[Spoiler alert]
Metro Manila, Philippines – When Anne Hathaway returns as Andy Sachs in The Devil Wears Prada 2, fashion isn’t the topic of her first scene. It’s loss.
A message arrives telling her and her department they’ve been laid off because of “restructuring.” Right now.
By the time Andy has navigated her way back to Runway, the world she left behind has already shifted.
Meryl Streep’s Miranda Priestly still leads it-ever composed, ever commanding-but the distance that once separated her from reality seems to have narrowed. Runway is no longer hers alone.
Her familiar peers have changed in their own ways, too. Emily Blunt as Emily Charlton has graduated from an anxious protégé to a confident industry insider, Stanley Tucci as Nigel Kipling remains a steady presence, but even his role reflects the system’s evolution.
Fashion is still the medium of their daily grind, but it no longer seems to be the main message.
The reality of the Philippines’ media landscape
A similar phenomenon has been at play within the Philippine media industry over the last decade. The decline of print hasn’t happened overnight, but rather a gradual phasing out.
Similar to newspapers, magazine circulation saw the same downfall.
Summit Media stopped printing some of its well-known magazines such as Preview, Yes!, Candy, and Cosmopolitan Philippines in 2018, a transition that set the tone for the future of magazine publications. Although these magazines continued online, their print run came to an end.
And yet, the industry persists. It adapts. What the film refuses to do is create a definitive line between fashion and journalism; instead, it allows them to intertwine.
Ultimately, The Devil Wears Prada 2 leaves us with an uneasy thought: that journalism in the current day increasingly resembles the world of fashion- competitive and constantly on the lookout for relevance.
Unlike fashion, however, the journalistic profession can’t afford to be transient.
Truth isn’t supposed to go out of style.
