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“Everything about this reeks of a cheap made-for-TV,” observes an opportunistic podcaster midway through the horror sequel Influencers. In the moment, his tone is dismissive in a calculated way toward an interviewee with an outlandish story he previously claimed he believed. But his description of the events on screen isn't inaccurate. On its face, two films on demand about a young woman who worms her way into the worlds of social media stars and then murders them feels like the 21st-century equivalent of a lurid but network-approved Movie of the Week. The surprising aspect regarding Influencers is how much better it is than plenty of its competition, irrespective of where you watch it. It is precisely the suspense film that should give other movies a bad case of FOMO.

Recapping the Original and Establishing the Scene

2022’s Influencer follows the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) while she quietly chooses traveling alone social media targets, lures them to their doom, and covers up those deaths (for a time) by taking control of their online accounts. The movie leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW stranded on a deserted island off the coast of Thailand, after her latest target, Madison (Emily Tennant), reverses their roles on her.

This provides 2025's Influencers some early mystery, as returning filmmaker the director resumes with the character CW contentedly residing alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. During a trip marking the couple’s one-year anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW's attention and anger.

CW remarks to her partner that someone should try leaving a device-obsessed online personality in a place with no technology and see if they can survive. Is this an origin-story prequel? Did CW become extremist by seeing the special treatment afforded a single fame-seeker?

Shifting Perspectives and International Chases

The story’s perspective changes multiple times, eventually clarifying those early scenes’ chronological position. Harder catches up with Madison, who has been exonerated for committing CW's offenses, yet still encounters suspicion over her recounting of what happened, which includes the killing of her boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali attempting to juice his career as half of a right-wing-influencer power couple alongside Ariana (Veronica Long), although his chosen platform is bro-heavy streams, rather than the curated images that typically capture CW’s attention.

Naud remains terrifically magnetic in her role, a role that appears especially custom-fit for her talents. (She also designed CW's striking outfits.) Although the follow-up's screentime balance tips heavily toward CW — the original seemed more balanced between the two women — it still functions as a story of dueling amateur detectives, as Madison and CW both use fabricated profiles, social media surveillance, and an apparently unlimited travel budget to chase or evade one another. Of course, maybe the vast resources aren't needed. Influencers have a talent for getting to explore luxurious locales at little cost, a skill which CW mirrors with her more overt scheming.

Ingenious Filmmaking and Visual Wanderlust

The filmmakers behind Influencers appear equally ingenious in locating beautiful places to film, though they were likely more legitimate about it. The vast majority of the film seems to be filmed in real places, providing it an authentic gravity that remains even as many scenes involve a relatively small cast of people looking at computer or phone screens.

It’s the same principle that made the Bond franchise look so persistently lavish for decades: Indeed, big action and special effects can show off large spending, but just providing a kind of visual tour to viewers also seems inherently cinematic. It’s also especially fitting for a story so rooted in the simultaneous surface-level allure and desperate hustle involved in producing envy-inducing digital content.

All of the characters in Bali, like those who were in Thailand in the original, appear to enjoy entry to unbelievably stylish modern bungalows; films exist about lifeguards that don’t show off this much overhead swimming-pool video. These individuals have to convincingly occupy these lush, far-flung locations to highlight the uneasy irony of how frequently everyone — including the woman exacting revenge upon the online stars' narcissistic falseness — nevertheless devotes much time under the light of their screens.

Nuanced Portrayals and Tech-Savvy Tension

Simultaneously, Harder hasn’t authored a screed targeting the vacuousness of online fame. Though it is gratifying to watch CW manipulate various online personalities, and a Hitchcockian sense of alignment lets us to wish she doesn’t get caught, Harder is somewhat understanding of the major influencer characters. In the first movie, 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 is selling false masculinity to other doofuses; he avoids turning into a caricature the character further. He even grants Jacob a degree of respect by showing his genuine loyalty to his girlfriend; he is two-faced, yet Ariana is a partner in his double standards, not a victim of it.

The flip side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation is that it may occasionally seem that he is acknowledging bits of modern online life without investigating them further. This is especially true regarding how he introduces artificial intelligence into the story, an intriguing development which misses 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 movie ultimately delivers exactly that, with a suitably chaotic climax. But before that, it’s more like a polished Hitchcock thriller than an wild-eyed, tech-addled Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ extensive use of actual places may also be what keeps it from coming across like pure nightmare fuel. Our society might be saturated with content-churning influencers, digital deception, and self-serving tourism, but reality itself remains present, for now.