The Thriller Follow-Up <em>Influencers</em> Will Give Other Streaming Thrillers a Bad Case of FOMO

“The entire situation reeks of a cheap made-for-TV,” observes an opportunistic commentator during the horror sequel Influencers. In the moment, he’s being manipulatively dismissive toward an interviewee whose bizarre tale he once claimed he believed. Yet his assessment of what’s happening on screen isn’t wrong. Superficially, a pair of films on demand about a young woman who worms her way into the worlds of social media stars and then murders them feels like a modern-day version of a tawdry but cable-ready Movie of the Week. The wild thing regarding Influencers is how much better it is compared to much of the competition, irrespective of screen size. It’s the kind of thriller that should give other movies a bad case of FOMO.

Revisiting 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 doom, and conceals those murders (at least temporarily) by seizing control of their socials. The movie leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW stranded on a deserted island near the coast of Thailand, after her most recent mark, Madison (Emily Tennant), turns the tables on her.

This lends 2025's Influencers some early mystery, as returning writer-director Kurtis David Harder resumes with CW contentedly residing alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey marking their one-year anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW’s eye and anger.

CW comments to Diane that a person should try stranding a device-obsessed online personality in a place with no technology and see whether they can survive. Are we witnessing a backstory prequel? Was CW radicalized by seeing the special treatment afforded a single clout-chaser?

Evolving Viewpoints and Global Pursuits

The story’s perspective changes multiple times, ultimately revealing those early scenes’ chronological position. The story revisits Madison, who has been exonerated for carrying out CW’s crimes, yet still encounters doubt over her version of what happened, which includes the murder of her boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), based in Bali attempting to juice his career as half of a right-wing-influencer duo alongside Ariana (Veronica Long), though his chosen platform is bro-heavy streams, as opposed to the Instagram photos that typically capture CW's interest.

Naud remains terrifically magnetic in her role, a role that appears especially tailor-made to her strengths. (She even created CW's eye-catching outfits.) Although the sequel’s screentime balance leans heavily into CW — the first film seemed more balanced between her and Madison — it still works as a tale of rival investigators, with both women both use fabricated profiles, Insta-stalking, and an apparently unlimited travel budget to chase and/or escape each other. Of course, perhaps the vast resources aren't needed. Influencers have a talent for gaining access to luxurious locales at little cost, a skill that CW echoes through her more blatant scamming.

Resourceful Production and Visual Wanderlust

The filmmakers behind Influencers seem similarly ingenious in locating beautiful places to film, though they were presumably more legitimate about it. Most of the film appears to be filmed in real places, providing it a real-world weight that remains even when many scenes consist of a relatively small cast of people staring at digital devices.

It’s the same principle which allowed the Bond franchise look so persistently lavish for decades: Yes, explosive action and special effects can show off a big budget, however simply offering a kind of visual tour to viewers also seems deeply filmic. This is especially fitting for a narrative so dependent on the coexisting surface-level allure and try-hard grind of creating envy-inducing online content.

Every character visiting Bali, like those staying in Thailand in the original, appear to enjoy access to unbelievably stylish contemporary villas; there are movies concerning beach rescuers that don’t show off this much overhead swimming-pool video. These individuals have to convincingly inhabit these luxurious, far-flung locations to emphasize the uncomfortable paradox of how often each person — even the woman exacting revenge upon the online stars' self-centered phoniness — nevertheless spends plenty of time under the light of their devices.

Nuanced Portrayals and Tech-Savvy Tension

At the same time, Harder hasn’t authored a rant targeting the emptiness of the influencer industry. Though it can be satisfying to watch CW exploit different internet celebrities, and a Hitchcockian sense of alignment lets us to hope she doesn’t get caught, the filmmaker is somewhat sympathetic to the major influencer characters. In the first movie, he keyed into the loneliness Madison experienced during supposedly envy-worthy vacations. In this film, Harder seems to trust that just observing Jacob in action will reveal that he is selling false masculinity to other doofuses; he resists turning into a caricature the character further. He even grants Jacob a measure of dignity by showing his true devotion to his girlfriend; he’s a hypocrite, yet Ariana is a partner in his double standards, not a victim by it.

The flip side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation is that it may occasionally seem as if he’s nodding at elements of modern online life without investigating them. This is especially true of the way he brings AI into the plot, a fascinating turn that lacks the psychological edge it should have. The pluralized title of Influencers could offer fans of the first movie hope for an Aliens-style ante-upping, and the movie does eventually provide exactly that, with an appropriately chaotic climax. However, initially, it resembles more a polished Alfred Hitchcock movie than a wild-eyed, tech-addled De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ heavy use of actual places might also be what prevents it from coming across like pure nightmare fuel. Our society might be saturated with always-online creators, digital deception, and self-serving tourism, but the world itself is still here, at least for now.