Influencer, directed by Kurtis David Harder, comments on how social media has entirely changed our relationship dynamics, our personalities, our perceptions, and how we have started living a dual life where nobody actually knows how the person is feeling in reality. It feels like everybody on social media platforms is playing the game of pretend, and nobody wants to entertain or address real issues and problems. We are losing out on the essence of human connection, and those we refer to as our social media family do not even have an idea of who we really are. In this recap, we will discuss what exactly happened when an influencer went to Thailand on a solo trip and what kind of trouble she found herself in.
Spoilers Alert
Influencer Plot Summary: What Is The Film About?
Madison, an influencer with a huge following on Instagram, had traveled all the way to Thailand for some down time, and additionally, it also gave her an opportunity to provide her viewers with some diversified content. She made sure that the virtual world knew how traveling nourished her soul and how, on every vacation, she discovered herself, but the reality was very different from what she was portraying. She was enlightening her followers, but she was herself wrecked from within, and we believe that this is the kind of world we live in. What is portrayed on social media is not always real, but in the present, the line between the two worlds has become so blurred that we have forgotten what is real and what is not.
Madison was telling her friends how she was in paradise, but she felt more lonely than ever. Her boyfriend had backed out at the last moment, and she just didn’t know what to do in Thailand alone. Upholding the spirit of the influencing world, Madison uploaded whatever she did on social media, though she often forgot that she had to also be present in the moment to enjoy it. She met a girl named CW in a bar who, like a good samaritan, saved her from a creep named Rupert, who was trying to make passes at her. Madison very quickly became friendly with CW, but one just got the sense that something was not right with her. CW was trying really hard to get to know Madison, and it did feel like she had some ulterior motive behind it. Our suspicion strengthened when she told Madison that she didn’t like being clicked, and it did feel like, at that moment, she purposely did it so that there was no trace of her existence in Madison’s life.
What Was CW Up To?
CW showed Madison around and made her see the less touristy places, which a lot of people didn’t know about. They went out with a couple of guys and then later returned to their resort to find out that somebody had broken into Madison’s villa, and her passport and a lot of other things had been stolen. She called the embassy, and she was told that she would have to wait for 2 weeks to get a temporary passport. That’s when CW offered to stay at her place. Even at this preliminary stage, Influencer gives proper hints that tell us about the crooked intentions of CW. She took Madison to a place in the woods, and Madison found a book there in which the name of some other girl was written. That was the biggest clue that told us that the villa didn’t belong to CW and that either she was a scammer who wanted to steal Madison’s money or just a psychopath who was doing it for fun.
CW said that she had a surprise planned for Madison, and she took her to a remote island on her boat. The next morning, CW just left Madison on the island to die and came back to the mainland, where they had been staying earlier. CW was not doing it for the first time, and she had brought a lot of girls there before. CW came back to Madison’s villa and started living there as if nothing had happened and began searching for her next target.
Was Ryan Able To Rescue Madison?
CW found another influencer named Jessica, who was on a solo trip to Thailand, and she did the exact same thing with her as she had done with Madison. CW broke into Jessica’s apartment and stole her passport and other important documents so that she could offer her house for her to move in. Jessica, not knowing anybody in Thailand, ultimately did end up calling CW, and she took her to the same villa where Madison was staying. This was the biggest mistake she committed, as Ryan, Madison’s boyfriend, had come to Thailand unannounced because he wanted to surprise Madison. Madison was not happy with Ryan’s behavior, and she had broken up with him just a couple of days ago. Ryan was not only Madison’s boyfriend but also her social media manager, and he knew that if he met her in person, he would be able to convince her to get back into the relationship.
Nobody had any clue about Madison’s disappearance, as CW was constantly photoshopping Madison’s face on her own pictures and posting them on Instagram, through Madison’s phone, which she was smart enough to take. She also had an automated voice generator through which she could talk to anybody in Madison’s voice, and that is why people didn’t even have an ounce of suspicion that she was in some kind of trouble. Jessica had an intuition that CW was the one who had stolen her things, as she knew that it was not a coincidence that somebody had broken into Madison’s villa, too, just before she went to travel with CW. Moreover, CW had told the influencer that the villa was booked in her and her boyfriend’s names, but Jessica found that even that was a lie. Jessica wanted to leave as she was unsure of CW’s intentions, but before she could do that, CW ended up killing her in the most brutal manner.
CW didn’t want to kill Ryan, and she wanted to make him feel that things were absolutely fine between them. They decided to go out drinking one night, and CW spiked his drink and then pretended the next morning as if they had gotten very intimate the other night. Ryan was supposed to leave the next day, but something inside told him that Madison was in trouble. He felt very weird when Madison talked to him over the phone, and he knew that there was something off with her voice. Ryan went to every place where Madison had posted pictures and ultimately found out that all those images had been photoshopped, and it was actually CW in all of them. Ryan went back to the villa where CW was staying, and he found Madison’s diary, in which she had made mention of the remote island where CW was taking her. Ryan hit CW as soon as she came to the villa and tied her to a chair. CW agreed to take him to that island, but as soon as they reached the jet boat, she was able to free her hands, and assaulted Ryan with all her might. Ryan died on the spot, and it felt like Madison would be forever stranded on that island.
‘Influencer’ Ending Explained: Is Madison Dead Or Alive?
CW once again went back to that remote island with the dead body of Ryan lying in her jet boat. As soon as she stepped foot on the island, she saw signs that made her believe that Madison had somehow managed to survive. CW went to the other end of the island, and Madison emerged out of nowhere and attacked her. CW fell unconscious on the ground, and Madison left the godforsaken island on her jetboat. CW was still alive, and in the end, when she saw Madison getting the better of her, she just smirked at her as if it was all a game.
The ending of Influencer doesn’t reveal to us why CW was targeting the women and killing them, but we are very sure that something might have happened in the past that made her such a psychopath. We heard CW say that these girls were entitled, as if she didn’t like how these influencers earned so much money and probably didn’t think that they deserved such an extravagant life. She felt that their world was fake, and she probably didn’t even respect the work they did. Maybe she hated the social media culture and just wanted to prove that nobody cared for anybody on the virtual platforms and that each individual was living one big lie. She told Madison that nobody would care even if she was gone and that people would forget about her in a day or two. CW had a lot of anger buried inside her, and she was clearly suffering from some kind of mental disorder. It gave her an adrenaline rush when she planned the perfect murder. She did have a lot of faith in her abilities. We don’t know if CW would be able to get off that island or not, and there is a probability that Madison might come back with law enforcement authorities to get her arrested.
