A familiar motif courses through numerous 2025's genre movies. This concept which extends far back to the era of the Little Tramp. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the villain is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire wielding his vast wealth to smear Earth's superhero icon while orchestrating world events for his own profit. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the antagonist is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir squandering vast sums to throw the heroes into a dinosaur-packed death trap for his own profit. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a clan of ultra-rich lynxes who pilfered a altruistic inventor's altruistic invention and set her up for murder, all for their own profit.
A Tradition of Cinematic Wealth Disparity
In *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate embodies a rich antagonist running a TV network that earns a fortune by preying upon and eliminating people enduring desperate poverty, while using AI forgeries and a sophisticated media apparatus to label them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight economic inequality quite that directly, but its evil characters enjoy conspicuous opulence while preying upon and oppressing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, driving them into unemployment and toward imprisonment or servitude. The box-office champion *Ne Zha 2*, the year's top film, sets the tough people of a hardscrabble farm town against haughty aristocrats who dwell in extravagant gold-and-jade palaces above the clouds. Even, the agreeably goofy humorous remake *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's scheme to trigger worldwide catastrophe — for financial gain, needless to say.
It is not particularly surprising in a string of movies taking it as a given that the wealthy have excessive influence, are devoid of conscience, and a insatiable, privileged appetite for more wealth. "The wealthy are antagonists and plucky heroes are heroes" as a plot device goes back to the birth of movies, with the Little Tramp's adventures contrasting his chronically destitute Little Tramp character against corporate bosses, bosses, and bumbling wealthy fools. 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 greedy, harmful tech-bro villain, the entire history of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that affluence is contrary to core morality, and applaud the neutralizing, defeat, and sometimes elimination of powerful, wealthy people.
The Release That Changes Nothing
Nevertheless, somehow, we never actually eating the rich. Every time elected officials respond to a tragic gun violence event by faulting graphic media, I roll my eyes, because if people truly were that easily influenced — if frequent consumption to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the societal mindset — surely American society wouldn’t still revere billionaires. But the headlines makes it obvious constantly that a alarming number of Americans instinctively link affluence to competence and social worth, even after decades of the world's most beloved movies communicating a contradictory message.
Actually, it looks as though the never-ending cycle of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has given us a relief valve that impedes real-world action. Offered a regular dose of predominantly triumphant fables where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can leave the theater content about good conquering evil. These stories are like ethical parables, suggesting that the system works, and that determined protagonists will identify any bad apples among the generally hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who pulled themselves up on their own merit.
An Angrier Tone in 2025
But while 2025's movies aren’t new in that respect, they indeed follow some contemporary patterns among class warfare stories: They’re getting more furious, sharper, more specific, and apparently more lethal. It is no longer satisfactory these days to see rich people gain some humility in humility, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, selfish, cruel rich individuals were eliminated by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face directly on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a wine opener (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an ambitious rival (*Him*).
"Almost none of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the packed into a police car conclusion, perhaps because it’s become so apparent that rich people operate under their own legal rules, and are all too likely to purchase their freedom."
The "behind bars" ending fails to deliver anymore. Instead, these villains are apt to die at the conclusion of their movies, often in particularly horrific, fitting ways.
Key Exceptions
A few stories differ, of course. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is simply humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself confined to the digital realm, a setup that obviously being saved for future installments. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is redeemed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
