For years, the summer movie season has belonged to capes, cowls, and CGI explosions. Studios have treated May like a superhero parking lot, cramming the first weekend with Marvel properties and hoping audiences don’t notice they’re watching the same city get destroyed for the eighth time. But this year, something radical is happening. The movie kicking off summer isn’t about a man in tights—it’s about three women in couture, and the box office tracking suggests audiences are ready for the change.
The Devil Wears Prada 2 is projected to open with as much as $66 million domestically over the May 1-3 weekend, a figure that would make it the highest-grossing non-superhero summer opener in recent memory. For context, the original film opened to $27.5 million in 2006 and legged its way to $326.6 million worldwide. The sequel is expected to nearly triple that opening number, with presales reportedly double those of Wuthering Heights and first-choice interest among women over 25 tracking just behind Wicked.
This is significant because Hollywood has spent the last decade convinced that summer belongs to fanboys. The Marvel Cinematic Universe claimed the first weekend of May as its birthright, using Iron Man, The Avengers, and various other spandex-clad saviors to launch the season. But production delays, pandemic aftershocks, and superhero fatigue have created a vacuum that Prada 2 is striding into with impeccable timing. Disney, which owns both Marvel and 20th Century Studios, made the calculated decision to let Miranda Priestly claim the date instead of another Avenger.
The film’s commercial prospects are further boosted by its Mother’s Day positioning. Opening May 1 gives it a full week to build word-of-mouth before the holiday weekend, when daughters will drag their mothers, mothers will drag their daughters, and everyone will collectively marvel at Meryl Streep’s ability to make sunglasses look like a weapon. As counterprogramming, it faces Mortal Kombat II and Star Wars: The Mandalorian & Grogu later in the month—films targeting completely different demographics, which means Prada 2 essentially has the “adults who like clothes and dialogue” market all to itself.
Industry estimates suggest the sequel could earn between $80 and $95 million in its opening weekend, with some trackers predicting it could ultimately surpass the original’s global total and land among Emily Blunt’s top five highest-grossing films. That would put it in the company of Oppenheimer, Edge of Tomorrow, Mary Poppins Returns, and A Quiet Place—respectable company for a film about fashion journalism.
What makes these numbers particularly impressive is the twenty-year gap between installments. Most sequels that succeed are released within three to five years of their predecessors, while the audience’s goodwill is still warm. Prada 2 is betting that nostalgia, combined with the genuine cultural footprint of the original, will bring back viewers who haven’t thought about cerulean blue in two decades. The marketing has leaned heavily into this nostalgia, reuniting the original cast for press events and reminding everyone that the first film remains one of the most quotable movies of the 2000s.
Anne Hathaway has embraced her role as generational babysitter, noting that fans who grew up with The Princess Diaries and The Devil Wears Prada are now sending her graduation announcements and wedding invitations. “We’ve grown up together,” she said, which is both sweet and slightly unsettling when you realize she was playing a college graduate at twenty-two and is now playing a woman in her forties navigating career obsolescence.
The film’s success would also validate Disney’s strategy of using 20th Century Studios to release adult-oriented counterprogramming. After years of relying exclusively on Marvel, Star Wars, and animated features, the studio is remembering that grown-ups also buy tickets—especially when the movie promises Meryl Streep verbally eviscerating people while wearing clothes that cost more than most cars.
If the tracking holds, The Devil Wears Prada 2 won’t just be a hit—it will be a statement. A declaration that summer doesn’t have to belong to superheroes, that women over twenty-five are a viable audience, and that sometimes the most explosive thing you can put on screen is a well-delivered insult from Meryl Streep.
That’s the kind of box office fashion statement even Miranda Priestly would approve of.
Get your tickets now—The Devil Wears Prada 2 arrives in theaters May 1, just in time for Mother’s Day weekend.
Also Read: Miranda Forgetting Andy Is the Most Realistic Thing About Devil Wears Prada 2