Official Trailer
Rating: 6.7/10 | Genre: Comedy, Drama | Runtime: 119 min
Starring: Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt, Stanley Tucci, Justin Theroux
I went into The Devil Wears Prada 2 expecting either a cash grab or a solid nostalgia trip. It ended up being somewhere in the middle, and honestly, I’m fine with that.
The setup is pretty straightforward. Andy Sachs is back in Miranda Priestly’s orbit, and Runway is in trouble. The fashion industry has changed. Digital media is eating print’s lunch. Miranda needs money to keep the magazine alive, and that’s where Emily Charlton comes in. Emily’s now loaded and running her own luxury brand, so there’s this whole thing about whether she’ll actually help her old boss or if she’s going to let Runway die.
What Actually Works
Meryl Streep is still Meryl Streep. She hasn’t lost anything in the fifteen years since the first movie. The woman delivers a line about font choices and makes you feel like the fate of Western civilization is at stake. There’s a scene where she’s dealing with a crisis at the magazine and she’s just sitting at her desk, not really doing much of anything, but you can feel how tired and frustrated she is underneath all that ice. That’s the kind of acting that reminds you why she’s been doing this forever.
Anne Hathaway brings a different energy this time around. Andy’s not the scrappy wannabe anymore. She’s successful, confident, maybe a little too caught up in her own thing. There’s real tension between her and Miranda now that they’re not in a straight boss-employee dynamic. The movie actually plays with that, which I didn’t expect.
Emily Blunt as Emily Charlton is where things get interesting. She’s gone from being Andy’s awful coworker to this power player, and Blunt nails the specific flavor of someone who’s won at the game but is still carrying around some bitterness. She and Streep have a scene near the end where they’re negotiating, and there’s this whole history between them that comes out. It’s petty and funny and a little sad all at once.
The costume design is exactly what you want from a Devil Wears Prada movie. It’s fashionable without being try-hard. Everyone looks amazing, and the clothes actually tell you something about who these people are and where they are in their lives.
Where It Falls Apart
The movie is two hours, which should be fine for this story, but it feels padded in places. There’s a whole subplot with Andy’s romantic life involving Justin Theroux that honestly could’ve been cut entirely. It doesn’t go anywhere meaningful. It’s just there, and it slows things down.
The bigger problem is that the movie doesn’t really know what it wants to say about the fashion industry in 2026. Is it about how Miranda adapts to change? Is it about women competing with each other? Is it about whether print media deserves to survive? The movie touches on all of these but doesn’t commit to any of them. It just kind of meanders through scenes of people in nice clothes talking about the industry.
Stanley Tucci shows up as Nigel, and while it’s nice to see him, his character doesn’t have much to do. He’s just there for a few laughs and some emotional support moments. It feels like they brought him back because they needed the connection to the first movie, not because he had an actual part to play.
The Ending
I won’t spoil it, but the resolution feels like a compromise between what the movie thought it should be and what it actually wanted to be. It’s not bad, but it’s not particularly satisfying either. Everything wraps up a little too neatly for a movie that spent two hours saying the fashion world is cutthroat and complicated.
Final Verdict
The Devil Wears Prada 2 is worth watching if you loved the first one and want to spend some time with these characters again. It’s got great performances, it looks beautiful, and parts of it are legitimately funny. But it’s also a sequel that didn’t really need to exist, and the movie knows it. There’s no spark here, just competent filmmaking and actors who still know how to carry a scene.
It’ll probably be fine on a streaming service. Don’t go out of your way to catch it in theaters, but if it pops up on your feed some weekend, you could do worse. Just don’t expect lightning to strike twice.
What did you think if you saw it? Did the nostalgia factor work for you, or did it feel like a letdown?
Where to Watch
Streaming availability varies by region. Check your favorite streaming platform to see if this title is available in your country.