🔗 Share this article

“This whole affair stinks of a cheap TV movie,” states an opportunistic podcaster midway through the horror sequel Influencers. At that point, his tone is manipulatively dismissive of a guest whose outlandish story he once said he trusted. But his assessment of what’s happening in the movie isn't inaccurate. Superficially, a pair of streaming movies chronicling a young woman who insinuates herself into the lives of online influencers before killing them seems like a modern-day version of a tawdry but network-approved Movie of the Week. The surprising aspect regarding Influencers is just how superior it proves to be compared to much of the competition, regardless of screen size. It is precisely the suspense film that should give other movies a bad case of FOMO.

Recapping the First Film and Setting the Stage

The 2022 film Influencer follows the mysterious CW (Cassandra Naud) as she quietly chooses solo-traveling influencer targets, lures them to their doom, and conceals those deaths (for a time) by taking control of their online accounts. The film concludes (spoiler ahead) with CW marooned on a deserted island near the coast of Thailand, after her most recent mark, Madison (Emily Tennant), turns the tables against her.

This provides 2025's Influencers a degree of ambiguity, when returning filmmaker Kurtis David Harder resumes with CW happily living with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey to celebrate their one-year anniversary, British influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW’s eye and ire.

CW remarks to Diane that a person ought to attempt leaving a phone-addicted influencer in a place without any devices to see if they can make it. Is this a backstory prequel? Was CW radicalized after witnessing the special treatment afforded a single clout-chaser?

Shifting Perspectives and International Chases

The narrative viewpoint shifts several more times, eventually clarifying those introductory moments' chronological position. Harder catches up with Madison, who has been exonerated for committing CW’s crimes, but still faces doubt regarding her recounting of what happened, including the killing of her boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali and trying to boost his profile as part of a right-wing-influencer duo with Ariana (Veronica Long), though his preferred medium is bro-heavy streams, rather than the Instagram photos that typically capture CW's interest.

Naud remains terrifically magnetic in the part, which seems especially tailor-made for her talents. (She even created CW's striking wardrobe.) While the sequel’s focus leans heavily into CW — the original felt more equally divided between the two women — it still functions as a story of rival investigators, with both women employ fake accounts, Insta-stalking, and an apparently limitless travel fund to pursue and/or escape each other. Of course, perhaps the unlimited budget isn’t necessary. Influencers have a knack for gaining access to posh places without paying much, a skill that CW echoes with her more overt scheming.

Ingenious Filmmaking and Cinematic Travelogue

The filmmakers behind Influencers appear equally resourceful in locating stunning locations to film, although they were presumably more legitimate in their methods. The vast majority of the film appears to be filmed in real places, providing it an authentic gravity that lingers even when numerous sequences consist of a handful of actors of characters looking at digital devices.

It follows the same logic which allowed the Bond franchise look so persistently lavish over the years: Yes, explosive action and special effects can display large spending, however simply offering a kind of visual tour to viewers also seems deeply filmic. It’s also especially fitting for a narrative so dependent on the coexisting superficial glamour and try-hard grind of creating jealousy-worthy online content.

Every character in Bali, similar to those staying in Thailand in the first film, seem to have access to unbelievably stylish modern bungalows; films exist about lifeguards that don’t show off this much aerial pool video. The characters have to convincingly inhabit these luxurious, far-flung locations to highlight the uncomfortable paradox of how often each person — even the woman exacting revenge on the influencers’ self-centered phoniness — nevertheless devotes much time in the glow of their screens.

Balanced Depictions and Tech-Savvy Tension

Simultaneously, the director has not crafted a screed targeting the vacuousness of the influencer industry. While it is gratifying to see CW exploit various online personalities, and a Hitchcockian sense of alignment lets us to wish she evades capture, the filmmaker is somewhat sympathetic to the key influencer figures. In the first movie, he keyed into the isolation Madison experienced during ostensibly envy-worthy vacations. In this film, Harder seems to trust that just observing Jacob at work will make it clear that he is selling false masculinity to other gullible men; he avoids caricaturing the character further. He even gives Jacob a degree of respect by showing his true devotion to his girlfriend; he’s a hypocrite, but Ariana is a collaborator in his hypocrisy, not someone exploited by it.

The flip side of this balanced approach means it can sometimes appear that he is acknowledging bits of modern online life without deeply exploring them. This is particularly evident regarding how he introduces artificial intelligence into the plot, a fascinating turn which misses the psychosexual kick it should have. The pluralized title for the film could offer fans of the first movie hope for an Aliens-style ante-upping, and the movie ultimately delivers exactly that, with a suitably chaotic climax. But before that, it’s more like a sleek Hitchcock thriller than an frenzied, technology-obsessed De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ extensive use of actual places might also be what keeps it from seeming like pure nightmare fuel. The world might be saturated with content-churning influencers, digital deception, and self-serving tourism, but reality itself remains present, at least for now.