Review: The Devil Wears Prada 2 stumbles on the runway

Gird your loins, people. The Devil Wears Prada 2 (Rating: ✭✭) is out, and it commits the worst fashion faux pas imaginable: it’s dull.

Besides most of the main cast, the same creative team that made the 2006 original so quotable and rewatchable has reassembled, including director David Frankel and screenwriter Aline Brosh McKenna.

And there are callbacks galore, including both the opening scene of Andrea Sachs (Anne Hathaway) brushing her teeth, and the curt final line, spoken once again by Meryl Streep’s Miranda Priestly, although in a much different context. The infamous cerulean sweater appears in a wink-wink moment, as do a pair of belts that — to the untrained eye — might look suspiciously similar. Andy and her workplace fairy godfather Nigel (Stanley Tucci) once again go to the cafeteria.

But the first film knew what it was and had a clearer arc. Eager-to-please recent J-school grad Andy (Hathaway) somehow lands as the second assistant to Runway magazine’s exacting head honcho Miranda (Streep) — a job, as everyone keeps telling her, “a million girls would kill for.”

Based on Lauren Weisberger’s roman à clef inspired by her brief time working as an assistant for Vogue’s legendary editrix Anna Wintour, the picture was a sharp satire of the fashion industry, a bracing portrait of the ultimate boss-from-hell and a coming-of-age film dressed up in romantic comedy designer duds. (The traditional romance plotlines, involving the forgettable Adrian Grenier and Simon Baker, were the least convincing parts of the film.)

It also proved to be career changers for many of the actors. With her withering put-downs and iconic silver bob, Streep embarked on a late career comeback (she was considering retiring), Hathaway graduated from YA leads to adult parts, and Emily Blunt — who killed each one of her bitchy insults — became a star, although arthouse audiences already knew her from Pawel Pawlikowski’s beautiful My Summer of Love.

The new film has an identity problem. Twenty years after walking away from Runway, Andy, now a respected serious journalist who’s just been fired from her job, gets a call from media conglomerate Elias-Clark owner Irv Raditz (Tibor Feldman) to come join the magazine as features editor — which is news to Miranda, who doesn’t even remember her.

One of Andy’s first jobs is to do damage control on a piece the magazine printed about a fashion house that employed sweatshop workers. Miranda gets minced and meme’d online, and throughout most the film, repeatedly puts her Prada-shod foot in her pursed mouth, relying on her trusted first assistant Amari (Bridgerton’s Simone Ashley) to correct her.

So will this be about cultural sensitivity and cancel culture? Sure.

Andy’s article spawns dozens of think pieces and punditry, but nobody clicks on it. When the editorial team looks at the dismal online metrics, anyone who’s worked in media in the past decade will break out in an all-too-familiar sweat.

So will this be about the ruthlessness of the clickbait universe? Again, sure.

You can also add in themes like how tech bros are taking over media (Justin Theroux delivers the film’s single fresh performance as a Musk-meets-Bezos type former dweeb billionaire), the rise of AI, diversity in the workplace and snuggling up with brand names.

Speaking of brands... it’s rumoured that for the first film, Wintour threatened every fashion company that if they took part in the film they would no longer be featured in Vogue. Oh how times have changed. TDWP2 is chock full of brands — both onscreen (Blunt’s character now works at Dior) and off (you can now have what Miranda’s having at your local Starbucks).

The problem is, the narrative momentum and wit from the first film are sorely missing. What’s worse, none of the characters has any real motivation beyond what you’d see in a mid TV series like Scandal. I knew the film was in trouble early on when Miranda smiled in public — something Streep’s character didn’t do until much later in the original, and then only in private. A smiling Miranda is not an interesting Miranda.

New characters like the assistants played by Helen J. Shen (from Broadway’s Maybe Happy Ending) and stand-up/podcast host Caleb Hearon have a few fun moments. But others, like Kenneth Branagh as Miranda’s new husband, clearly signd on for scenes that aren’t in the movie. And don’t even get me started about Andy’s new love interest, an Australian developer played by Patrick Brammall.

I’m sure the film will make a gazillion dollars, and the new song by Lady Gaga — who of course appears, along with a bunch of other shilling celebrities — will be a monster hit.

Just don’t forget to get your no foam, extra shot, extra hot Caffè Latte with Non-Fat Milk (Miranda’s order) from Starbucks before you see it. You’ll need it to stay awake.

The Devil Wears Prada 2 opens in theatres Friday (May 1).