The Thriller Sequel <em>Influencers</em> Is Set to Give Competing Streaming Suspense Films a Bad Case of FOMO

“The entire situation reeks like a bad TV movie,” remarks a cynical commentator midway through the chilling follow-up Influencers. At that point, he’s being dismissive in a calculated way of a guest with an outlandish story he previously said he trusted. Yet his assessment of the events on screen isn’t wrong. On its face, a pair of streaming movies chronicling a woman who insinuates herself into the worlds of social media stars before killing them seems like a modern-day version of a lurid but cable-ready Movie of the Week. The wild thing about Influencers is just how superior it is compared to much of the competition, irrespective of where you watch it. It’s the kind of thriller capable of giving its peers a bad case of FOMO.

Recapping the Original and Establishing the Scene

The 2022 film Influencer follows the mysterious CW (Cassandra Naud) while she methodically selects traveling alone social media targets, lures them to their doom, and conceals those murders (at least temporarily) by taking control of their online accounts. The movie concludes (spoiler ahead) with CW marooned on a deserted 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 ambiguity, when returning writer-director Kurtis David Harder resumes with CW happily living with her girlfriend Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. During a trip marking the couple’s first anniversary, British influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) catches CW's attention and anger.

CW comments to Diane that a person ought to attempt leaving a phone-addicted influencer somewhere without any devices and see if they can survive. Are we witnessing an origin-story prequel? Was CW radicalized after witnessing the special treatment afforded a single fame-seeker?

Evolving Viewpoints and International Chases

The story’s perspective shifts several more times, eventually clarifying those introductory moments' place in the timeline. Harder catches up with Madison, who has been cleared of committing CW’s crimes, but still faces doubt regarding her recounting of what happened, which includes the murder of her boyfriend. We also follow Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali and trying to boost his profile as half of a right-wing-influencer power couple with Ariana (Veronica Long), although his chosen platform is bro-heavy streams, as opposed to the curated images that typically attract CW’s attention.

Naud remains immensely captivating in her role, a role that appears particularly custom-fit to her strengths. (She also designed CW's striking wardrobe.) Although the sequel’s screentime balance leans heavily into CW — the first film felt more equally divided between her and Madison — it still functions as a tale of dueling investigators, as Madison and CW both use fake accounts, social media surveillance, and a seemingly limitless travel fund to chase and/or escape one another. Of course, maybe the unlimited budget isn’t necessary. Online personalities possess a knack for gaining access to posh places at little cost, an ability that CW echoes with her more overt scheming.

Resourceful Production and Cinematic Travelogue

The creative team for Influencers seem similarly ingenious in locating stunning locations to visit, though they were likely more legitimate about it. The vast majority of the movie seems to be shot on location, giving it a real-world weight that lingers even as numerous sequences involve a handful of actors of characters staring at digital devices.

It’s the same principle that made the James Bond movies appear so consistently opulent over the years: Indeed, explosive action and visual effects can show off a big budget, however simply offering a kind of visual tour for the audience also seems inherently cinematic. It’s also especially fitting for a narrative so rooted in the coexisting surface-level allure and try-hard grind of creating envy-inducing online content.

Every character visiting Bali, similar to those staying in Thailand in the original, seem to have entry to unbelievably stylish contemporary villas; films exist about lifeguards which don't feature this much overhead swimming-pool footage. The characters have to convincingly inhabit these luxurious, remote places to emphasize the uncomfortable paradox of how often everyone — including the woman exacting revenge on the influencers’ narcissistic falseness — nonetheless devotes much time under the light of their devices.

Nuanced Portrayals and Digital-Age Suspense

Simultaneously, Harder hasn’t authored a rant against the emptiness of the influencer industry. Though it is gratifying to watch 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 major influencer characters. In the first movie, he keyed into the loneliness Madison felt while on supposedly envy-worthy vacations. In this film, the director appears confident that merely watching Jacob at work will reveal that he’s peddling false masculinity to other doofuses; he resists caricaturing the character further. He even gives Jacob a degree of respect through depicting his true devotion to his partner; he’s a hypocrite, yet Ariana is a partner in his hypocrisy, not someone exploited by it.

The flip side of Harder’s even-keeled presentation means it may occasionally seem as if he’s nodding at bits of contemporary digital culture without investigating them. This is particularly evident regarding how he introduces artificial intelligence into the plot, an intriguing development which misses the psychological edge it should have. The pluralized title for the film might give fans of the first movie expectations of an Aliens-style ante-upping, and the film does eventually provide exactly that, with a suitably chaotic climax. But before that, it’s more like a polished Alfred Hitchcock movie than a wild-eyed, technology-obsessed Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ extensive use of actual places may also be what prevents it from seeming like pure nightmare fuel. The world might be saturated with always-online creators, digital deception, and self-serving tourism, but reality itself is still here, for now.