Still, I remember watching the film’s protagonist, Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway), with envy — judging her for not seeing the opportunity that had fallen at her feet. “A million girls would kill for this job,” I’d mouth along as Emily Charlton — the snobby first assistant to the Anna Wintour-esque Miranda Priestley — took an ill-dressed Sachs through the famed halls of the Runway offices. I gasped at the fashion montages, drooled over the thigh-high Chanel boots, added phrases like “why is no one ready” to my lexicon permanently, and (most importantly) rolled my eyes at Sachs’ boyfriend for getting mad at her for prioritizing work over his birthday.

Nonetheless, for me, it seemed impossible at the time. Sure, I loved writing, loved music, and stapled printer paper into my own books and magazines as a kid. But writing — the thing that came to me as naturally as breathing, couldn’t be commodified, right? Music, the thing Tina Turner did on the radio as I wielded a brush like a microphone at just seven years old, wasn’t something you could put into words, right? And let’s say you could jot some thoughts down, you couldn’t possibly monetize it, and if you could monetize it, you couldn’t live off it!

Fast forward to 2026, sitting in the Upper West Side’s Beacon Theatre, popcorn in hand,  I watched a promo screening of The Devil Wears Prada 2, giggling with my friend Eduardo Holguin and saying “Us!” during each scene — living my life as a self-made, full-time entertainment journalist. Somehow, we’d made it to a Manhattan theatre, in (according to me) the best city in the world, watching scenes about fashion and journalism play out like inside jokes. Is this film about us? Yes, and specifically now, the changing landscape that we’re working in.

See, The Devil Wears Prada 2 is just as charming, funny, and fashionably delightful as its first iteration, but it’s placed squarely in 2026. AI, video, and advertising have all eclipsed the desire for authenticity, beauty, and integrity — that is, unless you ask features editor Sachs, art director Nigel Kipling, and Editor-in-Chief Priestley. In a time where newsrooms are closing, raw human talent is challenged by artificial intelligence, and individualism has the industry kicking down ladders beneath them instead of building each other up, the film echoes through the emptiness of our current landscape. Remember when we used to care? Maybe we can find a way to make the new way good? Perhaps we could even make the new way better?

And listen — I needed to watch it. I needed to sit there and have my cold, jaded journalist heart melted. I needed to renew my vows to New York City, to journalism, to myself. See, I’ve had publications expect me to survive full-time on less than New York City demands while still requiring me to live in New York, as if prestige alone could pay my bills. And when I have made enough money working around the clock on side hustle after side hustle, I’ve had fellow journalists complain about my brand deals and first-class flights (this is a real thing that has happened, I shit you not). I’ve been accused of corporate gatekeeping while mentoring for free whenever I can, and (I’m sorry if this is relatable) I’ve been given impossible standards to work and achieve under, while watching my counterparts receive more by doing less, all while taking punches of misogynoir on the chin.

I’ve had alleged friends and, worse, romantic partners, ditch me when I was no longer a commodifiable asset, and writers no longer speak to me when I couldn’t assign them work. I’ve been used for photo passes and access, and my intelligence and 10 years of experience have been downplayed as if my hard-won experience was somehow a threat to someone’s ego. However, I really would do it all again. Because I don’t really care if a million girls would want this job, I want this job; this is what I love and feel called to do, and that may sound crazy, but that’s enough for me to do it.

So, a little watery-eyed and stuffed full of Diet Coke and popcorn, thinking about the girl who moved to New York City on a dream with zero industry connections save a journalist she cold emailed that she aspired to be like (shoutout KTB), I sat in the car on the way home from The Devil Wears Prada 2, giddy with validation. I chose the path that made no sense to anyone but me, the one that only seemed real on a big screen, and I made it work, I’m making it work, and I hope that with integrity intact in the best way you know how, you, reading this, can make it work too.

Because yes, I know that journalism, the way we used to know it, may be dead. But also — long live journalism.