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“The entire situation reeks of a bad made-for-TV,” remarks an opportunistic podcaster during the chilling follow-up Influencers. In the moment, he’s being manipulatively dismissive of a guest with an outlandish story he previously claimed he believed. But his description of the events on screen isn't inaccurate. On its face, a pair of streaming movies about a young woman who insinuates herself into the worlds of online influencers before killing them seems like a modern-day version of a lurid but network-approved weekly TV movie. The wild thing regarding Influencers remains just how superior it is compared to much of its competition, regardless of where you watch it. It is precisely the thriller capable of giving other movies a serious bout of FOMO.

Revisiting the Original and Establishing the Scene

The 2022 film Influencer follows the mysterious CW (Cassandra Naud) while she quietly chooses traveling alone influencer targets, entices them to their deaths, and conceals those deaths (for a time) by seizing control of their socials. The movie concludes (spoiler ahead) with CW stranded on a deserted island off the coast of Thailand, following her latest target, Madison (Emily Tennant), reverses their roles on her.

This provides 2025's Influencers a degree of mystery, when returning filmmaker Kurtis David Harder resumes with CW happily living alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey to celebrate the couple’s one-year anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW’s eye and ire.

CW comments to Diane that a person should try stranding a phone-addicted online personality somewhere without any devices and see whether they can survive. Are we witnessing a backstory prequel? Did CW become extremist after witnessing the preferential treatment given to a single fame-seeker?

Shifting Perspectives and Global Pursuits

The story’s perspective changes multiple times, ultimately revealing those introductory moments' chronological position. Harder catches up with Madison, now exonerated for carrying out CW's offenses, but still faces doubt regarding her recounting of what happened, including the murder of Madison’s boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali and trying to juice his career as part of a conservative-influencer duo with Ariana (Veronica Long), though his preferred medium is bro-heavy streams, as opposed to the curated images that normally attract CW's interest.

Naud remains immensely captivating in the part, a role that appears particularly tailor-made for her talents. (She also designed CW's striking outfits.) While the sequel’s screentime balance tips heavily toward CW — the first film seemed more balanced between her and Madison — it still functions as a story of rival amateur detectives, with both women both use fake accounts, Insta-stalking, and a seemingly limitless travel fund to chase and/or escape one another. Then again, maybe the unlimited budget aren't needed. Influencers have a knack for gaining access to luxurious locales at little cost, an ability that CW echoes through her more blatant scamming.

Ingenious Filmmaking and Cinematic Travelogue

The creative team for Influencers appear equally ingenious in locating beautiful places to film, though they were presumably more legitimate about it. The vast majority of the film seems to be filmed in real places, giving it an authentic gravity that remains even as many scenes consist of a handful of actors of characters staring at computer or phone screens.

It follows the same logic which allowed the James Bond movies appear so consistently opulent for decades: Indeed, big action and visual effects can display a big budget, however just providing a travelogue of sorts for the audience also feels inherently cinematic. This is particularly appropriate for a story so dependent on the simultaneous surface-level allure and desperate hustle of creating jealousy-worthy digital content.

Every character visiting Bali, like those who were in Thailand in the original, appear to enjoy access 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 highlight the uncomfortable paradox of how often everyone — even the woman exacting revenge on the influencers’ narcissistic falseness — nonetheless devotes much time in the glow of their screens.

Balanced Depictions and Digital-Age Suspense

At the same time, Harder hasn’t authored a rant targeting the vacuousness of online fame. While it can be satisfying to see CW exploit various online personalities, and a sense reminiscent of Hitchcock of identification lets us to wish she evades capture, the filmmaker is relatively understanding of the major influencer characters. In the first movie, he keyed into the isolation Madison experienced during supposedly envy-worthy vacations. In this film, the director appears confident that merely watching Jacob in action will make it clear that he’s peddling false masculinity to other gullible men; he avoids turning into a caricature the character. He even gives Jacob a degree of respect through depicting his genuine loyalty to his partner; he is two-faced, but Ariana is a collaborator in his hypocrisy, not a victim of it.

The flip side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation means it may occasionally seem as if he is acknowledging elements of modern online life without investigating them further. This is especially true regarding how he brings AI into the plot, an intriguing development that lacks the psychological edge it should have. The retitled sequel of Influencers could offer devotees of the original hope for a larger-scale escalation, and the movie ultimately delivers exactly that, with an appropriately wild final act. However, initially, it resembles more a polished Hitchcock thriller than an wild-eyed, technology-obsessed De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ extensive use of actual places might also be what keeps it from seeming like utter horror. The world may be overrun with content-churning influencers, online fraud, and self-serving tourism, but the world itself remains present, for now.