish she evades capture, Harder is relatively sympathetic to the key influencer figures. In the first movie, he keyed into the loneliness Madison experienced during supposedly dream getaways. Here, Harder seems to trust that merely watching Jacob in action will reveal that he’s peddling snake-oil masculinity to other doofuses; he avoids caricaturing the character further. He even gives Jacob a degree of respect by showing his true devotion to his partner; he’s a hypocrite, yet Ariana is a partner in his double standards, not someone exploited by it.

The flip side of this balanced approach means it may occasionally seem as if he’s nodding at elements of modern online life without investigating them. This is especially true of the way he introduces artificial intelligence into the story, a fascinating turn which misses the psychological edge it should have. The pluralized title of Influencers could offer devotees of the original hope for a larger-scale escalation, and the film does eventually provide exactly that, with a suitably wild final act. But before that, it’s more like a polished Alfred Hitchcock movie than an wild-eyed, technology-obsessed De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ extensive use of real-world locations might also be what keeps it from coming across like pure nightmare fuel. Our society may be overrun with content-churning influencers, digital deception, and exploitative travel, but reality itself is still here, at least for now.