The Devil Wears Prada 2 Review

A Comfortable Sequel That Cruelly Reminds Us We're No Longer in 2006

By: Marc Kozak

The Devil Wears Prada 2

A Comfortable Sequel That Cruelly Reminds Us We're No Longer in 2006

By: Marc Kozak

If you asked a fan of the 2006 film The Devil Wears Prada what they would want and expect out of a sequel, you’d probably get a pretty simple list. Lots of iconic, high-end fashion with cameos from recognizable figures in the industry. A story about women aspiring to and achieving professional success while maintaining personal integrity. And of course, lots of devastatingly sassy banter between Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt, and Stanley Tucci.

If you’re worried that 20 years of time may have caused director David Frankel to forget the basic formula that made the original such a success, fear not: The Devil Wears Prada 2 retains the same pleasures of the original, resulting in a satisfying comfort watch that will doubtlessly entertain anyone who enjoyed the first one. All of the main actors slip effortlessly back into the world of their old characters, interacting with the calming familiarity of a warm blanket. The original story – which wasn’t spectacularly complicated to begin with – is given a fresh coat of paint for modern times, using just enough terms of the moment to make it feel plausible in 2026. It’s a legacy vehicle bereft of surprises, aimed at checking the same boxes for the same fans – and honestly, that feels perfectly fine in this case.

Set two decades after the events of the first film, almost nothing has changed. Our characters are mostly acting the same way, doing the same things – it’s one of the inevitabilities of trying to create a sequel many years later without changing things that we liked too much. Andy Sachs (Hathaway) is now a respected reporter in New York, struggling to get by on a meager salary despite a career full of award-winning journalism about the struggles of “real people.” But this is 2026 and journalism is dead, which means Andy and her entire newsroom are abruptly laid off over text to save some rich guy a few bucks.

Even the famous Runway magazine isn’t immune to such financial pressures. Miranda (Streep) is still the fearsome leader at the helm, assisted ably by the forever-right-hand-man Nigel (Tucci), both lamenting the once-proud printed book’s descent into the world of – shudder – online content. Miranda’s new assistant Amari (Simone Ashley) serves more as a walking HR rep, constantly reminding Miranda that she can’t be as mean as she used to without getting written up or sued. Yes, it’s a cruel world when the cruel can’t be cruel in the workplace, but again, this is 2026 – we’ve changed!

" It's a sequel that retains the same pleasures of the original, resulting in a satisfying comfort watch that will doubtlessly entertain anyone who enjoyed the first one. "

Events collide in a way that leads to Andy getting hired by Runway to improve the publication’s image by utilizing her reputation for ethical work. Miranda, who wasn’t asked for her input on the hire, is classically frosty to Andy and resents the idea that she needs help from someone like Andy (who she claims to not remember) to run a fashion magazine. This sets up a situation similar to the first, in which Andy is desperate to win the approval of Miranda, who seems to loathe Andy with every fiber of her existence. Why would a now-respected journalist like Andy even accept a job like this, especially one in which she is expected to embrace clickbait and move units? Why would she still care what Miranda thinks about her? Why is she still a meek, tongue-tied mess of a person any time Miranda shoots so much as a raised eyebrow in her direction? Who cares! It’s all great fun to see the pair sniping at each other, as Nigel falls back into his lovable role of providing cutting remarks about Andy’s fashion while still lending a supportive ear. This is the dynamic fans wanted to see more of, and the movie is more than happy to deliver.

As part of Runway’s efforts at rehabilitation, it must also answer to the demands of Dior, one of its key advertisers. What a delight it is for everyone to discover that one of the senior executives at Dior is none other than Andy’s former co-worker and frenemy Emily (Blunt), who relishes the opportunity to hold power over the women who once tormented and passed her over for advancement at Runway. These scenes are all great fun, and Emily’s new role provides a great launching pad for Blunt to get plenty of digs in at Andy. Hathaway is at her best when interacting with Blunt – she is clearly happy to see her old friend succeed, but frustrated that she once again has no choice but to answer “how high” when asked to jump. You can almost feel the two actors doing their best to hold back grins when they’re together, which translates into some joyous moments on screen.

All of the excellent table setting and pleasingly nostalgic banter in the movie’s first half is partially undone by an increasingly implausible final half, which suddenly becomes a battle between extremely silly new characters over who is able to purchase control of Runway. The current owner Irv (Tibor Feldman) and his clueless tech bro son (B.J. Novak) have their own ideas for the publication, none of which are good. Emily’s new boyfriend, Benji, is a rich but dimwitted Elon Musk/Jeff Bezos type (Justin Theroux), who negotiates to buy everything just to please Emily and give her control over her former co-workers. And then there’s Lucy Liu as Sasha Barnes, a mysterious billionaire and Benji’s ex-wife, an admirer of Runway and someone who wants to see the magazine stay in the hands of the people who know it best.

As these machinations culminate in Italy during Runway’s huge gala during Milan Fashion Week, we are forced to root for one billionaire to succeed over another, the best-case scenario being one in which the more “ethical” one can basically save not only high-end fashion but true journalism. Either Frankel and returning screenwriter Aline Brosh McKenna have hit on a depressingly real piece of satire, intentional or not, reminding us that the things we love are almost exclusively controlled by people with more money than sense. The financial battle over Runway strikes a strange tone in an otherwise breezy movie, leaving a bitter taste in your mouth after the movie casually wraps things up in a way that seems designed for joyous victory, but feels depressingly all too real.

There’s still a good amount of silliness to be had, oddly enough at the expense of fashion itself. There are several moments where an extremely extravagant outfit is being analyzed, leading to lots of laughs in the theater I was in. Multiple celebrity and industry cameos will please sharp-eyed viewers, including public figures like Donatella Versace, Ciara, Jon Batiste, Suleika Jaouad, Jenna Bush Hager, Jar-Anthony Towns, and Rory McIlory, just to name a few. Lady Gaga makes an appearance as herself, humorously hinting at some kind of beef between her and Miranda, even as she eventually provides an energetic performance of “Shape of a Woman” at the Milan fashion show.

As with the original, the relationships away from the main action provide little to no substance, particularly when it comes to Andy. She is single at the start of the movie with nothing serious happening in her love life over the past 20 years. Of her original crew of friends, she still only talks to Lily (Tracie Thoms), who apparently got over Andy getting a kiss on the cheek from the hunky journalist in the first movie. Her love interest in this movie is Peter (Patrick Brammall), an overly genial and utterly blank Australian who is repeatedly and nonsensically belittled by Andy for being a real estate developer/contractor – which doesn’t deter him at all from trying to be with her, of course. Kenneth Branagh is equally ridiculous yet slightly more effective as Miranda’s new husband, Stuart, a calm voice of support for Miranda who also inexplicably appears in the background of multiple scenes, either playing in a string quartet or reading a book with the cover angled towards the camera.

It’s these moments of lighthearted silliness where The Devil Wears Prada 2 is at its best, owning its own unseriousness and doing its best to please crowds. The darker notes around the decline of journalism and billionaires buying up art as assets are certainly era-appropriate – this isn’t 2006 anymore, if we really needed the reminder – but they also serve to call greater attention to the inherent capitalism of fashion, and even the movie itself. Do we really care about expensive handbags or beautiful people holding an exclusive event in a space so extravagant that it houses a painting of “The Last Supper”? Sure, rich tech bros are bad, but having prohibitively expensive clothes, luxuriating in a mega-swanky hotel suite, and buying an unbelievably nice New York apartment are good? Is it really funny that Miranda is brought so low that she has to – gasp – fly economy? Are these characters that we like so much actually villains? These same questions existed after watching the first movie, but the sequel makes it a lot harder to ignore them.