An age-old idea permeates a host of 2025's popular films. It's an idea that stretches all the way back to the time of Charlie Chaplin. In the new *Superman* film, the evil force is a greedy, heartless billionaire using his immense fortune to smear Earth's greatest hero while orchestrating world events for personal gain. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the bad guy is a privileged biotech mogul squandering a fortune to throw the heroes into a monster-filled death trap for his own profit. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a family of extremely affluent lynxes who stole a altruistic inventor's life-changing idea and pinned the blame on her for murder, solely for their financial benefit.
A Lineage of Cinematic Wealth Disparity
In the remake of *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate plays a wealthy villain running a TV network that makes millions by exploiting and murdering people living in extreme hardship, while using AI forgeries and a sophisticated propaganda machine to label them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight wealth disparity quite that directly, but its antagonists reside in conspicuous opulence while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, pushing them into unemployment and into bondage. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one film, contrasts the scrappy residents of a impoverished farm town against arrogant elites who inhabit opulent sky-high mansions above the clouds. Remarkably, the lighthearted farcical update of *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's plan to trigger planetary doom — for his own profit, needless to say.
There’s nothing particularly surprising in a string of movies presupposing that the affluent have too much power, are devoid of conscience, and a endless, demanding appetite for increased fortune. "Rich people are villains and everyday folks are heroes" as a plot device stretches back to the birth of movies, with early comedies pitting his chronically destitute Little Tramp character against fat cats, industrialists, and clueless rich men. Beginning with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that updated that very premise for the era of the exploitative, damaging Silicon Valley antagonist, the complete chronicle of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that wealth is contrary to basic human values, and celebrate the defusing, defeat, and sometimes demise of powerful, wealthy people.
The Release That Alters Little
And yet, somehow, we never get around to taking down the wealthy. On each occasion elected officials follow a tragic gun violence event by blaming graphic media, I sigh with frustration, because if people actually were that susceptible — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the collective psyche — surely American society would not persistently idolize billionaires. And yet the news makes it obvious constantly that a significant portion of Americans instinctively link affluence to smartness and social worth, even after one hundred years of the world's most beloved movies conveying the reverse.
In fact, it looks as though the never-ending cycle of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has provided us with a safety outlet that impedes real-world action. Given a regular dose of predominantly happily-ever-after fables where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can finish the film satisfied about good conquering evil. These films are like moral fairy tales, implying that the system works, and that resourceful individuals will root out any corrupt individuals among the generally industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who lifted themselves through sheer effort.
An Angrier Message in 2025
But while 2025's movies are not novel in that sense, they do follow some recent trends among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting angrier, sharper, more targeted, and observably more violent. It’s rarely enough nowadays to see rich people gain some humility in empathy, 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 rich individuals were slaughtered by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and executed directly on national television (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a wine opener (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the driven away in cuffs ending, likely due to it’s become so clear that rich people function with their own legal rules, and are all too likely to purchase their freedom."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" resolution isn’t cathartic anymore. Instead, these villains are prone to perish at the final act of their movies, often in notably brutal, poetic ways.
Notable Exclusions
There are exceptions, of course. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is simply disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up banished to the virtual grid, a setup that obviously being saved for future installments. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* loses all his money and is transformed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be frauds and deceivers, but they don’t meet|avoid
