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“Everything about this stinks like a bad made-for-TV,” observes an opportunistic podcaster midway through the chilling follow-up Influencers. In the moment, his tone is manipulatively dismissive of a guest with an bizarre tale he previously claimed he believed. Yet his assessment of the events on screen isn't inaccurate. Superficially, two streaming movies about a young woman who worms her way into the lives of online influencers and then murders them seems like a modern-day version of a lurid but network-approved weekly TV movie. The surprising aspect regarding Influencers remains just how superior it proves to be than plenty of its competition, regardless of where you watch it. It’s the kind of suspense film that should give other movies a serious bout of FOMO.

Revisiting the Original and Setting the Stage

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

This provides 2025's Influencers a degree of mystery, when returning filmmaker Kurtis David Harder resumes with CW happily living with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. During a trip marking the couple’s one-year anniversary, British influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW's attention and ire.

CW remarks to her partner that someone should try stranding a device-obsessed online personality in a place without any devices to see whether they can make it. Is this an origin-story prequel? Did CW become extremist after witnessing the special treatment afforded one clout-chaser?

Shifting Perspectives and International Chases

The story’s perspective changes multiple times, eventually clarifying those early scenes’ place in the timeline. The story revisits Madison, now exonerated for carrying out CW’s crimes, yet still encounters suspicion regarding her version of what happened, which includes the killing of Madison’s boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), based in Bali attempting to boost his profile as half of a conservative-influencer power couple alongside Ariana (Veronica Long), though his preferred medium is bro-heavy streams, rather than the curated images that normally attract CW's interest.

Naud remains terrifically magnetic in her role, which seems particularly tailor-made for her talents. (She even created CW's striking wardrobe.) Although the follow-up's screentime balance leans heavily into CW — the first film felt more equally divided between her and Madison — it still works as a tale of dueling amateur detectives, as Madison and CW employ fabricated profiles, social media surveillance, and an apparently unlimited travel budget to pursue and/or escape each other. Then again, maybe the vast resources aren't needed. Online personalities possess a talent for getting to explore posh places without paying much, an ability which CW mirrors through her more blatant scamming.

Ingenious Filmmaking and Cinematic Travelogue

The creative team for Influencers appear equally ingenious in locating stunning locations to film, though they were likely less nefarious in their methods. Most of the film appears to be shot on location, giving it an authentic gravity that lingers even as numerous sequences consist of a relatively small cast of characters staring at computer or phone screens.

It’s the same principle that made the James Bond movies appear so persistently lavish for decades: Indeed, explosive action and visual effects can show off large spending, however simply offering a travelogue of sorts to viewers also seems deeply filmic. It’s also particularly appropriate for a story so rooted in the coexisting superficial glamour and desperate hustle of creating jealousy-worthy digital content.

All of the characters in Bali, like those who were in Thailand in the first film, seem to have access to unbelievably stylish contemporary villas; films exist about lifeguards that don’t show off as much aerial pool video. The characters have to convincingly occupy these lush, far-flung locations to highlight the uneasy irony of how frequently everyone — even the woman wreaking vengeance upon the online stars' narcissistic falseness — nonetheless devotes much time under the light of their screens.

Balanced Depictions and Tech-Savvy Tension

At the same time, Harder hasn’t authored a screed targeting the vacuousness of online fame. While it can be gratifying to see CW exploit various online personalities, and a sense reminiscent of Hitchcock of identification allows us to hope she doesn’t get caught, Harder is somewhat sympathetic to the key influencer figures. Previously, he keyed into the isolation Madison experienced while on supposedly envy-worthy vacations. Here, Harder seems to trust that just observing Jacob in action will make it clear that he’s peddling false masculinity to other doofuses; he avoids turning into a caricature the character further. He even gives Jacob a measure of dignity by showing his true devotion to his girlfriend; he is two-faced, but Ariana is a collaborator in his double standards, not someone exploited by it.

The flip side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation means it can sometimes appear as if he is acknowledging elements of modern online life without deeply exploring them. This is especially true regarding how he introduces artificial intelligence into the story, a fascinating turn which misses the psychological edge it should have. The retitled sequel for the film might give fans of the first movie hope for an Aliens-style ante-upping, and the film ultimately delivers exactly that, with an appropriately wild final act. However, initially, it resembles more a polished Alfred Hitchcock movie than an wild-eyed, technology-obsessed Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ extensive use of actual places may also be what prevents it from seeming like utter horror. Our society might be saturated with content-churning influencers, online fraud, and self-serving tourism, but the world itself remains present, for now.