20 YEARS? FOR A SEQUEL? GROUNDBREAKING: ‘THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2’ EARNS ITS RETURN

words by FRANCESCO PIZZUTI

The Devil Wears Prada is, and will always be, a classic. Not only did it invent cerulean and cheese cubes, but it was a touchstone of queer media, a cultural landmark, and forever, a comfort film.

So, as the sequel arrived, twenty years later, the first reaction was excitement with an aftertaste of disbelief: ‘Why now?’ And yet with this sequel, the timing makes perfect sense. In an era marked by the collapse and reinvention of traditional media, returning to a film that crystallised the print magazine industry at its most glamorous and powerful feels very relevant. What has changed? What has remained? And what compromises must our favourite characters make to survive a world that no longer works the way it once did? The Devil Wears Prada 2 is a very self-aware reflection on legacy, relevance, fashion, media and the cost of staying cunt.

all images courtesy of DISNEY

The Devil Wears Prada 2 arrives with the impossible task of following one of the most quoted, rewatched, and repurposed films of the 2000s, and somehow maintains an integrity of its own, refusing to cosplay as its younger self. It is not a nostalgia tour, it is spectacular and theatrical in its own, new way, with all of Andy’s 47 outfit changes. But more than that, it is a glossy, funny, surprisingly melancholy update on power, relevance, ambition and ageing — although apparently that was optional for the actors who seem unbrudened by the weight of time. But seriously, this instalment poses a very real question every legacy institution eventually has to ask itself: what happens when the world stops needing you in the exact way it once did?

Directed again by David Frankel and written by Aline Brosh McKenna, the film reunites Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt, and Stanley Tucci, which is frankly half the battle. The chemistry is still so incredibly there; totally lethal.

Streep’s Miranda remains mean, snarky, still wearing Prada, and still incredibly passionate and driven in her work. But this time, the refined carpeted floors of her office are starting to crumble beneath her feet, as Runway Magazine is no longer the unquestioned temple of taste it once was. Print is struggling, influence has fragmented, and the empire Miranda built is struggling to hold up.

That is where the sequel finds its bite. If the first film was about Andy Sachs learning that glamour is never innocent, here, Miranda’s great enemy is not a younger assistant, or even a badly chosen belt; It is time. The movie understands that this is far more terrifying. Streep plays Miranda as sharpened by the knowledge that legacy can become a prison if you live long enough to watch the world redecorate without you. In that sense, the sequel feels surprisingly meta. Where many sequels try to pretend that nothing has changed, The Devil Wears Prada 2 makes change — and the discomfort of facing it — its central driving force.

Anne Hathaway’s Andy returns as a grown woman with professional weight and personal clarity. The genius of Hathaway’s performance is that Andy has not become cynical. She has become competent, which is much cooler. There is a lovely tension in watching her re-enter this universe with the confidence of someone who survived it, learned from it, and still does not entirely know whether she wants its approval.

Emily is Emily, always and forever the most real and relatable icon of them all. But if the original Emily was starving, frantic, and constantly one stomach flu away from transcendence, this Emily has become the fashion authority she once feared and worshipped. She is monstrous, insecure, fabulous, and a crucial puzzle piece in the film’s anatomy.

Tucci’s Nigel maintains that glimmer of humanity in a world increasingly ruled by digital metrics and corporate psychosis. Nigel’s presence gives the film warmth and memory; he is still devoted to beauty, still carrying the emotional intelligence everyone else pretends is bad for business. His scenes feel like a reminder that fashion, before the hierarchy and humiliation, was once about wonder, about seeing yourself differently.

Of course, a twist was due, and the new cast additions bring the perfect amount of contemporary energy. Simone Ashley’s Amari is especially compelling as Miranda’s new assistant, a more self-possessed figure who knows the rules and is already rewriting them. Caleb Hearon brings sweet, anxious comic charm as Charlie, while Helen J. Shen’s Jin gives the next-generation Runway ecosystem that sense of hunger we know so well. Importantly, the film does not turn Gen Z workplace politics into a lazy joke. Instead, it lets the younger characters ask if power, talent and genius must come with an equally high level of abuse, toxicity and elitism.

Visually, the movie is unapologetically spectacular. From Molly Rogers’ costumes that understood the assignment so thoroughly to the Milan sequences that give the film its grandest cinematic pleasures. But what makes The Devil Wears Prada 2 more than a high-budget reunion is its emotional intelligence and the palpable passion behind the project. Underneath the sparkle is a surprisingly tender film about work as identity and about women who built themselves inside hostile systems. This sequel lets the original age with grace; in a cinematic landscape full of desperate reboots begging us to clap because we recognise the logo, The Devil Wears Prada 2 actually earns its applause.