Meryl Streep’s deliciously cruel Miranda remains fearsome heart of The Devil Wears Prada 2

The Devil Wears Prada 2 (PG13)

120 minutes, opens on April 30
★★★★☆

The story: Twenty years after the events of The Devil Wears Prada (2006), Andrea “Andy” Sachs (Anne Hathaway) is now an award-winning investigative journalist, only to lose her job when her publication’s parent company downsizes. Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep), the formidable editor-in-chief of fashion monthly Runway, has problems of her own when the magazine is associated with a disgraced brand. Runway’s parent company hires Andy without Miranda’s consent in an attempt to shore up the magazine’s credibility. Meanwhile, Emily Charlton (Emily Blunt) is now a senior executive at fashion house Dior. The three – with Miranda’s loyal aide Nigel (Stanley Tucci) – form an uneasy alliance when the magazine faces a crisis that could shrink its importance and cost Miranda her job.

The first movie was not just a global hit. It was also the reason many now know that blue comes in cerulean, lapis and turquoise, and it also made Miranda’s dismissive phrase – “that’s all” – iconic.

The sequel makes sly nods to those clips, spread on every meme platform in the last decade.

Like the original, the follow-up leads viewers to believe that Andy is the main character, when it is the anti-heroic Miranda – cruel, imperious, withering – who is the star.

Streep, once more, inhabits the role of the beloved villainess like no other actress can, using the same less-is-more approach that launched a thousand Instagram and TikTok clips.

Rewatch the first movie and one should quickly see that it is a bunch of tropes about a starry-eyed girl in the big bad city strung together. Without Streep’s performance anchoring the story, it would have been another disposable mid-2000s comedy.

The best bits of both films show Miranda doing her job – her work scenes are the epitome of competence porn.

Here, she is shown – with some justification – dressing down art directors who sell poverty as an aesthetic (a joke also made in the 2001 modelling parody Zoolander).

But the movie keeps up with the times. Miranda wants to make a mean remark about body positivity and to use the F-word to describe generously proportioned models, but a Gen Z assistant shoots her a stern look, letting her know the magazine does not need a lawsuit.

The first film’s success testifies to the fact the viewers love ultra-competence more than they hate cruelty.

The sequel really shines only when Miranda is in frame. Andy is there to serve as a moral compass, while Emily is the classic mean girl. Despite the 20-year gestation, their characters are still woefully underdeveloped.

One can feel the minutes tick by when Andy gets an age-appropriate romantic sub-plot. Yes, she deserves one after the events of the last movie, but the fan service does not have to be this obvious or plodding.

Director David Frankel, returning from the first film with the main cast, knows that a little Miranda goes a long way. He deploys her scenes as a bracing contrast to the sweeter ones with Andy.

When Miranda is not there, Nigel is a strong substitute. Describing the outdoorsy technical wear – called “gorpcore” in fashion parlance – favoured by the finance and tech bros who are the new villains in the sequel, he says: “They had on so many synthetics, if I dropped a match on them, they’d light up like a Christmas tree in March.”

Hot take: Streep’s Miranda is as magnificent as ever, and the sequel is a worthy return to the world of Runway.