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“The entire situation smells of a bad TV movie,” remarks an opportunistic podcaster midway through the chilling follow-up Influencers. In the moment, his tone is dismissive in a calculated way of a guest with an outlandish story he once claimed he believed. But his assessment of the events on screen isn't inaccurate. On its face, two films on demand about a woman who insinuates herself into the lives of social media stars before killing them feels like a modern-day version of a tawdry but cable-ready weekly TV movie. The wild thing regarding Influencers is just how superior it is compared to much of its competition, irrespective of screen size. It’s the kind of thriller capable of giving other movies a bad case of FOMO.

Revisiting the Original and Establishing the Scene

The 2022 film Influencer tracks the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) as she methodically selects traveling alone influencer targets, entices them to their doom, and covers up those deaths (for a time) by seizing control of their online accounts. The movie leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW marooned on a deserted island off the coast of Thailand, following her latest target, Madison (Emily Tennant), turns the tables against her.

This provides the 2025 Influencers some early ambiguity, as returning filmmaker Kurtis David Harder picks up with CW happily living alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey to celebrate their one-year anniversary, British influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW's attention and anger.

CW comments to her partner that someone should try stranding a phone-addicted online personality somewhere with no technology to see if they can make it. Is this an origin-story prequel? Did CW become extremist after witnessing the preferential treatment given to a single fame-seeker?

Evolving Viewpoints and Global Pursuits

The narrative viewpoint changes multiple times, ultimately revealing those introductory moments' chronological position. The story revisits Madison, who has been cleared of carrying out CW’s crimes, yet still encounters suspicion regarding her version of what happened, which includes the killing of Madison’s boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), based in Bali and trying to juice his career as half of a conservative-influencer duo alongside Ariana (Veronica Long), although his chosen platform is bro-heavy streams, as opposed to the curated images that normally capture 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 outfits.) While the follow-up's focus tips heavily toward CW — the original seemed more balanced between the two women — it still works as a tale of dueling amateur detectives, with both women employ fabricated profiles, social media surveillance, and a seemingly unlimited travel budget to chase and/or escape one another. Of course, maybe the vast resources aren't needed. 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 Cinematic Travelogue

The creative team for Influencers appear equally resourceful in locating stunning locations to film, although they were presumably less nefarious in their methods. Most of the movie seems to be filmed in real places, giving it a real-world weight that remains even as numerous sequences involve a relatively small cast of people looking at computer or phone screens.

It’s the same principle that made the Bond franchise look so consistently opulent for decades: Indeed, big action and special effects can show off large spending, however simply offering a kind of visual tour to viewers also feels deeply filmic. This is particularly appropriate for a narrative so dependent on the simultaneous surface-level allure and desperate hustle of creating envy-inducing online content.

Every character in Bali, similar to those staying in Thailand in the original, seem to have access to unbelievably stylish contemporary villas; films exist about lifeguards which don't feature this much overhead swimming-pool video. These individuals must believably inhabit these lush, remote places to emphasize the uneasy irony of how frequently each person — even the woman exacting revenge on the influencers’ narcissistic falseness — nevertheless devotes much time in the glow of their devices.

Balanced Depictions and Digital-Age Suspense

At the same time, Harder hasn’t authored a rant targeting the vacuousness of online fame. Though it is satisfying to watch CW manipulate different internet celebrities, and a sense reminiscent of Hitchcock of identification allows us to hope she evades capture, the filmmaker is relatively sympathetic to the major influencer characters. In the first movie, he tapped into the loneliness Madison felt during supposedly envy-worthy vacations. In this film, Harder seems to trust that merely watching Jacob in action will make it clear that he is selling false masculinity to other doofuses; he resists turning into a caricature the character. He even gives Jacob a degree of respect through depicting his genuine loyalty to his girlfriend; he’s a hypocrite, but Ariana is a collaborator in his hypocrisy, not someone exploited of it.

The other side of this balanced approach means it may occasionally seem that he is acknowledging elements of contemporary digital culture without investigating them further. This is particularly evident of the way he introduces artificial intelligence into the story, an intriguing development which misses the psychosexual kick it should have. The pluralized title of Influencers could offer fans of the first movie expectations of an Aliens-style escalation, and the film does eventually provide that, with a suitably wild final act. But before that, it’s more like a polished Hitchcock thriller than a wild-eyed, tech-addled De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ heavy use of real-world locations may also be what prevents it from coming across like utter horror. Our society may be overrun with content-churning influencers, online fraud, and exploitative travel, but reality itself remains present, for now.