This Horror Sequel <em>Influencers</em> Is Set to Give Competing Digital Thrillers a Bad Case of FOMO

“The entire situation smells like a bad TV movie,” remarks a cynical podcaster midway through the horror sequel Influencers. At that point, he’s being dismissive in a calculated way toward an interviewee whose bizarre tale he once claimed he believed. But his description of what’s happening on screen isn't inaccurate. Superficially, a pair of films on demand chronicling a young woman who insinuates herself into the worlds of social media stars and then murders them seems like a modern-day version of a lurid but cable-ready weekly TV movie. The wild thing regarding Influencers is how much better it is than plenty of its competition, regardless of screen size. It’s the kind of suspense film that should give other movies a serious bout of FOMO.

Revisiting the First Film and Establishing the Scene

2022’s Influencer follows the mysterious CW (Cassandra Naud) while she methodically selects solo-traveling influencer targets, lures them to their doom, and covers up those deaths (at least temporarily) by taking control of their online accounts. The film leaves off (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 the 2025 Influencers a degree of mystery, when returning writer-director Kurtis David Harder picks up with CW contentedly residing alongside her partner Diane (Lisa Delamar) in Paris. On a journey to celebrate the couple’s one-year anniversary, UK-based influencer Charlotte (Georgina Campbell) draws CW's attention and anger.

CW remarks to her partner that someone should try stranding a device-obsessed influencer somewhere without any devices to see whether they can make it. Is this a backstory prequel? Was CW radicalized after witnessing the special treatment given to a single fame-seeker?

Shifting Perspectives and Global Pursuits

The story’s perspective changes multiple times, eventually clarifying those introductory moments' chronological position. Harder catches up with Madison, now exonerated for carrying out CW’s crimes, yet still encounters suspicion over her recounting of the events, which includes the murder of Madison’s boyfriend. The film also follows Jacob (Jonathan Whitesell), living in Bali attempting to juice his career as half of a right-wing-influencer duo with Ariana (Veronica Long), though his chosen platform involves masculine-focused livestreams, as opposed to the Instagram photos that typically attract CW’s attention.

Naud remains immensely captivating in her role, a role that appears particularly custom-fit to her strengths. (She even created CW's striking wardrobe.) While the sequel’s screentime balance tips heavily toward CW — the first film seemed more balanced between the two women — it still works as a story of dueling investigators, as Madison and CW employ fabricated profiles, social media surveillance, and a seemingly unlimited travel budget to pursue or evade one another. Of course, perhaps the vast resources aren't needed. Online personalities possess a talent for getting to explore posh places at little cost, a skill which CW mirrors with her more overt scamming.

Resourceful Production and Visual Wanderlust

The creative team for Influencers seem similarly ingenious in locating stunning locations to film, although they were presumably less nefarious about it. Most of the film seems to be filmed in real places, giving it an authentic gravity that lingers even when many scenes involve a relatively small cast of characters staring at computer or phone screens.

It follows the same logic which allowed the Bond franchise appear so consistently opulent over the years: Yes, big action and visual effects can show off a big budget, but simply offering a travelogue of sorts to viewers also seems deeply filmic. It’s also especially fitting for a story so rooted in the coexisting superficial glamour and desperate hustle of creating envy-inducing digital content.

All of the characters in Bali, like those staying in Thailand in the original, seem to have access to unbelievably stylish contemporary villas; films exist concerning beach rescuers that don’t show off this much aerial pool footage. These individuals have to convincingly occupy these lush, remote places to highlight the uneasy irony of how frequently everyone — even the woman exacting revenge on the influencers’ narcissistic falseness — nevertheless spends plenty of time in the glow of their screens.

Balanced Depictions and Tech-Savvy Tension

Simultaneously, the director has not crafted a rant against the emptiness of the influencer industry. Though it can be gratifying to watch CW exploit various online personalities, and a Hitchcockian sense of alignment lets us to hope she evades capture, Harder is relatively understanding of the key influencer figures. Previously, he keyed into the loneliness Madison experienced during supposedly dream getaways. In this film, the director appears confident that merely watching Jacob at work will make it clear that he is selling snake-oil masculinity to other doofuses; he avoids turning into a caricature the character. He even gives Jacob a measure of dignity by showing his genuine loyalty to his partner; he is two-faced, but Ariana is a collaborator in his hypocrisy, not a victim of it.

The other side of this balanced approach is that it may occasionally seem that he’s nodding at elements of contemporary digital culture without investigating them. This is especially true regarding how he brings AI into the plot, an intriguing development which misses the psychological edge it deserves. The retitled sequel of Influencers could offer devotees of the original hope for an Aliens-style escalation, and the movie does eventually provide that, with an appropriately chaotic climax. But before that, it resembles more a polished Alfred Hitchcock movie than a wild-eyed, tech-addled Brian De Palma thriller. Influencers’ heavy use of real-world locations may also be what keeps it from seeming like utter horror. Our society may be overrun with content-churning influencers, online fraud, and self-serving tourism, but the world itself is still here, for now.