A familiar idea permeates numerous 2025's blockbuster hits. This notion which extends all the way back to the era of Charlie Chaplin. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the evil force is a envious, ruthless billionaire wielding his enormous resources to tarnish Earth's superhero icon while orchestrating world events for personal gain. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the villain is a privileged biotech mogul spending a fortune to trap the heroes into a dinosaur-packed death trap for his own profit. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a family of extremely affluent lynxes who stole a well-meaning mother's life-changing idea and pinned the blame on her for murder, purely for their own profit.
A Lineage of Film Class Warfare
In *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate embodies a affluent bad guy running a TV network that makes millions by preying upon and eliminating people living in abject destitution, while leveraging AI forgeries and a well-honed smear campaign to portray them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about class division in such a blunt manner, but its villains reside in conspicuous opulence while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's most vulnerable population, driving them from their homes and into cages or slavery. The box-office champion *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing film, contrasts the resourceful residents of a impoverished farm town against haughty aristocrats who inhabit lavish gleaming towers in the sky. Interestingly, the zany comedy reboot *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's plot to trigger worldwide catastrophe — for his own profit, of course.
There is little especially new in a string of movies presupposing that the wealthy have too much power, lack ethics or compassion, and a endless, demanding appetite for increased fortune. "Elites are the bad guys and plucky heroes are heroes" as a theme dates back to the birth of movies, with the Little Tramp's adventures contrasting his chronically destitute iconic vagrant against fat cats, authority figures, and bumbling wealthy fools. Beginning with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that refreshed that very premise for the era of the rapacious, destructive Silicon Valley antagonist, the entire history of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that riches is contrary to core morality, and exalt the overthrowing, defeat, and sometimes destruction of powerful, wealthy people.
The Catharsis That Changes Nothing
Nevertheless, inexplicably, we consistently fail to taking down the wealthy. On each occasion politicians react to a public shooting event by pointing fingers at graphic media, I feel exasperated, because if people truly were that impressionable — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the societal mindset — certainly American society wouldn’t still worship billionaires. And yet the daily reports reveals regularly that a alarming number of Americans innately link affluence to competence and importance, even after a century of cinema's biggest movies communicating a contradictory message.
If anything, it appears that the constant stream of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has given us a pressure release that hinders meaningful change. Given a frequent serving of largely uplifting stories where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can walk away satisfied about good conquering evil. These stories are like moral fairy tales, pretending that institutions function, and that resourceful individuals will root out any corrupt individuals among the generally industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded on their own merit.
A Sharper Edge in 2025
Even though 2025's movies do not break new ground in that regard, they do follow some modern developments among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting angrier, more incisive, more specific, and apparently more fatal. It is seldom sufficient nowadays to see rich people learn a useful lesson about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful affluent villains were slaughtered by mythological beasts (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face directly on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a wine opener (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the driven away in cuffs finale, possibly since it’s become so clear that affluent individuals function with different standards, and are very likely to purchase their freedom."
The "off to face justice" resolution no longer satisfies anymore. Instead, these villains are prone to die at the final act of their movies, often in particularly grotesque, ironic ways.
Notable Outliers
There are exceptions, certainly. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up confined to the virtual grid, a setup that obviously being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* loses all his money and is transformed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
