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“This whole affair smells like a bad made-for-TV,” remarks an opportunistic commentator during the chilling follow-up Influencers. At that point, his tone is dismissive in a calculated way toward an interviewee with an bizarre tale he previously said he trusted. But his assessment of what’s happening in the movie isn't inaccurate. Superficially, two streaming movies chronicling a woman who worms her way into the lives of social media stars before killing them seems like a modern-day version of a lurid yet cable-ready Movie of the Week. The wild thing about Influencers is 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 its peers a serious bout of FOMO.

Recapping the Original and Establishing the Scene

The 2022 film Influencer follows the mysterious CW (Cassandra Naud) as she quietly chooses traveling alone influencer targets, lures them to their doom, and conceals those deaths (at least temporarily) by seizing control of their socials. The film concludes (spoiler ahead) with CW stranded on a deserted island off the coast of Thailand, after her most recent mark, Madison (Emily Tennant), reverses their roles against her.

This lends the 2025 Influencers a degree of ambiguity, as returning writer-director the director resumes with the character CW contentedly residing with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. During a trip to celebrate their first anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW’s eye and ire.

CW comments to Diane that someone ought to attempt leaving a phone-addicted online personality in a place without any devices and see if they can survive. Is this an origin-story prequel? Did CW become extremist after witnessing the preferential treatment afforded a single fame-seeker?

Evolving Viewpoints and International Chases

The story’s perspective changes multiple times, eventually clarifying those early scenes’ chronological position. The story revisits Madison, who has been exonerated for committing CW’s crimes, but still faces doubt over her recounting of what happened, including the murder of her boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali and trying to juice his career as part of a right-wing-influencer power couple alongside Ariana (Veronica Long), although his preferred medium is bro-heavy streams, rather than the curated images that normally capture CW's interest.

Naud remains immensely captivating in the part, which seems especially tailor-made for her talents. (She even created CW's eye-catching outfits.) While the follow-up's screentime balance tips heavily toward CW — the original felt more equally divided between her and Madison — it still works as a story of rival investigators, with both women both use fabricated profiles, Insta-stalking, and a seemingly limitless travel fund to chase or evade one another. Then again, perhaps the vast resources isn’t necessary. Online personalities possess a talent for getting to explore posh places without paying much, a skill that CW echoes with her more overt scamming.

Resourceful Production and Cinematic Travelogue

The filmmakers behind Influencers appear equally ingenious in locating beautiful places to visit, although they were likely more legitimate in their methods. Most of the film appears to be shot on location, providing it an authentic gravity that remains even as many scenes involve a handful of actors of characters looking at digital devices.

It’s the same principle that made the James Bond movies look so persistently lavish over the years: Yes, explosive action and visual effects can show off large spending, however simply offering a travelogue of sorts for the audience also feels deeply filmic. It’s also especially fitting for a story so rooted in the simultaneous superficial glamour and desperate hustle involved in producing envy-inducing online content.

Every character in Bali, similar to those staying in Thailand in the first film, seem to have access to impossibly chic modern bungalows; there are movies concerning beach rescuers which don't feature this much overhead swimming-pool video. These individuals have to convincingly occupy these luxurious, far-flung locations to emphasize the uncomfortable paradox of how frequently each person — even 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

At the same time, the director has not crafted a rant targeting the emptiness of online fame. Though it can be satisfying to see CW exploit various online personalities, and a sense reminiscent of Hitchcock of alignment lets us to wish she doesn’t get caught, the filmmaker is relatively understanding of the major influencer characters. Previously, he tapped into the isolation Madison felt while on ostensibly envy-worthy vacations. Here, the director appears confident that just observing Jacob at work will make it clear that he’s peddling false masculinity to other gullible men; he resists 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 hypocrisy, not a victim by it.

The flip side of this balanced approach is that it may occasionally seem as if he’s nodding at bits of modern online life without deeply exploring them further. This is especially true of the way he brings AI into the story, a fascinating turn which misses the psychological edge it deserves. The retitled sequel of Influencers could offer devotees of the original expectations of a larger-scale ante-upping, and the movie does eventually provide that, with an appropriately chaotic climax. However, initially, it’s more like a polished Alfred Hitchcock movie 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 utter horror. Our society might be saturated with content-churning influencers, online fraud, and self-serving tourism, but reality itself remains present, at least for now.