Introduction
In the eighteen years I’ve been reviewing movies, I’ve seen plenty of sequels that should not have been made. I’m sure there’s a timeline in the multiverse where Super Troopers 2 (2018) was hilarious and Independence Day 2 (2016) wasn’t embarrassingly stupid. We are in neither of those timelines. Nor are we in the timeline where someone made a version of The Devil Wears Prada 2 that didn’t make you go “why?”
It’s been twenty years since The Devil Wears Prada (2006) was released in theaters. That’s plenty of time for someone to have written an interesting sequel, show it to their friend, and their friend to roll it up, smack that writer upside the head with it, and say “no.” The Devil Wears Prada was a really good movie and a surprise smash at the box office. And it certainly didn’t leave any questions at the end for audiences to wonder about for two decades.
The biggest mistake when making sequels is misunderstanding why audiences loved the originals. The Devil Wears Prada didn’t appeal to audiences because of a fictitious fashion-industry magazine or pretty clothes. It appealed to audiences because of the characters themselves. Both the hero, Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway), and the villain, Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep), were exceptionally well-written and well-developed characters. And the way the movie ends both of their story arcs is perfection.
If the original movie had been called The Devil Wears Rawlings, Miranda was the general manager of a Major League baseball team, and Andy was Miranda’s young assistant, the rest of the movie could have unfolded the same way and been just as well-received.
Synopsis
The Devil Wears Prada 2 falls right into the trap of thinking the fashion magazine part matters. Now a seasoned journalist, Andy is hired back to Runway magazine to run the features section and to help rehabilitate the magazine. Except this time, Andy has no arc. She learned everything she needed to learn in the first movie. Now, she’s just trying to figure out how to save the magazine because it’s 2026 and nobody reads anymore.
The same goes for Miranda. Her arc in the first movie was all about establishing and proving how devilish she was. Yes, she showed a teeny, tiny affection for Andy by the end, but that was out of respect for Andy growing a spine. In the sequel, Miranda is still head of the magazine, but she’s far less mean because the screenwriter thought it would be funny if Miranda were forced to be more politically correct and nicer. Just gross.
Another sequel trap it falls into is trying to retread parts of the first film. The sequel tries to rekindle the same dynamic between Miranda and Andy, the tyrannical boss and terrified subordinate, but it falls flat for the reasons mentioned above. Not to mention Andy isn’t a fresh college grad eating shit as a glorified intern just for a good recommendation for later employment. And, as I said, Miranda is being forced to be nicer, literally by her first assistant, Amari (Simone Ashley), which is not something any of us wants to see.
Discussion
Other retreads in this film that hit in much weaker ways are Nigel (Stanley Tucci) picking out outfits for Andy, a sequence where Andy is trying to make the impossible happen (actually, two sequences), and Miranda trying to dismiss Andy’s work on multiple occasions. However, the scene that proved how little the filmmakers understood of what made the first movie great was when Andy showed up for her first day of work.
She walks into Miranda’s office with a huge smile on her face, practically squealing with delight, and she greets Miranda and Nigel as if they are close sorority sisters Andy hasn’t seen in years. There was no scenario where Miranda was going to light up with glee at the sight of Andy, and Andy would never behave like this because Andy isn’t an idiot. It’s mindboggling to think that the director (David Frankel) and screenwriter (Aline Brosh McKenna) of this sequel served in those same roles for the original.
In case you were wondering, Emily (Emily Blunt) returns in this film as well. Now, she’s a senior executive at Dior and just as spicy and dry-witted as ever. The film tries to involve her where it can while also trying to establish a budding friendship between her and Andy. But like everything else in The Devil Wears Prada 2, there just doesn’t seem to be a lot of heart behind it. Some of that has to do with the direction they take her character and how it plays into the larger plot. But it seems more like the filmmakers didn’t embrace the possibilities of that direction and just sort of settled for something decidedly meh.
Conclusion
The entire effort of this movie reminded me of when people try to recapture the magic of something that happened spontaneously by trying to force it to happen again (it never works). You know what I’m talking about. A blowout college party happens, and some people try to recreate that same party. A night out on the town where you and some friends woke up the next morning on a famous person’s yacht. Or even just a family vacation where everything went exactly according to plan, the kids had tons of fun and zero fights, and nobody wanted to push an in-law off a ledge. In other words, I can see that the filmmakers thought they could, but nobody asked if they should.
