“This whole affair stinks of a bad made-for-TV,” observes a cynical podcaster during the chilling follow-up Influencers. In the moment, he’s being manipulatively dismissive of a guest whose bizarre tale he once said he trusted. Yet his description of the events on screen isn’t wrong. Superficially, two films on demand chronicling a woman who insinuates herself into the lives of social media stars and then murders them feels like the 21st-century equivalent of a tawdry yet cable-ready Movie of the Week. The wild thing regarding Influencers is how much better it is than plenty of its competition, irrespective of screen size. It is precisely the suspense film capable of giving its peers a serious bout of FOMO.
Revisiting the First Film and Establishing the Scene
The 2022 film Influencer follows the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) while she quietly chooses solo-traveling social media targets, lures them to their deaths, and covers up those deaths (at least temporarily) by seizing control of their socials. 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 lends 2025's Influencers a degree of ambiguity, as returning writer-director the director resumes with CW contentedly residing alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. During a trip to celebrate their one-year anniversary, British influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW's attention and anger.
CW comments to her partner that a person should try leaving a device-obsessed online personality somewhere without any devices and see whether they can survive. Are we witnessing a backstory prequel? Did CW become extremist by seeing the special treatment given to a single clout-chaser?
Shifting Perspectives and International Chases
The story’s perspective changes multiple times, eventually clarifying those introductory moments' place in the timeline. Harder catches up with Madison, who has been exonerated for carrying out CW’s crimes, but still faces suspicion regarding her recounting of the events, which includes the killing of Madison’s boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), based in Bali attempting to boost his profile as half of a right-wing-influencer duo with Ariana (Veronica Long), although his chosen platform involves masculine-focused livestreams, rather than the Instagram photos that normally capture CW’s attention.
Naud remains terrifically magnetic in the part, a role that appears especially custom-fit for her talents. (She also designed CW's eye-catching wardrobe.) While the follow-up's screentime balance leans heavily into CW — the original seemed more balanced between her and Madison — it still functions as a tale of rival investigators, as Madison and CW both use fake accounts, social media surveillance, and an apparently limitless travel fund to pursue and/or escape each other. Then again, perhaps the unlimited budget aren't needed. Online personalities possess a talent for getting to explore luxurious locales without paying much, an ability which CW mirrors with her more overt scheming.
Ingenious Filmmaking and Visual Wanderlust
The creative team for Influencers seem similarly resourceful in locating beautiful places to visit, though they were presumably less nefarious in their methods. Most of the film appears to be shot on location, giving it a real-world weight that remains even when numerous sequences consist of a relatively small cast of characters staring at digital devices.
It follows the same logic that made the James Bond movies look so persistently lavish for decades: Yes, big action and visual effects can show off a big budget, but just providing a travelogue of sorts for the audience also seems inherently cinematic. This is especially fitting for a story so dependent on the coexisting superficial glamour and desperate hustle involved in producing envy-inducing digital content.
All of the characters visiting Bali, like those staying in Thailand in the first film, seem to have access to impossibly chic contemporary villas; films exist concerning beach rescuers that don’t show off this much aerial pool footage. These individuals must believably occupy these lush, remote places to highlight the uncomfortable paradox of how often each person — including the woman exacting revenge upon the online stars' self-centered phoniness — nevertheless spends plenty of time in the glow of their devices.
Balanced Depictions and Tech-Savvy Tension
At the same time, Harder hasn’t authored a rant targeting the emptiness of the influencer industry. While it can be satisfying to see CW manipulate various online personalities, and a sense reminiscent of Hitchcock of alignment allows us to wish she doesn’t get caught, the filmmaker is relatively understanding of the key influencer figures. Previously, he keyed into the isolation Madison felt while on ostensibly envy-worthy vacations. In this film, Harder seems to trust that just observing Jacob at work will reveal that he is selling snake-oil masculinity to other doofuses; he avoids caricaturing the character further. He even grants Jacob a measure of dignity by showing his genuine loyalty to his partner; he’s a hypocrite, yet Ariana is a collaborator in his hypocrisy, not a victim of it.
The other side of this balanced approach means it may occasionally seem as if he is acknowledging bits of modern online life without investigating them further. This is especially true regarding how he introduces artificial intelligence into the plot, a fascinating turn that lacks the psychosexual kick it should have. The pluralized title for the film might give fans of the first movie expectations of a larger-scale ante-upping, and the film does eventually provide exactly that, with a suitably chaotic climax. But before that, it resembles more a sleek Hitchcock thriller than an frenzied, tech-addled Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ heavy use of actual places may also be what prevents it from seeming like pure nightmare fuel. The world may be overrun with always-online creators, digital deception, and self-serving tourism, but reality itself is still here, at least for now.
