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“The entire situation reeks of a cheap TV movie,” states a cynical podcaster midway through the chilling follow-up Influencers. In the moment, he’s being manipulatively dismissive of a guest with an outlandish story he previously said he trusted. Yet his description of what’s happening in the movie isn’t wrong. Superficially, two streaming movies chronicling a young woman who insinuates herself into the worlds of social media stars before killing them feels like the 21st-century equivalent of a lurid yet cable-ready Movie of the Week. The wild thing regarding Influencers remains just how superior it is compared to much of its competition, irrespective of where you watch it. It is precisely the thriller capable of giving other movies a serious bout of FOMO.

Recapping the Original and Setting the Stage

The 2022 film Influencer follows the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) while she quietly chooses traveling alone social media targets, entices them to their deaths, and conceals those murders (for a time) by taking control of their online accounts. The film concludes (spoiler ahead) with CW marooned on a deserted island near the coast of Thailand, after her most recent mark, Madison (Emily Tennant), turns the tables on her.

This lends 2025's Influencers a degree of mystery, when returning writer-director Kurtis David Harder picks up with the character CW contentedly residing with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey marking the couple’s first anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW's attention and anger.

CW comments to her partner that someone should try stranding a device-obsessed online personality in a place without any devices and see if they can make it. Are we witnessing an origin-story prequel? Was CW radicalized by seeing the special treatment given to one fame-seeker?

Evolving Viewpoints and International Chases

The narrative viewpoint shifts several more times, eventually clarifying those early scenes’ place in the timeline. Harder catches up with Madison, who has been cleared of carrying out CW's offenses, but still faces suspicion over her recounting of the events, including the killing of her boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), based in Bali and trying to boost his profile as part of a conservative-influencer duo alongside Ariana (Veronica Long), although his preferred medium is bro-heavy streams, as opposed to the Instagram photos that typically attract CW’s attention.

Naud remains immensely captivating in the part, a role that appears particularly tailor-made for her talents. (She also designed CW's eye-catching wardrobe.) Although the follow-up's screentime balance tips heavily toward CW — the first film felt more equally divided between her and Madison — it still functions as a tale of rival investigators, as Madison and CW employ fabricated profiles, Insta-stalking, and an apparently unlimited travel budget to chase and/or escape one another. Then again, maybe the vast resources aren't needed. Influencers have a knack for gaining access to posh places without paying much, a skill that CW echoes with her more overt scheming.

Ingenious Filmmaking and Cinematic Travelogue

The filmmakers behind Influencers appear equally resourceful about finding beautiful places to visit, though they were likely more legitimate about it. Most of the film appears to be shot on location, providing it a real-world weight that lingers even when many scenes consist of a handful of actors of people staring at digital devices.

It follows the same logic which allowed the James Bond movies look so persistently lavish for decades: Indeed, explosive action and visual effects can display a big budget, but simply offering a travelogue of sorts to viewers also feels deeply filmic. It’s also particularly appropriate for a narrative so rooted in the coexisting superficial glamour and desperate hustle of creating jealousy-worthy online content.

Every character in Bali, like those who were in Thailand in the first film, seem to have access to unbelievably stylish modern bungalows; there are movies about lifeguards which don't feature as much aerial pool video. The characters have to convincingly inhabit these luxurious, far-flung locations to emphasize the uncomfortable paradox of how frequently everyone — even the woman exacting revenge upon the online stars' narcissistic falseness — nonetheless devotes much time in the glow of their devices.

Nuanced Portrayals and Tech-Savvy Tension

At the same time, the director has not crafted a screed targeting the vacuousness of online fame. While it is gratifying to watch CW exploit various online personalities, and a Hitchcockian sense of identification allows us to hope she doesn’t get caught, Harder is somewhat sympathetic to the key influencer figures. Previously, he tapped into the isolation Madison felt while on supposedly dream getaways. Here, Harder seems to trust that just observing Jacob in action will make it clear that he is selling false masculinity to other gullible men; he avoids caricaturing the character. He even grants Jacob a degree of respect through depicting his genuine loyalty to his partner; he’s a hypocrite, yet Ariana is a partner in his hypocrisy, not someone exploited of it.

The other side of this balanced approach is that it may occasionally seem that he is acknowledging elements of contemporary digital culture without deeply exploring them further. This is especially true of the way he brings AI into the story, an intriguing development that lacks the psychological edge it deserves. The retitled sequel for the film could offer fans of the first movie expectations of a larger-scale escalation, and the movie does eventually provide that, with a suitably chaotic climax. But before that, it’s more like a sleek Hitchcock thriller than an frenzied, tech-addled Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ extensive use of real-world locations might also be what keeps it from seeming like utter horror. Our society might be saturated with always-online creators, online fraud, and self-serving tourism, but reality itself is still here, for now.