A familiar theme permeates many of 2025's blockbuster hits. It's an idea that goes far back to the time of Charlie Chaplin. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the antagonist is a greedy, heartless billionaire using his vast wealth to smear Earth's mightiest protector while orchestrating world events to enrich himself. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the antagonist is a privileged biotech mogul investing tens of millions to cast the heroes into a prehistoric danger zone to boost his wealth. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a family of extremely affluent lynxes who appropriated a altruistic inventor's life-changing idea and pinned the blame on her for murder, solely for their dynasty's gain.
A Lineage of Cinematic Wealth Disparity
In the remake of *The Running Man*, the antagonist plays a rich antagonist operating a TV network that profits hugely by preying upon and eliminating people living in desperate poverty, while using AI forgeries and a well-honed smear campaign to portray them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight wealth disparity as overtly, but its evil characters enjoy conspicuous opulence while preying upon and oppressing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, driving them from their homes and toward imprisonment or servitude. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's top box-office hit, contrasts the resourceful people of a impoverished farm town against haughty aristocrats who inhabit extravagant sky-high mansions floating overhead. Remarkably, the lighthearted humorous remake *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plot to cause worldwide catastrophe — to make money, of course.
There’s nothing particularly surprising in a series of movies assuming as fact that the affluent have excessive influence, are devoid of conscience, and a endless, demanding appetite for more wealth. "Rich people are villains and everyday folks are heroes" as a concept stretches back to the dawn of cinema, with the Little Tramp's adventures contrasting his chronically destitute Little Tramp character against fat cats, bosses, and bumbling wealthy fools. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" movies from that era to the 1980s dance movies that revised a similar story for the era of the rapacious, destructive entrepreneurial bad guy, the whole legacy of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that wealth is at odds with core morality, and exalt the neutralizing, defeat, and sometimes demise of elite figures.
The Release That Changes Nothing
Nevertheless, for some reason, we never actually taking down the wealthy. On each occasion politicians respond to a new mass shooting event by blaming graphic media, I sigh with frustration, because if people really were that impressionable — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the collective psyche — undoubtedly American society would not persistently idolize billionaires. And yet the daily reports demonstrates regularly that a significant portion of Americans innately equate riches with intelligence and social worth, even after a century of history's most popular movies promoting a contradictory message.
In fact, it appears that the constant stream of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has created a pressure release that impedes meaningful change. Given a regular dose of predominantly triumphant tales where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can walk away content about right prevailing. These films are like ethical parables, implying that institutions function, and that plucky heroes will identify any bad apples among the largely hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who succeeded through sheer effort.
A More Pointed Tone in 2025
Although 2025's movies aren’t new in that respect, they certainly adhere to some contemporary patterns among class warfare stories: They’re getting more enraged, more incisive, more direct, and apparently more fatal. It’s rarely enough these days 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 affluent villains were killed by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face directly on national television (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an ambitious rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the packed into a police car ending, possibly since it’s become so clear that affluent individuals live by different standards, and are all too likely to negotiate their release."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" resolution no longer satisfies anymore. Instead, these villains are apt to die at the end of their movies, often in especially grotesque, ironic ways.
Notable Exceptions
There are exceptions, of course. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is merely humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up banished to the digital realm, a setup that obviously being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* is stripped of all his money and is redeemed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
