Following up something as culturally cemented as The Devil Wears Prada was always going to be a tall task. An iconic film that not only launched the careers of Emily Blunt and Anne Hathaway into the stratosphere, but is still going strong to this day. Endlessly quotable and rewatchable, it still holds its momentous power some 20 years later. The Devil Wears Prada 2 was always going to have a difficult time living up to the staying power of its predecessor, and while it does its best to get in front of it and carve its own path, the final product ends up being a bit of a mixed bag.
The gang is all here, with everyone reprising their roles and slipping seamlessly back into them. Regardless of its narrative misgivings, The Devil Wears Prada 2 knows that having all of its stars return is the first hurdle to clear to making anything in this dressed up return worth wearing. It helps too that the crew is the same. Same writer and same director, something that rarely happens with sequels so far removed from their original. Both the cast and crew know the characters and all work overtime to – in the everlasting words of Tim Gunn – make it work. But it’s not good enough to have a reunion if you don’t have a good enough reason for having it in the first place, and The Devil Wears Prada 2 finds itself stuck trying to recreate the magic while also trying to justify existing.
Glitz and Glam and Immaculate Costumes
Aline Brosh McKenna returns as the writer with David Frankel returning to the directors chair, The Devil Wears Prada 2 picks up 20 years later with Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway) as a successful, award winning journalist. Right she’s accepting an award, her entire outlet gets fired over text, leaving her jobless after a long established career. As fate would have it, she is called back to Runway, still helmed by Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep) to run their features department and help get them out of a PR crisis. The magazine has changed, now under the thumb of corporate overlords and streamlined digital content. when a new billionaire threatens to buy Runway and change everything, both Miranda and Andy must join forces once again and save the magazine. The Devil Wears Prada 2 also stars Emily Blunt, Stanley Tucci, Justin Theroux, Lucy Lui, Kenneth Branagh, and Patrick Brammall.
There is enough glitz and glam and immaculate costumes to at least satisfy some fans who come for the designer clothes. The Devil Wears Prada 2 is very knowing of its audience and smartly gives them most of what they want from a sequel. But it ultimately lacks the spark of the original, that brisk entertaining pace of entering a world we don’t know and discovering a wealth of knowledge of art and creativity. That’s kind of here too, but not as kinetic or as engaging. It doesn’t have the bite it once did, and even though it probably never could given how successful the first one was, the effort comes up short. Some of that is the defanging of Miranda, who is a shell of her former vicious self.
Rehashed Plot Amid Everything Changing
Obviously she can’t be the dragon slayer anymore – not in the 2026 workplace. But she’s kind of robbed of all her agency, answering to pretty much everyone instead of staying on step ahead of them all. The Devil Wears Prada 2 wants to have it both ways, offer a glimpse into a changing landscape of the workplace and forcing Miranda to change but also still forcing assistants to not be able to get up and take breaks to go to the bathroom. It’s a perfectly fine character arc that gets undercut for jokes, many of which don’t land with the same gusto and unforgettable quotes we’ve come to incorporate into our daily lives. She literally only says “that’s all” once in the entire film, a testament to just how far she’s fallen but not consistent enough to validate her change.
I don’t believe anything about Emily Blunt’s character, who feels kind of shoehorned in and stuck in a sort of tact on, switching allegiance role. But Blunt is so good at this that it doesn’t really matter. Paired with a laugh out loud Jeff Bezos stand in Theroux, the two steal nearly every scene their in despite her character not really needing to be in any of them. The Devil Wears Prada 2 is truly at its worst when it’s trying to rehash beats and plot points of the original, and gets a little too eager to have it all while showing its hand as having not much in the first place. I know some people will love the who’s who of cameo (of which there are many), but I found them to be exhausting and the film’s most obvious cash grab tendencies.
The Death of Journalism
At its best however, The Devil Wears Prada 2 shines bright when it examines the collapse of journalism and rise of billionaire tech bros and private equity firms destroying the arts. It’s shockingly candid and direct, taking these threats head on in a somber but canny look at what is happening all around us. The landscape is changing and changing for the worst in pretty much all of these spaces, and The Devil Wears Prada 2 is unafraid to call it all out and force us to reckon with the bleak reality of media. Of course, as a journalist these themes were always going to resonate with me far more than a surprise Lady Gaga performance. It’s the real catalyst of the story, the things that actually drive Andy and Miranda’s arcs and motivations.
The Devil Wears Prada 2 goes as far as literally name checking Mickinsey, something I found particularly amusing and quite audacious for a big studio Hollywood tentpole. To quote Andy, “Journalism still fucking matters!” and the film wants to believe that no matter how much they try to push efficency and profits over human creativity and artistry, people will eventually pushback and grow tired of the slop. We aren’t there yet, but The Devil Wears Prada 2 truly believes that we’ll get there, and while it all looks incredibly bleak and dire there are still people fighting for voices – human ones – to be heard, shared, and read. I think that’s really beautiful and easily the film’s greatest and most profound takeaway.
Bittersweet Conclusion and Final Thoughts
But it also resolves itself to something even more bittersweet in its ending: the savior of everything is a good billionaire. That’s the best we can hope for, and while The Devil Wears Prada 2 gives us some worthy payoffs for Miranda, Andy, and Nigel (an always excellent Tucci who gets a little more shine and some well deserved flowers), the real answer to our problems is that the rich have a heart once in a while. And I’m sorry, but that is just not reality even for fashion fantasy. There’s sadly no other way to give us a conclusion that sees them all survive the storm and be able to pursue their passions, but man, that is just dark and frankly naive.
The Devil Wears Prada 2 is not a bad film. It’s got all the things general audiences want and is sure to make a gazillion dollars. It also has its heart in the right place and is doing more to defend journalistic integrity than pretty much anyone else in power pretends to be doing. But it also just can’t escape its own trappings, sorely lacking the dynamism that made the first one work so well and last so long. The Devil Wears Prada 2 is, at best, fine. It’s strength and commentary on the decay of everything is incisive and engaging, but not enough to carry this one all the way to Milan again.
The Devil Wears Prada 2 is about as good as legacy sequels can get, but that makes it aggressively mid and at best, passible. I will, however, live my life by the film’s key takeaway: shared carbs don’t count.
Rating: 6 out of 10
The Devil Wears Prada 2 is now playing in theaters. You can watch the trailer below.
