A recurring idea permeates many of 2025's blockbuster hits. This notion that stretches back in time to the days of the Little Tramp. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the antagonist is a greedy, heartless billionaire wielding his enormous resources to smear Earth's greatest hero while manipulating world events for his own profit. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the villain is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir squandering tens of millions to throw the heroes into a dinosaur-packed death trap for his own profit. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of ultra-rich lynxes who stole a altruistic inventor's altruistic invention and pinned the blame on her for murder, solely for their financial benefit.
A Legacy of On-Screen Wealth Disparity
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin plays a affluent bad guy operating a TV network that earns a fortune by taking advantage of and killing people enduring abject destitution, while leveraging AI forgeries and a powerful media apparatus to portray them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about class division in such a blunt manner, but its evil characters live in conspicuous opulence while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, pushing them into unemployment and into cages or slavery. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing movie, pits the resourceful people of a hardscrabble farm town against haughty aristocrats who dwell in lavish gleaming towers floating overhead. Interestingly, the lighthearted humorous remake *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's plan to trigger worldwide catastrophe — for his own profit, needless to say.
It is not especially new in a run of movies assuming as fact that the affluent have disproportionate control, are devoid of conscience, and a endless, demanding hunger for greater riches. "The wealthy are antagonists and everyday folks are heroes" as a concept goes back to the dawn of cinema, with early comedies contrasting his chronically destitute Little Tramp character against corporate bosses, authority figures, and bumbling wealthy fools. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that updated the exact same bit for the era of the greedy, harmful Silicon Valley antagonist, the complete chronicle of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that affluence is at odds with core morality, and exalt the defusing, defeat, and sometimes destruction of elite figures.
The Catharsis That Changes Nothing
However, somehow, we never actually consuming the elite. Every time politicians follow a public shooting event by pointing fingers at popular entertainment, I feel exasperated, because if people really were that impressionable — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the collective psyche — undoubtedly American society would not persistently idolize billionaires. Still the news makes it obvious every single day that a alarming number of Americans subconsciously equate riches with intelligence and value to society, even after a century of history's most popular movies communicating the reverse.
In fact, it appears that the constant stream of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has created a relief valve that gets in the way of real-world action. Offered a frequent serving of predominantly uplifting fables where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can walk away feeling good about good conquering evil. These stories are like ethical parables, suggesting that the system works, and that determined protagonists will root out any corrupt individuals among the mostly hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who succeeded by their bootstraps.
A More Pointed Message in 2025
But while 2025's movies aren’t new in that respect, they do follow some contemporary patterns among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more furious, sharper, more direct, and observably more violent. It is no longer satisfactory nowadays to see rich people learn a useful lesson in empathy, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious rich individuals were killed by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face point blank on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a wine opener (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an ambitious rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the hauled off to jail ending, perhaps because it’s become so apparent that rich people operate under different standards, and are highly probable to negotiate their release."
The "behind bars" ending no longer satisfies anymore. Instead, these villains are prone to perish at the final act of their movies, often in especially brutal, poetic ways.
Key Outliers
Some films diverge, of course. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up confined to the virtual grid, where he’s clearly being saved for future installments. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is transformed as a person. The antagonist family members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
