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“The entire situation stinks like a cheap made-for-TV,” remarks a cynical commentator during the horror sequel Influencers. In the moment, he’s being manipulatively dismissive toward an interviewee with an bizarre tale he previously claimed he believed. But his assessment of the events on screen isn't inaccurate. On its face, a pair of films on demand chronicling a woman who worms her way into the lives of online influencers before killing them feels like the 21st-century equivalent of a lurid but network-approved Movie of the Week. The wild thing about Influencers remains how much better it is than plenty of its competition, regardless of where you watch it. It is precisely the thriller capable of giving other movies a serious bout of FOMO.

Revisiting the Original and Establishing the Scene

The 2022 film Influencer follows the mysterious CW (Cassandra Naud) as she methodically selects solo-traveling 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 marooned on an uninhabited island near the coast of Thailand, after her latest target, Madison (Emily Tennant), reverses their roles against her.

This lends the 2025 Influencers a degree of ambiguity, as returning filmmaker Kurtis David Harder resumes with CW happily living with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey marking the couple’s one-year anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW’s eye and ire.

CW remarks to Diane that someone should try stranding a phone-addicted online personality in a place with no technology to see whether they can survive. Are we witnessing an origin-story prequel? Did CW become extremist by seeing the preferential treatment afforded one fame-seeker?

Shifting Perspectives and International Chases

The narrative viewpoint changes multiple times, ultimately revealing those introductory moments' chronological position. The story revisits Madison, who has been exonerated for carrying out CW's offenses, yet still encounters doubt over her version of what happened, which includes the killing of Madison’s boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali and trying to boost his profile as half of a conservative-influencer duo with Ariana (Veronica Long), although his preferred medium involves masculine-focused livestreams, as opposed to the curated images that typically attract CW's interest.

Naud remains immensely captivating in the part, a role that appears especially tailor-made 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 her and Madison — it still functions as a story of rival investigators, as Madison and CW employ fake accounts, social media surveillance, and a seemingly limitless travel fund to pursue or evade each other. Of course, perhaps the vast resources isn’t necessary. Online personalities possess a knack for getting to explore luxurious locales without paying much, an ability which CW mirrors through her more blatant scheming.

Ingenious Filmmaking and Cinematic Travelogue

The creative team for Influencers appear equally ingenious in locating stunning locations to visit, though they were likely less nefarious about it. The vast majority of the film appears to be shot on location, giving it an authentic gravity that lingers even as many scenes involve a handful of actors of characters staring at digital devices.

It’s the same principle that made the Bond franchise appear so consistently opulent over the years: Indeed, big action and special effects can display large spending, but just providing a travelogue of sorts for the audience also feels deeply filmic. It’s also particularly appropriate for a story so dependent on the simultaneous surface-level allure and try-hard grind of creating envy-inducing online content.

Every character visiting Bali, like those staying in Thailand in the first film, appear to enjoy access to unbelievably stylish contemporary villas; films exist about lifeguards which don't feature this much overhead swimming-pool footage. The characters have to convincingly inhabit these lush, far-flung locations to highlight the uncomfortable paradox of how often everyone — even the woman exacting revenge on the influencers’ narcissistic falseness — nonetheless devotes much time in the glow of their screens.

Balanced Depictions and Tech-Savvy Tension

At the same time, Harder hasn’t authored a rant targeting the emptiness of online fame. While it can be satisfying to watch CW manipulate various online personalities, and a Hitchcockian sense of identification allows us to wish she doesn’t get caught, Harder is somewhat sympathetic to the major influencer characters. Previously, he keyed into the loneliness Madison felt during ostensibly dream getaways. In this film, the director appears confident that merely watching Jacob at work will make it clear that he is selling false masculinity to other gullible men; he avoids turning into a caricature the character further. He even gives Jacob a degree of respect through depicting his true devotion to his girlfriend; he is two-faced, but Ariana is a collaborator in his double standards, not someone exploited of it.

The flip side of this balanced approach is that it can sometimes appear that he is acknowledging elements of modern online life without investigating them further. This is especially true of the way he brings AI into the plot, an intriguing development which misses the psychosexual kick it deserves. The pluralized title of Influencers might give devotees of the original expectations of an Aliens-style ante-upping, and the film ultimately delivers exactly that, with a suitably chaotic climax. However, initially, it’s more like a polished Hitchcock thriller than an wild-eyed, technology-obsessed Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ extensive use of actual places may also be what prevents it from coming across like utter horror. The world may be overrun with always-online creators, online fraud, and exploitative travel, but reality itself is still here, at least for now.