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“This whole affair stinks of a cheap TV movie,” remarks an opportunistic commentator during the chilling follow-up Influencers. In the moment, his tone is dismissive in a calculated way toward an interviewee with an outlandish story he previously said he trusted. Yet his assessment of the events on screen isn't inaccurate. Superficially, a pair of streaming movies about a woman who insinuates herself into the lives of social media stars before killing them seems like the 21st-century equivalent of a tawdry yet cable-ready weekly TV movie. The wild thing about Influencers is just how superior it proves to be compared to much of the competition, regardless of where you watch it. It is precisely the thriller that should give its peers a bad case of FOMO.

Revisiting the Original and Setting the Stage

The 2022 film Influencer tracks the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) while she methodically selects solo-traveling social media targets, entices them to their deaths, and covers up those deaths (at least temporarily) by seizing control of their socials. The film leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW marooned on a deserted island near the coast of Thailand, after her latest target, Madison (Emily Tennant), turns the tables on her.

This lends the 2025 Influencers a degree of ambiguity, when returning writer-director the director resumes with CW happily living with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. During a trip marking their first anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW’s eye and ire.

CW comments to Diane that a person ought to attempt leaving a device-obsessed influencer in a place without any devices and see whether they can make it. Is this a backstory prequel? Did CW become extremist by seeing the special treatment given to one fame-seeker?

Shifting Perspectives and Global Pursuits

The story’s perspective changes multiple times, eventually clarifying those early scenes’ chronological position. The story revisits Madison, now exonerated for committing CW’s crimes, but still faces doubt over her recounting of what happened, which includes the killing of her boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali attempting to juice his career as part of a right-wing-influencer power couple with Ariana (Veronica Long), though his chosen platform involves masculine-focused livestreams, as opposed to the curated images that normally capture CW's interest.

The actor continues to be terrifically magnetic in her role, a role that appears especially tailor-made for her talents. (She also designed CW's striking wardrobe.) While the sequel’s screentime balance tips heavily toward CW — the first film felt more equally divided between her and Madison — it still functions as a tale of dueling investigators, with both women employ fabricated profiles, social media surveillance, and an apparently limitless travel fund to pursue or evade one another. Of course, maybe the vast resources isn’t necessary. Influencers have a knack for gaining access to posh places at little cost, a skill that CW echoes through her more blatant scamming.

Resourceful Production and Cinematic Travelogue

The filmmakers behind Influencers seem similarly ingenious in locating beautiful places to visit, although they were presumably less nefarious in their methods. The vast majority of the film appears to be shot on location, providing it an authentic gravity that lingers even as many scenes involve a relatively small cast of characters looking at digital devices.

It follows the same logic which allowed the James Bond movies appear so persistently lavish for decades: Yes, explosive action and visual effects can display large spending, however just providing a kind of visual tour to viewers also feels deeply filmic. It’s also especially fitting for a narrative so rooted in the coexisting superficial glamour and try-hard grind involved in producing envy-inducing digital content.

All of the characters in Bali, similar to those who were in Thailand in the original, appear to enjoy entry to unbelievably stylish contemporary villas; there are movies about lifeguards which don't feature as much overhead swimming-pool footage. The characters have to convincingly occupy these lush, far-flung locations to emphasize the uneasy irony of how frequently everyone — even the woman wreaking vengeance upon the online stars' self-centered phoniness — nonetheless spends plenty of time under the light of their devices.

Balanced Depictions and Tech-Savvy Tension

At the same time, Harder hasn’t authored a rant against the vacuousness of online fame. Though it is gratifying to watch CW manipulate different internet celebrities, and a sense reminiscent of Hitchcock of alignment allows us to hope she evades capture, the filmmaker is somewhat sympathetic to the major influencer characters. Previously, he keyed into the loneliness Madison experienced while on supposedly envy-worthy vacations. In this film, Harder seems to trust that merely watching Jacob in action will reveal that he’s peddling false masculinity to other gullible men; he avoids turning into a caricature the character further. He even grants Jacob a degree of respect through depicting his genuine loyalty to his girlfriend; he is two-faced, but Ariana is a partner in his double standards, not someone exploited by it.

The other side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation is that it can sometimes appear that he’s nodding at elements of modern online life without investigating them further. This is particularly evident regarding how he introduces artificial intelligence into the plot, a fascinating turn that lacks the psychosexual kick it deserves. The retitled sequel of Influencers could offer devotees of the original expectations of a larger-scale ante-upping, and the movie ultimately delivers exactly that, with an appropriately chaotic climax. But before that, it’s more like a polished Alfred Hitchcock movie than a frenzied, tech-addled De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ heavy use of real-world locations may also be what keeps it from coming across like pure nightmare fuel. The world might be saturated with always-online creators, online fraud, and self-serving tourism, but reality itself remains present, at least for now.