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“This whole affair stinks of a cheap TV movie,” remarks an opportunistic commentator during the chilling follow-up Influencers. At that point, his tone is manipulatively dismissive of a guest whose outlandish story he once said he trusted. But his assessment of the events in the movie isn't inaccurate. Superficially, a pair of films on demand about a woman who insinuates herself into the worlds of online influencers and then murders them seems like a modern-day version of a lurid yet cable-ready Movie of the Week. The wild thing regarding Influencers is how much better it is compared to much of its competition, irrespective of screen size. It’s the kind of suspense film capable of giving other movies a bad case of FOMO.

Revisiting the Original and Setting the Stage

2022’s Influencer tracks the mysterious CW (Cassandra Naud) as she quietly chooses traveling alone influencer targets, entices them to their deaths, and conceals those murders (at least temporarily) by seizing control of their socials. The movie leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW stranded on an uninhabited island off the coast of Thailand, following her most recent mark, Madison (Emily Tennant), turns the tables on her.

This lends 2025's Influencers a degree of mystery, when returning filmmaker the director picks up with CW contentedly residing alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. During a trip marking the couple’s first anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW’s eye and anger.

CW comments to Diane that a person should try leaving a phone-addicted online personality in a place with no technology to see whether they can survive. Are we witnessing an origin-story prequel? Was CW radicalized after witnessing the preferential treatment afforded one clout-chaser?

Shifting Perspectives and Global Pursuits

The story’s perspective shifts several more times, eventually clarifying those early scenes’ place in the timeline. The story revisits Madison, now exonerated for committing CW’s crimes, but still faces doubt regarding her version of the events, which includes 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 conservative-influencer duo alongside Ariana (Veronica Long), although his chosen platform is bro-heavy streams, rather than the Instagram photos that normally capture CW’s attention.

The actor continues to be immensely captivating in the part, a role that appears especially custom-fit for her talents. (She also designed CW's striking outfits.) While the sequel’s screentime balance tips heavily toward CW — the original felt more equally divided between the two women — it still functions as a story of dueling investigators, as Madison and CW employ fabricated profiles, Insta-stalking, and a seemingly limitless travel fund to pursue and/or escape one another. Then again, perhaps the vast resources aren't needed. Influencers have a knack for gaining access to luxurious locales without paying much, an ability that CW echoes through her more blatant scheming.

Resourceful Production and Visual Wanderlust

The creative team for Influencers appear equally resourceful about finding stunning locations to visit, although they were likely more legitimate in their methods. Most of the movie appears to be filmed in real places, giving it an authentic gravity that lingers even when many scenes consist of a handful of actors of people staring at computer or phone screens.

It’s the same principle which allowed the James Bond movies look so persistently lavish for decades: Indeed, big action and special effects can display large spending, however just providing a travelogue of sorts to viewers also feels inherently cinematic. 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, similar to those who were in Thailand in the original, seem to have entry to unbelievably stylish modern bungalows; films exist concerning beach rescuers that don’t show off this much overhead swimming-pool footage. These individuals must believably occupy these lush, far-flung locations to emphasize the uncomfortable paradox of how often each person — including the woman exacting revenge on the influencers’ self-centered phoniness — nevertheless devotes much time in the glow of their screens.

Nuanced Portrayals and Digital-Age Suspense

Simultaneously, the director has not crafted a rant against the vacuousness of the influencer industry. Though it is gratifying to see CW exploit different internet celebrities, and a Hitchcockian sense of identification lets us to hope she evades capture, the filmmaker is relatively sympathetic to the major influencer characters. In the first movie, he keyed into the isolation Madison experienced during ostensibly dream getaways. In this film, Harder seems to trust that just observing Jacob in action will make it clear that he is selling snake-oil masculinity to other doofuses; he resists turning into a caricature the character further. He even gives Jacob a degree of respect by showing his genuine loyalty to his girlfriend; he’s a hypocrite, but Ariana is a collaborator in his hypocrisy, not someone exploited of it.

The flip side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation is that it may occasionally seem as if he’s nodding at bits of contemporary digital culture without investigating them further. This is particularly evident regarding how he brings AI into the story, a fascinating turn that lacks the psychosexual kick it deserves. The pluralized title for the film could offer fans of the first movie expectations of a larger-scale escalation, and the film does eventually provide that, with an appropriately chaotic climax. But before that, it resembles more a polished Alfred Hitchcock movie than a wild-eyed, technology-obsessed De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ extensive use of actual places might also be what keeps it from coming across like utter horror. The world might be saturated with always-online creators, digital deception, and self-serving tourism, but reality itself is still here, for now.