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“The entire situation reeks like a cheap TV movie,” observes an opportunistic podcaster during the horror sequel Influencers. In the moment, his tone is dismissive in a calculated way of a guest with an outlandish story he previously said he trusted. Yet his assessment of the events on screen isn’t wrong. On its face, two films on demand chronicling a young woman who worms her way into the lives of social media stars and then murders them seems like a modern-day version of a tawdry but network-approved weekly TV movie. The surprising aspect about Influencers remains just how superior it is than plenty of its competition, irrespective of screen size. It is precisely the thriller that should give its peers a serious bout of FOMO.

Revisiting the First Film and Establishing the Scene

The 2022 film Influencer tracks the mysterious CW (Cassandra Naud) as she quietly chooses traveling alone social media targets, lures them to their doom, and covers up those murders (at least temporarily) by taking control of their socials. The film leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW stranded on an uninhabited island off the coast of Thailand, following her most recent mark, Madison (Emily Tennant), reverses their roles against her.

This provides 2025's Influencers a degree of mystery, when returning writer-director the director picks up with CW happily living with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey to celebrate their one-year anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW’s eye and anger.

CW remarks to her partner that someone ought to attempt leaving a phone-addicted influencer in a place with no technology and see whether they can make it. Are we witnessing a backstory prequel? Did CW become extremist by seeing the special treatment given to one clout-chaser?

Evolving Viewpoints and Global Pursuits

The narrative viewpoint shifts several more times, eventually clarifying those introductory moments' place in the timeline. Harder catches up with Madison, now cleared of carrying out CW’s crimes, yet still encounters suspicion regarding her version of what happened, including the murder of Madison’s boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali attempting to juice his career as half of a conservative-influencer duo with Ariana (Veronica Long), although his chosen platform involves masculine-focused livestreams, rather than the Instagram photos that typically capture CW’s attention.

Naud remains terrifically magnetic in her role, which seems especially tailor-made to her strengths. (She even created CW's eye-catching outfits.) While the sequel’s focus leans heavily into CW — the first film seemed more balanced between her and Madison — it still works as a story of rival amateur detectives, with both women employ fabricated profiles, social media surveillance, and an apparently unlimited travel budget to pursue or evade one another. Then again, maybe the vast resources aren't needed. Influencers have a knack for gaining access to posh places without paying much, an ability that CW echoes through her more blatant scheming.

Resourceful Production and Visual Wanderlust

The filmmakers behind Influencers seem similarly ingenious in locating stunning locations to film, although they were presumably more legitimate about it. The vast majority of the film seems to be filmed in real places, giving it a real-world weight that remains even when numerous sequences consist of a relatively small cast of characters looking at digital devices.

It’s the same principle which allowed the James Bond movies look so consistently opulent over the years: Yes, explosive action and visual effects can show off large spending, but simply offering a travelogue of sorts to viewers also feels deeply filmic. This is especially fitting for a narrative so dependent on 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 first film, seem to have entry to impossibly chic modern bungalows; there are movies about lifeguards which don't feature this much overhead swimming-pool video. These individuals have to convincingly inhabit these luxurious, far-flung locations to emphasize the uneasy irony of how often each person — even the woman exacting revenge on the influencers’ narcissistic falseness — nonetheless spends plenty of time in the glow of their screens.

Nuanced Portrayals and Tech-Savvy Tension

Simultaneously, Harder hasn’t authored a screed targeting the emptiness of the influencer industry. Though it can be satisfying to watch CW exploit different internet celebrities, and a sense reminiscent of Hitchcock of alignment lets us to wish she evades capture, Harder is relatively understanding of the key influencer figures. In the first movie, he tapped into the isolation Madison experienced during supposedly dream getaways. In this film, Harder seems to trust that merely watching Jacob in action will make it clear that he’s peddling false masculinity to other doofuses; he avoids caricaturing the character further. He even grants Jacob a measure of dignity by showing his true devotion to his partner; he’s a hypocrite, yet Ariana is a collaborator in his hypocrisy, not a victim by it.

The flip side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation means it can sometimes appear that he’s nodding at elements of modern online life without investigating them further. This is particularly evident of the way he brings AI into the story, an intriguing development which misses the psychosexual kick it should have. The pluralized title of Influencers could offer devotees of the original hope for an Aliens-style ante-upping, and the film ultimately delivers exactly that, with a suitably wild final act. But before that, it resembles more a sleek Hitchcock thriller than a frenzied, tech-addled Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ heavy use of actual places may also be what keeps it from seeming like pure nightmare fuel. The world may be overrun with content-churning influencers, digital deception, and self-serving tourism, but the world itself remains present, for now.