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“This whole affair smells like a cheap made-for-TV,” observes an opportunistic podcaster during the chilling follow-up Influencers. In the moment, his tone is dismissive in a calculated way of a guest whose outlandish story he once said he trusted. Yet his assessment of the events in the movie isn’t wrong. Superficially, two films on demand about a woman who insinuates herself into the worlds of online influencers and then murders them feels like a modern-day version of a tawdry yet cable-ready weekly TV movie. The surprising aspect regarding Influencers remains how much better it is than plenty of the competition, irrespective of screen size. It’s the kind of thriller that should give other movies a serious bout of FOMO.

Revisiting the First Film and Setting the Stage

2022’s Influencer tracks the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) while she quietly chooses solo-traveling influencer targets, entices them to their doom, and covers up those murders (for a time) by seizing control of their online accounts. 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 against her.

This provides the 2025 Influencers some early ambiguity, as returning writer-director the director resumes with the character CW contentedly residing alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. During a trip to celebrate their one-year anniversary, British influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW's attention and anger.

CW comments to her partner that a person should try stranding a phone-addicted online personality somewhere with no technology to see whether they can make it. Is this a backstory prequel? Was CW radicalized by seeing the preferential treatment afforded a single clout-chaser?

Shifting Perspectives and Global Pursuits

The narrative viewpoint changes multiple times, eventually clarifying those introductory moments' place in the timeline. The story revisits Madison, now exonerated for carrying out CW’s crimes, yet still encounters doubt regarding her recounting of what happened, which includes the murder of her boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), based 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 capture CW's interest.

Naud remains terrifically magnetic in her role, a role that appears particularly custom-fit for her talents. (She even created CW's striking outfits.) Although the sequel’s focus tips heavily toward CW — the original seemed more balanced between the two women — it still functions as a story of rival amateur detectives, with both women both use fake accounts, social media surveillance, and a seemingly limitless travel fund to chase and/or escape each other. Then again, perhaps the unlimited budget isn’t necessary. Influencers have a knack for gaining access to posh places without paying much, a skill which CW mirrors through her more blatant scamming.

Resourceful Production and Cinematic Travelogue

The creative team for Influencers appear equally resourceful in locating beautiful places to film, though they were presumably more legitimate in their methods. Most of the movie appears to be shot on location, providing it an authentic gravity that remains even as numerous sequences involve a relatively small cast of people staring at computer or phone screens.

It’s the same principle which allowed the Bond franchise look so persistently lavish over the years: Indeed, big action and visual effects can display a big budget, however just providing a kind of visual tour to viewers also feels inherently cinematic. It’s also particularly appropriate for a story so rooted in the coexisting superficial glamour and try-hard grind involved in producing jealousy-worthy online content.

All of the characters in Bali, like those staying in Thailand in the original, seem to have entry to unbelievably stylish modern bungalows; films exist concerning beach rescuers that don’t show off as much aerial pool video. These individuals must believably inhabit these luxurious, remote places to highlight the uneasy irony of how often each person — including the woman exacting revenge upon the online stars' narcissistic falseness — nevertheless spends plenty of time in the glow of their devices.

Balanced Depictions and Digital-Age Suspense

At the same time, the director has not crafted a rant against the vacuousness of the influencer industry. While it is gratifying to see CW exploit different internet celebrities, and a Hitchcockian sense of identification allows 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 isolation Madison experienced during supposedly envy-worthy vacations. In this film, the director appears confident that just observing Jacob in action will make it clear that he is selling false masculinity to other doofuses; he resists turning into a caricature the character. He even grants Jacob a degree of respect through depicting his true devotion to his partner; he’s a hypocrite, yet Ariana is a partner in his double standards, not a victim by it.

The other side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation is that it can sometimes appear as if he is acknowledging bits of contemporary digital culture without deeply exploring them further. This is especially true of the way he introduces artificial intelligence into the plot, a fascinating turn which misses the psychosexual kick it deserves. The pluralized title of Influencers could offer fans of the first movie hope for an Aliens-style escalation, and the movie ultimately delivers exactly that, with a suitably wild final act. But before that, it resembles more a sleek Alfred Hitchcock movie than a wild-eyed, technology-obsessed De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ heavy use of actual places might also be what keeps it from seeming like pure nightmare fuel. Our society might be saturated with content-churning influencers, digital deception, and self-serving tourism, but reality itself is still here, at least for now.