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“Everything about this stinks like a cheap TV movie,” states a cynical commentator midway through the chilling follow-up Influencers. At that point, his tone is manipulatively dismissive toward an interviewee with an outlandish story he once said he trusted. Yet his description of the events on screen isn't inaccurate. Superficially, two films on demand about a woman who worms her way into the worlds of online influencers before killing them seems like a modern-day version of a tawdry but network-approved weekly TV movie. The surprising aspect regarding Influencers remains how much better it proves to be compared to much of the competition, regardless of screen size. It’s the kind of thriller that should give other movies a serious bout of FOMO.

Revisiting the Original and Establishing the Scene

The 2022 film Influencer follows the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) while she methodically selects traveling alone social media targets, lures them to their deaths, and covers up those murders (at least temporarily) by seizing control of their online accounts. The movie concludes (spoiler ahead) with CW stranded on a deserted island near the coast of Thailand, after her most recent mark, Madison (Emily Tennant), reverses their roles against her.

This provides 2025's Influencers a degree of ambiguity, as returning writer-director the director resumes with the character CW contentedly residing with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. During a trip to celebrate their first anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW’s eye and anger.

CW comments to Diane that a person ought to attempt stranding a device-obsessed online personality in a place with no technology and see whether they can survive. Is this an origin-story prequel? Did CW become extremist after witnessing the preferential treatment afforded a single clout-chaser?

Shifting Perspectives and Global Pursuits

The story’s perspective changes multiple times, eventually clarifying those early scenes’ chronological position. Harder catches up with Madison, now cleared of carrying out CW’s crimes, but still faces suspicion over her version of the events, including the killing of her boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), based in Bali attempting to juice his career as half of a conservative-influencer power couple with Ariana (Veronica Long), though his preferred medium involves masculine-focused livestreams, rather than the Instagram photos that typically attract CW's interest.

The actor continues to be terrifically magnetic in her role, which seems especially tailor-made to her strengths. (She also designed CW's striking outfits.) Although the sequel’s screentime balance tips heavily toward CW — the original felt more equally divided between her and Madison — it still functions as a tale of rival amateur detectives, as Madison and CW employ fake accounts, Insta-stalking, and an apparently limitless travel fund to pursue and/or escape each other. Of course, maybe the vast resources isn’t necessary. Online personalities possess a knack for getting to explore luxurious locales at little cost, an ability that CW echoes with her more overt scheming.

Ingenious Filmmaking and Visual Wanderlust

The filmmakers behind Influencers seem similarly resourceful about finding stunning locations to visit, although they were presumably more legitimate about it. Most of the film appears to be shot on location, providing it an authentic gravity that lingers even as many scenes consist of a handful of actors of people staring at digital devices.

It follows the same logic that made the James Bond movies look so consistently opulent for decades: Yes, big action and special effects can display large spending, but simply offering a travelogue of sorts for the audience also feels inherently cinematic. This is especially fitting for a narrative so rooted in the coexisting superficial glamour and desperate hustle involved in producing jealousy-worthy online content.

All of the characters visiting Bali, similar to those who were in Thailand in the original, appear to enjoy entry to impossibly chic contemporary villas; films exist concerning beach rescuers which don't feature this much overhead swimming-pool video. These individuals have to convincingly occupy these luxurious, far-flung locations to emphasize the uncomfortable paradox of how frequently each person — even the woman exacting revenge on the influencers’ narcissistic falseness — nonetheless spends plenty of time under the light of their devices.

Balanced Depictions and Digital-Age Suspense

Simultaneously, the director has not crafted a screed against the vacuousness of the influencer industry. While it is gratifying to see CW manipulate different internet celebrities, and a sense reminiscent of Hitchcock of identification lets us to hope she doesn’t get caught, Harder is relatively understanding of the major influencer characters. In the first movie, he tapped into the loneliness Madison felt while on ostensibly dream getaways. Here, the director appears confident that merely watching Jacob in action will reveal 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 through depicting his true devotion to his partner; he is two-faced, yet Ariana is a partner in his double standards, not a victim of it.

The other side of this balanced approach means it may occasionally seem as if 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 plot, a fascinating turn that lacks the psychological edge it deserves. The pluralized title of Influencers could offer devotees of the original expectations of a larger-scale ante-upping, and the film ultimately delivers exactly that, with a suitably chaotic climax. But before that, it resembles more a sleek Alfred Hitchcock movie than an wild-eyed, tech-addled De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ extensive use of real-world locations may also be what prevents it from coming across like pure nightmare fuel. The world may be overrun with always-online creators, online fraud, and self-serving tourism, but reality itself remains present, for now.