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“Everything about this stinks like a cheap made-for-TV,” states an opportunistic commentator during the horror sequel Influencers. At that point, he’s being manipulatively dismissive toward an interviewee with an outlandish story he once said he trusted. But his assessment of what’s happening on screen isn't inaccurate. On its face, a pair of streaming movies about a woman who worms her way into the worlds of social media stars before killing them feels like a modern-day version of a tawdry but network-approved Movie of the Week. The wild thing regarding Influencers remains how much better it proves to be than plenty of the competition, regardless of screen size. It is precisely the suspense film capable of giving other movies a bad case of FOMO.

Recapping the Original and Setting the Stage

2022’s Influencer tracks the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) as she methodically selects traveling alone influencer targets, lures them to their doom, and covers up those deaths (at least temporarily) by taking control of their socials. The movie leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW marooned on an uninhabited island off the coast of Thailand, after her latest target, Madison (Emily Tennant), turns the tables against her.

This provides the 2025 Influencers some early mystery, 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 first anniversary, British influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW's attention and ire.

CW remarks to Diane that a person ought to attempt stranding a phone-addicted online personality in a place with no technology and see if they can make it. Is this an origin-story prequel? Did CW become extremist after witnessing the special treatment given to a single fame-seeker?

Shifting Perspectives and Global Pursuits

The story’s perspective shifts several more times, ultimately revealing those introductory moments' chronological position. Harder catches up with Madison, now exonerated for carrying out CW's offenses, but still faces doubt over her version of what happened, including the murder of Madison’s boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), based in Bali and trying 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 typically capture CW’s attention.

Naud remains immensely captivating in the part, which seems particularly custom-fit to her strengths. (She even created CW's striking wardrobe.) While the sequel’s focus leans heavily into CW — the first film felt more equally divided between her and Madison — it still functions as a story of rival amateur detectives, as Madison and CW both use fake accounts, Insta-stalking, and an apparently unlimited travel budget to pursue and/or escape each other. Of course, maybe the vast resources aren't needed. Influencers have a knack for getting to explore posh places without paying much, a skill that CW echoes through her more blatant scheming.

Ingenious Filmmaking and Visual Wanderlust

The creative team for Influencers seem similarly resourceful about finding stunning locations to film, although they were presumably more legitimate in their methods. Most of the movie appears to be filmed in real places, providing it a real-world weight that remains even as many scenes involve a relatively small cast of characters looking at computer or phone screens.

It’s the same principle which allowed the James Bond movies appear so consistently opulent for decades: Yes, explosive action and visual effects can show off a big budget, however simply offering a kind of visual tour to viewers also feels deeply filmic. It’s also particularly appropriate for a story so rooted in the coexisting surface-level allure and desperate hustle involved in producing jealousy-worthy 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 that don’t show off as much overhead swimming-pool footage. The characters have to convincingly inhabit these luxurious, far-flung locations to emphasize the uneasy irony of how often everyone — even the woman wreaking vengeance upon the online stars' narcissistic falseness — nonetheless spends plenty of time under the light of their screens.

Nuanced Portrayals and Digital-Age Suspense

At the same time, Harder hasn’t authored a rant against the emptiness of online fame. Though it is gratifying to see CW exploit different internet celebrities, and a Hitchcockian sense of identification allows us to wish she doesn’t get caught, the filmmaker is relatively understanding of the key influencer figures. In the first movie, he keyed into the isolation Madison experienced while on supposedly envy-worthy vacations. Here, Harder seems to trust that merely watching Jacob in action will reveal that he’s peddling false masculinity to other gullible men; he resists caricaturing the character further. He even grants Jacob a degree of respect through depicting his genuine loyalty to his partner; he is two-faced, yet Ariana is a collaborator in his double standards, not a victim by it.

The flip side of this balanced approach is that it can sometimes appear as if he is acknowledging bits of contemporary digital culture without investigating them further. This is particularly evident of the way he introduces artificial intelligence into the plot, a fascinating turn which misses the psychological edge it deserves. The pluralized title for the film could offer devotees of the original expectations of an Aliens-style ante-upping, and the film ultimately delivers exactly that, with a suitably wild final act. But before that, it resembles more a sleek Hitchcock thriller than a frenzied, tech-addled De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ heavy use of actual places may also be what keeps it from coming across like pure nightmare fuel. Our society might be saturated with always-online creators, digital deception, and exploitative travel, but the world itself is still here, for now.