The original “The Devil Wears Prada”, released June 30, 2006 has one word to describe it: iconic. It is a well renowned chick-flick with everything it needs to be an iconic movie with not only having timeless lines or incredible actors, but also, from my perspective, a statement on high-class patriarchal systems that women have to sacrifice for. It is close to perfection and will forever have a place in many people’s hearts. 

“The Devil Wears Prada 2”, a tribute to 20 years of the original film was released May 1, 2026 and, as expected, did not hold up to the first movie. 

To start, the script does everything to fall flat. The dialogue is repetitive, predictable and painfully shallow. As you listen to each line being delivered by such amazing actors, you question why it just does not hit as well as the first film. This movie desperately tries and fails miserably to have every line be something iconic. The dialogue constantly grasps at straws to be quotable, and it gets horribly tiring. 

Speaking of the actors, there’s little to criticize. They all deliver strong performances, doing their best to embody well-established characters, even as the film itself somehow manages to misrepresent them. 

It is common knowledge that Meryl Streep is close to perfection, and Miranda Priestley (Streep) is another role that she can perfectly execute. However, while Streep does a great job in her role, it seems the script completely forgets who this character is. 

In the first movie, Miranda is seen smiling only once the entire film and barely breaks a sweat in the hardest of times. Everyone hustles to get out of her way at the mere mention of her name. She arguably has one of the greatest character establishment scenes in cinema. Now, this new era Miranda suddenly has tripled the amount of emotion with visible stress on her face in every scene along with her initial intimidation being completely erased. 

Some characters manage to keep consistent enough from the first movie, but, as mentioned, the dry, try-hard script does enough to butcher the characters. Even when the film attempted to add new characters, they managed to butcher what they could’ve been. Such great actors like Simone Ashley are wasted on a poor attempt at a parallel to Emily in the first movie. 

Like everything else, the plot also manages to fall flat. There are barely any stakes, and you find yourself not caring about what happens with the lackluster conflict arcs. Every scene is so focused on trying to be an homage to the first film, but all it does is give the movie a harder time in separating itself as its own story with its own unique plot line. 

Now, the fashion. Of course I had no expectations for the outfits to even come close to living up to the fashion of the original film, especially with modern changes of trends in the fashion industry. To my surprise, the outfits actually do a good enough job of keeping trends seen today and looking somewhat good for what they can do. 

Really, this film is not terrible. It is not exactly worth it to see, you would be better off watching it on an airplane with no other options. Despite its blatant flaws, there is much worse that could have been done with it, and there was such a high bar for it to reach for it to give the slightest bit of justice for the first movie. All in all, this movie did not need to exist.