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“This whole affair reeks like a cheap TV movie,” states an opportunistic commentator midway through the chilling follow-up Influencers. At that point, his tone is manipulatively dismissive toward an interviewee with an outlandish story he previously said he trusted. Yet his assessment of what’s happening on screen isn't inaccurate. On its face, two streaming movies chronicling a woman who worms her way into the lives of social media stars and then murders them feels like the 21st-century equivalent of a lurid yet network-approved weekly TV movie. The surprising aspect regarding Influencers remains how much better it proves to be than plenty of its competition, regardless of screen size. It’s the kind of thriller that should give other movies a bad case of FOMO.

Revisiting the First Film and Establishing the Scene

The 2022 film Influencer tracks the mysterious CW (Cassandra Naud) while she quietly chooses traveling alone influencer targets, lures them to their doom, and conceals those deaths (for a time) by seizing control of their online accounts. The movie leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW stranded on a deserted island off the coast of Thailand, after her most recent mark, Madison (Emily Tennant), turns the tables against her.

This provides 2025's Influencers some early mystery, when returning filmmaker the director resumes with CW contentedly residing with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey to celebrate the couple’s first anniversary, British influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW's attention and anger.

CW remarks to her partner that a person should try stranding a device-obsessed online personality somewhere without any devices to see if they can survive. 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, ultimately revealing those introductory moments' chronological position. The story revisits Madison, now cleared of carrying out CW's offenses, yet still encounters doubt regarding her version of the events, including the killing of Madison’s boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali attempting to boost his profile as part of a right-wing-influencer power couple with Ariana (Veronica Long), although his preferred medium is bro-heavy streams, rather than the Instagram photos that normally capture CW’s attention.

Naud remains immensely captivating in the part, a role that appears especially tailor-made for her talents. (She also designed CW's striking outfits.) Although the sequel’s focus tips heavily toward CW — the original felt more equally divided between her and Madison — it still functions as a tale of dueling investigators, as Madison and CW both use fabricated profiles, Insta-stalking, and an apparently unlimited travel budget to pursue and/or escape one another. Of course, perhaps the unlimited budget aren't needed. Online personalities possess a knack for getting to explore posh places at little cost, a skill which CW mirrors through her more blatant scamming.

Ingenious Filmmaking and Cinematic Travelogue

The creative team for Influencers seem similarly ingenious about finding stunning locations to visit, although they were likely less nefarious about it. Most of the film seems to be shot on location, giving it a real-world weight that lingers even as numerous sequences consist of a relatively small cast of people looking at computer or phone screens.

It follows the same logic that made the James Bond movies appear so persistently lavish over the years: Yes, explosive action and special effects can show off a big budget, but just providing a kind of visual tour to viewers also feels deeply filmic. This is particularly appropriate for a narrative so rooted in the simultaneous surface-level allure and desperate hustle of creating jealousy-worthy digital content.

Every character in Bali, similar to those staying in Thailand in the original, seem to have entry to unbelievably stylish contemporary villas; films exist concerning beach rescuers which don't feature this much overhead swimming-pool video. The characters have to convincingly inhabit these luxurious, remote places to emphasize the uncomfortable paradox of how frequently each person — including the woman exacting revenge upon the online stars' self-centered phoniness — nevertheless devotes much time in the glow of their devices.

Nuanced Portrayals and Tech-Savvy Tension

Simultaneously, the director has not crafted a screed targeting the vacuousness of online fame. While it can be gratifying to see CW exploit different internet celebrities, and a Hitchcockian sense of alignment lets us to wish she evades capture, the filmmaker is relatively sympathetic to the major influencer characters. Previously, he tapped into the isolation Madison experienced during ostensibly envy-worthy vacations. Here, 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 turning into a caricature the character further. He even gives Jacob a degree of respect by showing his genuine loyalty to his partner; he is two-faced, but Ariana is a partner in his double standards, not a victim of it.

The flip side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation means it can sometimes appear as if he’s nodding at elements of contemporary digital culture without deeply exploring them. This is particularly evident of the way he brings AI into the story, a fascinating turn that lacks the psychosexual kick it should have. The pluralized title of Influencers might give fans of the first movie hope for a larger-scale ante-upping, and the film ultimately delivers that, with a suitably wild final act. However, initially, it resembles more a sleek Hitchcock thriller than a wild-eyed, tech-addled De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ heavy use of real-world locations might 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.