Twenty years and 100 million dollars later, The Devil Wears Prada 2 (2026) released in theaters on May 1st 2026. Beloved actresses Anne Hathaway and Meryl Streep reprise their roles as Miranda Priestly and Andy Sachs respectively. But as Miranda would ask, should they have even bothered coming back? 

The Devil Wears Prada (2006) amassed a total of 326 million dollars globally. The film’s rating on IMDb is 7/10 and has a 75% on Rotten Tomatoes. The sequel, The Devil Wears Prada 2 (2026) has amassed 439 million dollars in its first two weeks. The film has a current rating of  6.7/10 on IMDb and 78% on Rotten Tomatoes. The sequel has eclipsed its predecessor and is still on its way to surpassing it even more in the coming weeks.

The Original

The Devil Wears Prada (2006) follows Anne Hathaway as Andy Sachs, who is an aspiring journalist at Runway magazine. The movie was originally a 2003 novel by Lauren Weisberger. In both medias, Andy becomes the assistant of a strict magazine editor, Miranda Priestly, portrayed by Meryl Streep. The film follows Andy trying to please every single one of Miranda’s requests. Even though many of them seem impossible or cruel. There are many moments in the film that have defined many aspects of pop culture with the dynamic relationships and traits of the characters.

Over the course of the movie, Andy starts to transform into a new character. The movie tackles class divide and the fashion industry in the early 2000’s. At the end of the movie, Andy realizes that she’s slowly turning into Miranda; a career obsessed, dragon lady who pushes everyone in her personal life away. Andy realizes how far of a line she’s crossed and how much she’s changed and tries to revert it as much as possible. In the end, she gets a job at a company that’s not as famous as Runway, but she’s content and makes up with her friends and family.

The Sequel – Spoilers Ahead

The sequel has very large shoes to fill. It is based off of the novel, “Revenge Wears Prada: The Devil Returns,” by Lauren Weisberger. The sequel film follows Andy who is now a full time journalist at The Vanguard. However, at an award ceremony for journalism, Andy and other journalists get fired through text. Andy then gives a speech that goes viral for stating how important journalism is. Andy is then given a twice in a life opportunity of being hired by Runway magazine and takes the opportunity to go back. The film revolves around Andy back at Runway and demonstrates the decline of both journalism and the fashion industry in 2026. By the end of the film, Andy still works at Runway and enjoys her time there.

Pros
One of the good things about sequels is the callbacks that they bring back. They are very lighthearted gags that genuinely made me laugh. For example, when Andy meets Charlie, the second assistant portrayed by stand-up comedian Caleb Hearon who tells Andy that “a million girls were killed for this job.” Later in the film, when Andy meets her new assistant Jin Chao portrayed by Helen Shen she sees Miranda putting up her own coat. Andy points this out to which Jin Chao says, “I heard there were some H.R complaints. Apparently, she used to just throw her coat at you.”

In the next scene, while Charlie and Andy are working late, she says “No matter what anyone tells you, don’t go up the stairs,” to which Charlie replies “Who’d be stupid enough to do that?” All of these scenes got a genuine laugh out of me. They were great and funny callbacks that remind you of the movie’s origins and paid great homage to the first film.

Another detail that I appreciate a lot is the fact that the film hired a real artist to draw a meme centered around Miranda working at a fast food chain with test reading “Would you like some lies with that?” The artist, Alexis Franklin posted on Instagram and X (formerly Twitter) that the meme viewers saw was human-made and in fact not A.I. People online expressed a lot of praise for the movie for not taking the easy way out and using A.I unlike many other companies and productions. Many commenters also pointed out that the painting truly did look A.I generated and asked Franklin if that was the goal. 

“I was not attempting to mimic AI when I painted this. AI studied what we do, of course there are similarities. I was just trying to make a cheap meme, guys. The theories are wrong,” Franklin said on Instagram.

The casting was amazing. They brought back so many of the original actors. Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway, Stanley Tucci, Emily Blunt and many more familiar faces. This seems like a small thing but it’s something that so many people appreciated. It is one of the reasons why the movie had so much buzz around it. The actors made up the original film and bringing back the original cast was such a great move on their part.

As a student journalist, one of the best aspects of the movie was the spotlight on journalism. Journalism in every form has been in a decline. Whether that be through decline of funding, public interest or whatever factors it may be, journalism is dying. The movie really tries to highlight modern issues through the lens of a famous film. The scene where Andy gives a speech after her whole team got fired via text really captivates the reality that many journalists across America are facing right now. Going through every day wondering if you’ll still have your job. One of the things she says is “Something still matters more than money, journalism still f*cking matters.”

Cons

My biggest critique about the film is about Andy. The whole point of the original movie was that the money and rich life went to her head and she was becoming like Miranda and sacrificed a lot of her original morals. She takes a step back from “Runway” because of what it made her, but 20 years later she ignored all of that and returned like nothing happened. She has an ulterior motive to publish a biography on Miranda as some kind of revenge. Writing about the worst aspects of Miranda and making sure people know she’s a monster, a sadist, a devil. By the end of the movie, everyone is supposed to sympathize with Miranda and forgive her despite all the horrible things she’s done. Andy then feels bad about wanting to write the biography, but then Miranda tells her to write it anyway.

Along with Andy, the plot for this movie felt so messy and rushed. The characters were constantly doing something and something was always happening. Characters were always on the move. The first film limited its movement to New York and Paris, but this film expanded its horizons.

Andy and Miranda went to interview an elusive woman named Sasha Barnes, portrayed by Lucy Liu. Then Andy went to a party at a villa that Miranda owns. Then she also goes to the birthday party of Irv Ravitz who also tragically passed away at said party. Andy then also travels abroad to Paris again. It was kind of hard to follow the plot because things were always happening. And once they ran out of one thing to do, they introduced a new thing.

For example, after Irv passed away, Andy overhears that workers and budgets will be cut, her and Emily come up with a plan to have Emily’s husband, Benji Barners, portrayed by Justin Theroux buy Runway to “protect Miranda” and the company as a whole. Then when they reveal this to Miranda, she is appalled that Emily would betray her like that. This is because Emily’s goal all along was to own Runway. But then Miranda and Andy come up with a new plan to have Sasha Barnes buy all of Elias Clarke which is Runway’s parent company. 

The new actors and actresses who were introduced took such a big sideline throughout the movie. They were introduced in the beginning and then disappeared quietly for the rest of the film with maybe a scene or 2 with them included. This made them really unmemorable even though it would’ve been nice if they had a bigger role in the movie. I really would’ve enjoyed it if they were more crucial to the plot. Miranda had 2 new assistants that took over Emily and Andy’s old positions but they were rarely shown throughout the film or had any crucial roles.

Speaking of new actors, Jin Chao portrayed by Helen Shen has sparked a lot of controversy online. Not the actress herself,

but the character that she was playing. Prior to the movie’s release, 20th Century Studios released a short clip from the movie to try and generate hype for the movie. Emphasis on try. They released it to X (formerly known as Twitter) and a wave of backlash ensued. The clip shows dialogue between Andy and Jin Chao. Jin Chao thinks Andy doesn’t like her and spirals immediately. 

“If you don’t want me, you can interview someone else. That’s totally fine. I did go to Yale, 3.86 GPA, lead soprano of the Yale singing group the Whiffenpoofs, and my ACT score was 36 on the very first time,” Jin says. 

Many people, especially from East Asian countries, were outraged at the character being a racist caricature. She is portrayed as the hard-working and nerdy stereotype that many Asian people face throughout their lives. As an Asian American myself, this scene felt so stereotypical. It felt like the only thing my people are known for is their intelligence. This stereotype is so overused that this scene made me think “Of course, they made her a nerd” in the theater, coming off as distasteful and disappointing.

Others has suggested that her name “Jin Chao” sounds similar to a derogatory term that many Asian people were referred to in the past, although I completely understand this point as much. This backlash accumulated into many Chinese users on Weibo and Douyin which are Chinese social media apps saying that they would boycott the movie. 

Many people also came to the movie’s defense. They argue that the character is a people pleaser and overachiever to mock the newer and younger generation in the work force and corporate America. For example, an X user by the name of Joseph Kahn. 

“There’s an uproar with Japanese Twitter about this Asian character. They feel she’s a caricature, which she is, but not about Asians but Gen Z,” Kahn wrote.

I understand to a degree where the movie is coming from. They are trying to show how innocent and skittish especially in the younger generations can be. So much so, that they tend to be the people pleasing type. I think this portrayal is very realistic and would’ve been great to show. However, choosing an Asian character whether it was intentional or not was still exacerbating harmful stereotypes. It was unnecessary dialogue that could’ve been removed.

All in all, I rate the movie a 6/10. It had its moments especially when it came to old characters and callbacks, tackling real world issues and current events, and highlighting real artists. Beyond that, the film was so unnecessary and mediocre. The plot was confusing, the new actors and actresses were sidelined so hard, and in the end nothing changed. So much happened but so little happened at the same time. 

Why is there a sequel now?

Hollywood has been on a streak of sequels recently. Titles such as Zootopia 2 (2025) and Freakier Friday (2025) were released last year. And 2026 is looking even more packed. Upcoming titles such as Toy Story 5 (2026) and Scary Movie 6 (2026) are to be released later this year. One thing all of these movies have in common is that they are debuting many years after the original’s movie release. But why is Hollywood bringing them back now?

It’s possible that the movies that are coming out today are just not clicking with audiences. Some believe that they’re running out of ideas so they have to revert back to ideas that have already been done and bring them back. They see the original film’s success and try to capitalize on that success once again.

As the saying goes, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Trying to recreate perfection hasn’t worked out well for Hollywood. They try and try again to click with audiences by bringing back films and characters that people once adored. Hollywood has grown to be so disconnected from what people actually want and it shows. There are fewer and fewer movies every year that truly click with people. As Miranda Priestly herself would say, “that’s all.”