The Thriller Sequel <em>Influencers</em> Could Give Other Streaming Suspense Films a Bad Case of FOMO

“The entire situation reeks of a bad made-for-TV,” remarks a cynical podcaster during the horror sequel Influencers. At that point, his tone is manipulatively dismissive of a guest with an outlandish story he once claimed he believed. But his description of what’s happening on screen isn’t wrong. On its face, a pair of films on demand chronicling a young woman who worms her way into the worlds of online influencers and then murders them feels like the 21st-century equivalent of a tawdry but cable-ready weekly TV movie. The wild thing about Influencers remains just how superior it proves to be compared to much of the competition, irrespective of screen size. It’s the kind of thriller capable of giving its peers a bad case of FOMO.

Recapping the First Film and Establishing the Scene

2022’s Influencer follows the enigmatic CW (Cassandra Naud) while she quietly chooses traveling alone influencer targets, lures them to their doom, and conceals those murders (at least temporarily) by taking control of their socials. The film leaves off (spoiler ahead) with CW marooned on an uninhabited island off the coast of Thailand, following her latest target, Madison (Emily Tennant), reverses their roles against her.

This lends 2025's Influencers a degree of mystery, as returning writer-director the director resumes with the character CW happily living alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey to celebrate their one-year anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW’s eye and ire.

CW comments to Diane that someone should try stranding a device-obsessed influencer somewhere with no technology to see whether they can make it. Is this a backstory prequel? Was CW radicalized after witnessing the preferential treatment given to a single clout-chaser?

Shifting Perspectives and Global Pursuits

The story’s perspective changes multiple times, eventually clarifying those introductory moments' chronological position. Harder catches up with Madison, who has been cleared of committing CW’s crimes, but still faces suspicion regarding her recounting of what happened, including the killing of her boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living 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 attract CW's interest.

The actor continues to be immensely captivating in the part, which seems especially custom-fit for her talents. (She also designed CW's striking outfits.) While the sequel’s focus tips heavily toward CW — the original seemed more balanced between her and Madison — it still works as a tale of rival amateur detectives, with both women both use fabricated profiles, Insta-stalking, and an apparently limitless travel fund to chase or evade one another. Then again, maybe the unlimited budget isn’t necessary. Influencers have a talent for getting to explore posh places without paying much, an ability which CW mirrors with her more overt scamming.

Resourceful Production and Cinematic Travelogue

The filmmakers behind Influencers seem similarly resourceful about finding beautiful places to film, though they were presumably less nefarious in their methods. The vast majority of the movie appears to be shot on location, giving it an authentic gravity that lingers even when many scenes consist of a handful of actors of characters staring at computer or phone screens.

It follows the same logic that made the James Bond movies look so consistently opulent for decades: Yes, explosive action and visual effects can display a big budget, but simply offering a travelogue of sorts for the audience also feels inherently cinematic. It’s also especially fitting for a narrative so rooted in the coexisting surface-level allure and try-hard grind involved in producing envy-inducing online content.

All of the characters in Bali, similar to those who were in Thailand in the first film, seem to have access to unbelievably stylish contemporary villas; films exist about lifeguards which don't feature this much aerial pool footage. The characters have to convincingly inhabit these luxurious, far-flung locations to highlight the uneasy irony of how often each person — even the woman exacting revenge on the influencers’ self-centered phoniness — nonetheless spends plenty of time under the light of their screens.

Nuanced Portrayals and Tech-Savvy Tension

Simultaneously, the director has not crafted a screed against the vacuousness of online fame. While it can be satisfying to see 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 key influencer figures. In the first movie, he tapped into the isolation Madison felt while on supposedly dream getaways. In this film, Harder seems to trust that merely watching Jacob in action will reveal that he is selling false masculinity to other doofuses; he resists caricaturing the character further. He even gives Jacob a measure of dignity through depicting his true devotion to his girlfriend; he’s a hypocrite, yet Ariana is a partner in his double standards, not someone exploited by it.

The other side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation means it may occasionally seem that he’s nodding at elements of contemporary digital culture without investigating them. This is particularly evident regarding how he introduces artificial intelligence into the story, an intriguing development that lacks the psychosexual kick it deserves. The pluralized title for the film could offer devotees of the original expectations of an Aliens-style escalation, and the film ultimately delivers that, with a suitably chaotic climax. But before that, it resembles more a polished Hitchcock thriller than an wild-eyed, technology-obsessed De Palma-style shocker. Influencers’ extensive use of actual places may 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, for now.