Walking into The Devil Wears Prada 2, I’ll admit—I had expectations. I shouldn’t have. Sequels, especially to something as sharp and iconic as the original, rarely rise to the occasion.

This one doesn’t even try hard enough.

The film brings back Meryl Streep as Miranda Priestly, Anne Hathaway as Andrea Sachs, and Emily Blunt as Emily Charlton—but somewhere along the way, it forgets what made these characters electric in the first place.

What we get instead is a strangely sanitised version of a world that was once cutting, ruthless, and deliciously intimidating.

The bite is gone.

There are no truly sharp observations about fashion, power, or ambition. The iconic one-liners that defined the original film are largely missing—and the few that do land are handed almost entirely to Emily Blunt. She is, quite frankly, the only one who feels alive in this film. She carries the same acerbic energy, the same hunger—and ironically, she ends up framed as a kind of “villain vendor,” which feels both reductive and oddly misplaced. If anything, she feels like the natural successor to Miranda’s throne.

And you can’t help but think: why isn’t she in Andrea’s position?

The film leans heavily into aesthetics—yes, the clothes are stunning. Milan looks gorgeous. Fashion, visually, is still doing its job. But storytelling? That’s where it falters. The narrative feels flat, almost indifferent. The industry that once pulsed with ambition and ego now feels muted, like it’s been softened for comfort.

There’s a sense that as the magazine world fades into digital, the film itself loses its edge—as if human brilliance has been replaced with something safer, more forgettable.

The grit is missing.
The passion is missing.
The chutzpah is missing.

One moment does stand out: Miranda’s monologue referencing The Last Supper, where she speaks to Andrea about betrayal. It briefly rekindles the old magic—a reminder of what this film could have been. But it’s fleeting.

And that’s the tragedy here.

Even Miranda, once the embodiment of intimidating perfection, feels… toned down. As she herself might say—this isn’t New York anymore.

It’s New Jersey.

I dressed for the occasion, fully stepping into the world this film once celebrated. But walking out, I realised something uncomfortable:

I didn’t like it very much.

It’s not a terrible film. It’s just… disappointing. A glossy shell without the soul that made the original unforgettable.

And perhaps that’s the most unfashionable thing of all.