One commenter soberly reacted to the “Raiders of the Lost Podcast” host’s take by posting, “I genuinely believe you love this movie, but it’s a little unclear what’s a paid promo with you guys these days. It’s not your fault, though rules around journalism are gone.”

Other influencer takes on “Digger” said, “I just got done watching this movie, I just got out of the theater… Tom Cruise should be nominated for an Oscar… he’s that damn great in this, it’s one of the best performances of his career,” as well as, “I don’t even know where to start, but I’ll start with this… I’m in a movie promotion with the Tom Cruise!” and “Tom Cruise did a phenomenal job… I wouldn’t be surprised if he gets an award for this.”

Many of the influencer raves seem to have elements in common: the word “masterpiece,” an intro that says they just saw the movie or just left the theater (and immediately had to jump on camera?) and predictions that Cruise will obviously get an Oscar.

But as a host of the Academy Awards podcast, “Mike, Mike, and Oscar,” points out in his own Instagram clip: “‘Digger’ has been promoted through every corner of the film internet over the past week. And Tom Cruise has had FaceTime with seemingly every influencer available. What was the point? A purposeful muddying of the waters by [Warner Bros.] which ends up helping… nobody.”

Adds the clip: “What good is this doing the studios where the critics see the movie — the paid professionals — and they pan it. But if you go online and look up the movie itself, well it’s the ‘greatest thing you’ve ever seen.’ I literally have seen influencers say, ‘It’s the best movie of all time,’ ‘It’s the most important movie of all time,’ ‘It’s the best movie of the year,’ ‘Tom Cruise is definitely winning best actor.’ We study the Academy 24/7, if he does it’ll be the first type of movie to bomb this badly at the box office to have an Oscar acting winner.”

We previously reported on a highly controlled event on the Warner Bros. lot this year to unveil the film’s trailer — where scads of influencers were invited to see the preview and pose for pics (provided by the studio, no phones allowed) with Cruise.

No doubt many of the influencers who (proverbially or literally?) signed on to be along for the ride are now the ones calling the movie, which opened to $8 million, the best of this century.

Said another movie influencer in their post, “I feel like what ‘Digger’ does so brilliantly is that it brings everyone together.”

But did it?