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“This whole affair smells of a bad TV movie,” remarks an opportunistic podcaster during the horror sequel Influencers. In the moment, his tone is manipulatively dismissive toward an interviewee with an outlandish story he once said he trusted. Yet his description of what’s happening in the movie isn't inaccurate. On its face, two streaming movies chronicling a woman who insinuates herself into the worlds of social media stars before killing them seems like the 21st-century equivalent of a tawdry yet network-approved Movie of the Week. The wild thing regarding Influencers is just how superior it is than plenty of the competition, regardless of where you watch it. It is precisely the suspense film that should give other movies a serious bout of FOMO.

Revisiting the Original and Establishing the Scene

2022’s Influencer tracks the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) while she quietly chooses traveling alone social media targets, entices them to their doom, and conceals those murders (at least temporarily) by seizing control of their online accounts. The film concludes (spoiler ahead) with CW stranded on a deserted island off the coast of Thailand, after her latest target, Madison (Emily Tennant), reverses their roles against her.

This lends 2025's Influencers a degree of mystery, as returning writer-director Kurtis David Harder resumes with the character CW happily living with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. During a trip to celebrate the couple’s first anniversary, British influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW’s eye and anger.

CW comments to her partner that someone should try leaving a phone-addicted online personality somewhere with no technology to see if they can survive. Are we witnessing a backstory prequel? Did CW become extremist by seeing the preferential treatment given to one clout-chaser?

Evolving Viewpoints and Global Pursuits

The story’s perspective changes multiple times, ultimately revealing those introductory moments' place in the timeline. Harder catches up with Madison, who has been cleared of carrying out CW's offenses, but still faces doubt regarding her version of the events, including the murder of Madison’s boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali and trying to boost his profile as half of a conservative-influencer power couple with Ariana (Veronica Long), though his chosen platform involves masculine-focused livestreams, as opposed to the curated images that typically attract CW’s attention.

The actor continues to be immensely captivating in her role, a role that appears particularly custom-fit to her strengths. (She also designed CW's eye-catching outfits.) While the follow-up's focus tips heavily toward CW — the original felt more equally divided between the two women — it still functions as a tale of rival amateur detectives, with both women both use fabricated profiles, social media surveillance, and an apparently unlimited travel budget to chase and/or escape each other. Of course, perhaps the unlimited budget isn’t necessary. Influencers have a knack for gaining access to posh places without paying much, an ability that CW echoes with her more overt scamming.

Resourceful Production and Cinematic Travelogue

The creative team for Influencers seem similarly resourceful about finding stunning locations to film, although they were presumably more legitimate about it. Most of the movie appears to be shot on location, providing it a real-world weight that lingers even when numerous sequences consist of a handful of actors of characters staring at digital devices.

It’s the same principle which allowed the James Bond movies look so persistently lavish over the years: Yes, explosive action and special effects can show off large spending, however simply offering a kind of visual tour for the audience also feels inherently cinematic. It’s also particularly appropriate for a narrative so dependent on the simultaneous surface-level allure and desperate hustle of creating envy-inducing digital content.

All of the characters in Bali, similar to those who were in Thailand in the original, seem to have entry to unbelievably stylish contemporary villas; films exist about lifeguards that don’t show off as much overhead swimming-pool video. The characters must believably occupy these luxurious, remote places to emphasize the uncomfortable paradox of how often everyone — including the woman wreaking vengeance upon the online stars' self-centered phoniness — nonetheless spends plenty of time under the light of their devices.

Balanced Depictions and Digital-Age Suspense

At the same time, the director has not crafted a rant against the emptiness of the influencer industry. Though it can be satisfying to watch CW exploit various online personalities, and a Hitchcockian sense of identification lets us to wish she evades capture, Harder is relatively sympathetic to the major influencer characters. Previously, he keyed into the loneliness Madison experienced during ostensibly 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 doofuses; he resists caricaturing the character further. 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 flip side of this balanced approach means it may occasionally seem as if he is acknowledging bits of contemporary digital culture without deeply exploring them. This is particularly evident regarding how he brings AI into the story, an intriguing development which misses the psychological edge it should have. The retitled sequel of Influencers might give devotees of the original expectations of an Aliens-style escalation, and the movie does eventually provide exactly that, with an appropriately wild final act. However, initially, it resembles more a sleek Hitchcock thriller than a wild-eyed, tech-addled Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ heavy use of real-world locations may also be what prevents it from coming across like pure nightmare fuel. The world might be saturated with content-churning influencers, online fraud, and self-serving tourism, but the world itself is still here, at least for now.