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“The entire situation smells like a bad TV movie,” remarks an opportunistic commentator during the chilling follow-up Influencers. At that point, his tone is dismissive in a calculated way of a guest with an bizarre tale he previously claimed he believed. But his assessment of what’s happening in the movie isn’t wrong. On its face, two streaming movies about a woman who worms her way into the lives of social media stars before killing them feels like a modern-day version of a lurid but cable-ready weekly TV movie. The wild thing regarding Influencers is just how superior it proves to be than plenty of the competition, irrespective of screen size. It is precisely the thriller capable of giving other movies a serious bout of FOMO.

Recapping the First Film and Establishing the Scene

The 2022 film Influencer tracks the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) while she quietly chooses traveling alone social media targets, entices them to their deaths, and covers up those deaths (for a time) by seizing control of their socials. The film leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW stranded on a deserted island near the coast of Thailand, following her most recent mark, Madison (Emily Tennant), turns the tables on her.

This lends 2025's Influencers a degree of mystery, as returning filmmaker Kurtis David Harder resumes with the character CW happily living alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. During a trip marking the couple’s first anniversary, British influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW's attention and ire.

CW remarks to her partner that a person should try leaving a phone-addicted influencer somewhere without any devices and see if they can make it. Are we witnessing an origin-story prequel? Did CW become extremist by seeing the preferential treatment given to one clout-chaser?

Evolving Viewpoints and International Chases

The narrative viewpoint changes multiple times, eventually clarifying those introductory moments' chronological position. Harder catches up with Madison, who has been exonerated for committing CW's offenses, but still faces suspicion over her version of what happened, including the murder of her boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), based in Bali attempting to boost his profile as half of a right-wing-influencer duo alongside Ariana (Veronica Long), though his preferred medium involves masculine-focused livestreams, rather than the Instagram photos that normally capture CW's interest.

The actor continues to be terrifically magnetic in her role, which seems especially tailor-made to her strengths. (She also designed CW's striking wardrobe.) Although the sequel’s focus leans heavily into CW — the original felt more equally divided between her and Madison — it still works as a tale of dueling investigators, with both women both use fabricated profiles, Insta-stalking, and a seemingly limitless travel fund to pursue and/or escape one another. Of course, perhaps the unlimited budget aren't needed. Influencers have a knack for gaining access to luxurious locales without paying much, an ability that CW echoes with her more overt scamming.

Resourceful Production and Visual Wanderlust

The filmmakers behind Influencers seem similarly resourceful in locating beautiful places to visit, although they were presumably more legitimate about it. The vast majority of the film appears to be filmed in real places, giving it an authentic gravity that lingers even when many scenes consist of a handful of actors of people looking at digital devices.

It’s the same principle that made the James Bond movies look so consistently opulent over the years: Indeed, explosive action and visual effects can display large spending, however simply offering a kind of visual tour to viewers also feels inherently cinematic. It’s also particularly appropriate for a narrative so rooted in the simultaneous superficial glamour and desperate hustle of creating jealousy-worthy digital content.

Every character in Bali, like those who were in Thailand in the first film, seem to have entry to impossibly chic modern bungalows; films exist about lifeguards which don't feature this much overhead swimming-pool footage. These individuals must believably occupy these luxurious, remote places to emphasize the uneasy irony of how frequently each person — even the woman wreaking vengeance upon the online stars' narcissistic falseness — nonetheless devotes much time under the light of their devices.

Nuanced Portrayals and Tech-Savvy Tension

At the same time, the director has not crafted a screed against the emptiness of the influencer industry. Though it is satisfying to watch CW exploit different internet celebrities, and a Hitchcockian sense of alignment lets us to hope she doesn’t get caught, Harder is relatively sympathetic to the major influencer characters. In the first movie, he tapped into the loneliness Madison experienced during supposedly envy-worthy vacations. Here, Harder seems to trust that merely watching Jacob at work will reveal that he’s peddling false masculinity to other gullible men; he avoids caricaturing the character. He even grants Jacob a degree of respect through depicting his genuine loyalty to his partner; 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 means it may occasionally seem as if he is acknowledging elements of modern online life without deeply exploring them further. This is particularly evident of the way he brings AI into the story, a fascinating turn that lacks the psychosexual kick it deserves. The pluralized title of Influencers could offer devotees of the original expectations of an Aliens-style escalation, and the movie does eventually provide that, with a suitably wild final act. But before that, it’s more like a polished Hitchcock thriller than an wild-eyed, technology-obsessed Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ heavy use of real-world locations may also be what keeps it from coming across like pure nightmare fuel. Our society may be overrun with always-online creators, digital deception, and exploitative travel, but the world itself is still here, at least for now.