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“Everything about this smells like a cheap made-for-TV,” remarks an opportunistic podcaster midway through the horror sequel Influencers. At that point, his tone is dismissive in a calculated way of a guest with an outlandish story he previously claimed he believed. But his description of the events on screen isn’t wrong. Superficially, two films on demand about a young woman who insinuates herself into the worlds of social media stars before killing them feels like the 21st-century equivalent of a tawdry yet cable-ready weekly TV movie. The wild thing regarding Influencers is just how superior it proves to be compared to much of the competition, irrespective of where you watch it. It’s the kind of thriller capable of giving other movies a serious bout of FOMO.

Revisiting the Original and Establishing the Scene

The 2022 film Influencer follows the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) as she quietly chooses traveling alone influencer targets, entices them to their doom, and conceals those deaths (at least temporarily) by seizing control of their socials. The film concludes (spoiler ahead) with CW stranded on an uninhabited 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 ambiguity, when returning writer-director the director picks up with CW happily living with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey to celebrate their one-year anniversary, British influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW’s eye and anger.

CW remarks to her partner that someone should try stranding a device-obsessed online personality somewhere with no technology to 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?

Evolving Viewpoints and Global Pursuits

The narrative viewpoint shifts several more times, eventually clarifying those early scenes’ chronological position. The story revisits Madison, who has been exonerated for carrying out CW’s crimes, but still faces suspicion over her version of the events, which includes the killing of her boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), based in Bali attempting to boost his profile as half of a right-wing-influencer duo with Ariana (Veronica Long), though his chosen platform involves masculine-focused livestreams, rather than the curated images that typically capture CW’s attention.

Naud remains immensely captivating in the part, a role that appears particularly tailor-made to her strengths. (She even created CW's striking outfits.) While the follow-up's screentime balance leans heavily into CW — the first film seemed more balanced between her and Madison — it still works as a story of dueling amateur detectives, as Madison and CW both use fake accounts, Insta-stalking, and a seemingly unlimited travel budget to chase or evade each other. Then again, maybe the vast resources isn’t necessary. Online personalities possess a knack for gaining access to luxurious locales without paying much, a skill that CW echoes through her more blatant scheming.

Resourceful Production and Cinematic Travelogue

The creative team for Influencers seem similarly ingenious in locating beautiful places to film, though they were presumably more legitimate about it. The vast majority of the movie appears to be filmed in real places, giving it a real-world weight that remains even as numerous sequences consist of a relatively small cast of characters staring at digital devices.

It’s the same principle that made the Bond franchise appear so consistently opulent for decades: Indeed, explosive action and visual effects can show off a big budget, but simply offering a travelogue of sorts to viewers also feels deeply filmic. It’s also particularly appropriate for a story so rooted in the simultaneous surface-level allure and try-hard grind of creating jealousy-worthy online content.

All of the characters visiting Bali, like those staying in Thailand in the first film, seem to have entry to unbelievably stylish modern bungalows; films exist concerning beach rescuers which don't feature this much overhead swimming-pool video. These individuals must believably occupy these luxurious, remote places to emphasize the uncomfortable paradox of how frequently each person — even the woman exacting revenge on the influencers’ self-centered phoniness — nevertheless spends plenty of time under the light of their devices.

Nuanced Portrayals and Digital-Age Suspense

At the same time, the director has not crafted a screed targeting the emptiness of the influencer industry. Though it is gratifying to see CW manipulate various online personalities, and a Hitchcockian sense of identification allows us to hope she doesn’t get caught, Harder is somewhat understanding of the major influencer characters. Previously, he tapped into the isolation Madison experienced while on supposedly dream getaways. Here, Harder seems to trust that merely watching Jacob in action will make it clear that he is selling snake-oil masculinity to other gullible men; he resists turning into a caricature the character. He even gives Jacob a measure of dignity through depicting his true devotion to his girlfriend; he is two-faced, but Ariana is a partner in his hypocrisy, not a victim of it.

The other side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation means it can sometimes appear that he’s nodding at bits of contemporary digital culture without investigating them. This is especially true of the way he introduces artificial intelligence into the story, an intriguing development that lacks the psychosexual kick it deserves. The retitled sequel for the film might give fans of the first movie expectations of a larger-scale ante-upping, and the movie does eventually provide that, with an appropriately wild final act. However, initially, it’s more like a polished Hitchcock thriller than an frenzied, technology-obsessed Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ heavy use of real-world locations might also be what keeps it from seeming like utter horror. The world may be overrun with always-online creators, online fraud, and exploitative travel, but the world itself is still here, at least for now.