An age-old motif runs through numerous 2025's blockbuster hits. This notion that goes far back to the time of the Little Tramp. In the new *Superman* film, the antagonist is a greedy, heartless billionaire wielding his enormous resources to defame Earth's greatest hero while manipulating world events to enrich himself. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the bad guy is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir squandering vast sums to throw the heroes into a monster-filled danger zone to boost his wealth. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a family of extremely affluent lynxes who pilfered a kindly mom’s life-changing idea and pinned the blame on her for murder, all for their financial benefit.
A Tradition of Cinematic Elite Villainy
In *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate embodies a affluent bad guy operating a TV network that earns a fortune by taking advantage of and killing people living in abject destitution, while leveraging AI forgeries and a well-honed media apparatus to portray them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about wealth disparity quite that directly, but its evil characters enjoy clear extravagance while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's most vulnerable population, forcing them from their homes and into cages or slavery. The box-office champion *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing box-office hit, pits the resourceful residents of a hardscrabble farm town against condescending upper classes who dwell in extravagant gleaming towers in the sky. Interestingly, the zany humorous remake *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's scheme to bring about planetary doom — to make money, naturally.
There’s nothing particularly surprising in a series of movies taking it as a given that rich people have disproportionate control, no morals or empathy, and a insatiable, privileged appetite for increased fortune. "The wealthy are antagonists and everyday folks are heroes" as a plot device goes back to the birth of movies, with the Little Tramp's adventures pitting his perpetually impoverished Little Tramp character against fat cats, authority figures, and clueless rich men. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that revised the exact same bit for the era of the rapacious, destructive entrepreneurial bad guy, the whole legacy of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that riches is at odds with core morality, and celebrate the neutralizing, downfall, and sometimes elimination of the rich and powerful.
The Catharsis That Alters Little
However, for some reason, we never get around to consuming the elite. Whenever lawmakers react to a new mass shooting event by faulting graphic media, I roll my eyes, because if people truly were that impressionable — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the public consciousness — surely American society wouldn’t still idolize billionaires. And yet the daily reports makes it obvious regularly that a frightening percentage of Americans innately equate riches with competence and value to society, even after a century of cinema's biggest movies conveying a contradictory message.
Actually, it looks as though the constant stream of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has created a relief valve that hinders meaningful change. Offered a regular dose of predominantly triumphant tales where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can walk away content about justice being served. These films are like moral fairy tales, implying that institutions function, and that resourceful individuals will weed out any malicious actors among the mostly industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded through sheer effort.
A Sharper Edge in 2025
But while 2025's movies are not novel in that regard, they certainly adhere to some modern developments among class warfare stories: They’re getting more enraged, more pointed, more specific, and apparently more violent. It is no longer satisfactory in the current era to see rich people learn a useful lesson in empathy, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful rich individuals were killed by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down point blank on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were murdered with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the driven away in cuffs finale, likely due to it’s become so obvious that the wealthy function with a separate justice system, and are all too likely to buy their way out."
The "behind bars" ending fails to deliver anymore. Instead, these villains are apt to meet their end at the final act of their movies, often in particularly horrific, fitting ways.
Key Exceptions
A few stories differ, of course. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is only disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up confined to the digital realm, where he’s clearly being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is reformed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
