The Devil Wears Prada 2
The 2006 film The Devil Wears Prada was a seminal entry in most millennial women’s pre-Letterboxd diaries. Alongside Ugly Betty, it was the reason for KT Tunstall’s mid-2000s billboard domination. It taught us about cerulean. It sparked our hatred of Adrian Grenier (so did Entourage, some might argue). For many of us, it was an introduction to Stanley Tucci. It’s far from my favourite movie of all time but it was among the first DVDs I bought and it does have major rewatchability. I never asked for a sequel – certainly not 20 years later during a cost of living crisis when ‘luxury clothing’ means ‘clothing is a luxury’ – but I also won’t pretend that I’m not interested in what Miranda Priestly, Emily and Andy ‘Andréa’ Sachs have been up to.
The sequel picks up at an industry event wherein Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway) both wins an award for her journalism and is unceremoniously fired by text, along with every one of her journo colleagues. At the same time, Runway is in the throes of a PR catastrophe after engaging a supply chain partner called SpeedFash who SHOCKINGLY turned out to be a sweatshop (Glass Onion called, it wants its storyline back). With the brand in desperate need of a credibility boost, now would seem the opportune moment to hire a recently out-of-work journo who’s worked there before and earned a rare tick of approval from its frosty Editor in Chief, Miranda Priestly (Meryl ‘The GOAT’ Streep). And so it begins.
Andy must work with Runway veterans Miranda and Nigel (Stanley Tucci) to get the business back on track. A lot has changed in the two decades that she’s been away: there’s no size 2 mandate for employees, the cafeteria is getting a lot more patronage and Miranda is no longer allowed to throw her coat at assistants. But Andy quickly learns that journalism isn’t the only industry that has fallen victim to budget cuts and corporate interference. No one in 2026 reads physical magazines but to top things off, no one (billionaires don’t count as people) can afford designer clothing and accessories, so Runway is subservient to its advertisers.
Its biggest is Dior. And who runs things at Dior? Emily (Blunt), of course! Watching Miranda have to schmooze her former first assistant is quite delicious but so too are the scenes with Emily and her new billionaire boyfriend Benji (Justin Theroux having the time of his life), who function as the main obstacles facing Miranda and co and whose antics would comfortably slot into an episode of Succession. With the board set, The Devil Wears Prada 2 proceeds to retread some familiar narrative ground, featuring an absolute onslaught of celebrity cameos and strutting its way to a convenient conclusion that Homer (of The Simpsons, not the Iliad) would describe as being “wrapped up in a neat little package!”
As fans (and not fans) know all too well, the original film is very much a product of its time, a time when magazines convinced us that [insert name of literally any actress or pop star] was a fat cow who should be ashamed to step out in public, while movies convinced us that Bridget Jones was overweight at 60kg and that Natalie in Love, Actually a) had “huge thighs” and b) that this was a bad thing. (Side note: Richard Curtis has a lot to answer for, actually). The Devil Wears Prada is a most brazen display of this time in culture and has therefore been called ‘problematic’ (hate that word) but in the film’s defense, it reflects the truth of how fucked things were ‘back then’.
And because fucked is how things were, I think we all knew that The Devil Wears Prada 2 would attempt to rectify the damage – the perpetuation of harmful attitudes towards female bodies and a contribution to the collective body dysmorphia of millennial women – depicted/done by the first film. I will say that it achieves that objective with an endearing sense of fun and cheekiness, though predictably with far less rewatchability or iconicity stitched into its fabric.
The studio threw everything they could think of at the wall to ensure the film had a shot at success. Director David Frankel is back, as is original screenwriter Aline Brosh McKenna spinning something resembling a story out of its threads. Considering the original film was based on a book and therefore had source material from which to draw, it’s forgivable that its sequel feels a bit more meandering.
It does, however, attempt to say some things about the decline of journalism and media as a whole. Andy is used to her main KPI being “write something good” but now the goalposts have shifted to “make content that gets eyes on it”, something I enjoyed as a former agency creative and current wanderer in the wasteland of modern marketing. I also related deeply to Andy navigating a supposed writing job where the majority of her time is spent chasing leads instead of writing. They really should just add ‘& Salesperson’ to all job descriptions these days.
Where the first film was both a cautionary tale about losing your soul on the way to your ideal career, The Devil Wears Prada 2 feels like a comforting hug and an acknowledgement of the shitshow we find ourselves in, a trait I’ve not found in some comparable legacy sequels (I’m looking at you in disgust, And Just Like That…). Runway’s dependence on pleasing their advertisers is as grim as it is hilarious and the switch in messaging on journalistic integrity (or vocational integrity, for that matter) being a luxury most can no longer afford rings painfully true.
I also love that they’ve gutted the worst characters and focus only on the three or four we’re here to see. Goodbye Nate. Goodbye Simon Baker and Simon Baker’s eyebrows. Goodbye every unsupportive friend except Lily (Tracie Thoms), the only one who understood the opportunity and valued fashion rather than writing it off as stupid. There’s a hint of a love story with an obligatory Australian (Patrick Brammall) but it’s precisely where it belongs on the tier of storyline importance: at the bottom.
At the top is Streep’s Miranda, an icon slightly neutered by the changing landscape of what’s appropriate in the workplace but who’s still as shrewd as ever and has moved from villain to unlikely underdog. Hathaway makes Andy feel exactly as she should after a couple of decades away; ever the optimist but now with the refreshing confidence of a woman who achieved the career fairytale (even if there was an expiration date). And the evolution of Emily is probably my favourite aspect of the film; Emily Blunt slips effortlessly back into the role and it’s a joy to watch her have this much fun.
While the film has enough going on to entertain an audience and justify its existence, I do have some gripes. Given the fact that no one is allowed to be as mean or dismissive today as they were in 2006, there are nowhere near as many great lines. No “Gird your loins.” No “By all means move at a glacial pace.” No “Florals? For spring? Groundbreaking.” Like Miranda, the film has undergone cultural competency and sensitivity training and while that’s to be expected from a big Disney production, it’s not as bold.
As mentioned, parts of the script feel a bit narratively convenient and there’s some dialogue that doesn’t quite delight the ear. I don’t want to throw an AI accusation out there but a few lines bear the hallmarks of Chat Daddy and it took me out of it a bit because Miranda would never.
As far as the look of the film, it lacks the richness of colour and visual interest of its predecessor but that’s not exactly surprising. There’d been lots of chatter about the Netflixification of filmmaking when the film’s trailer dropped and it became a prime example of the low contrast lighting and yucky colour grading we’ve unfortunately become accustomed to, especially where legacy sequels or soft reboots are concerned. More than this, the fashion itself just isn’t as awe inspiring. Then again, perhaps that’s more a 2026 problem than a The Devil Wears Prada 2 problem.
And speaking of 2026 problems, the models we see in the Milan show towards the end of the film look pretty much exactly how they did in the early 2000s. Bones and all, mostly white, mostly forgettable. It’s like Rihanna’s Savage X Fenty Show never happened! We have Ozempic and the return of heroin chic to thank for that, I suppose. Not the best note to end on, but appropriate for how this year is going.
The Devil Wears Prada 2 won’t change your life but if you’re a fan of the original and you want some low stakes escapism (who doesn’t?), it’ll do the job. I saw it at a packed preview screening with a mostly female audience and the verbal participation definitely enhanced my viewing experience. If you’re going to see it, go and actually see it (you know, in a cinema). Don’t pay the corporates so you can watch it at home on your couch in your depression suit, that’s what they want!
