A familiar idea permeates numerous 2025's blockbuster hits. This concept which extends all the way back to the days of silent film comedy. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the antagonist is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire using his enormous resources to defame Earth's greatest hero while controlling world events for personal gain. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the villain is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir spending vast sums to throw the heroes into a monster-filled danger zone to boost his wealth. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a clan of extremely affluent lynxes who appropriated a kindly mom’s altruistic invention and pinned the blame on her for murder, solely for their financial benefit.
A Tradition of Cinematic Class Warfare
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin plays a affluent bad guy controlling a TV network that earns a fortune by exploiting and murdering people enduring abject destitution, while leveraging AI forgeries and a sophisticated smear campaign to label them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight class division quite that directly, but its villains live in conspicuous opulence while preying upon and oppressing Oz's most vulnerable population, driving them out of jobs and toward imprisonment or servitude. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's top movie, sets the tough residents of a impoverished farm town against arrogant elites who inhabit extravagant gleaming towers floating overhead. Remarkably, the agreeably goofy humorous remake *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's scheme to trigger worldwide catastrophe — to make money, needless to say.
It is not inherently notable in a string of movies taking it as a given that the wealthy have disproportionate control, no morals or empathy, and a bottomless, entitled hunger for increased fortune. "The wealthy are antagonists and plucky heroes are heroes" as a plot device dates back to the early days of film, with the Little Tramp's adventures pitting his chronically destitute iconic vagrant against corporate bosses, authority figures, and inept, drunken millionaires. Beginning with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" movies from that era to the 1980s dance movies that refreshed that very premise for the era of the greedy, harmful Silicon Valley antagonist, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that riches is at odds with basic human values, and exalt the neutralizing, routing, and sometimes demise of the rich and powerful.
The Release That Changes Nothing
And yet, inexplicably, we never actually eating the rich. Whenever elected officials respond to a tragic gun violence event by pointing fingers at violent video games, I sigh with frustration, because if people actually were that easily influenced — if frequent consumption to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the societal mindset — surely American society would not persistently idolize billionaires. But the headlines reveals constantly that a alarming number of Americans innately equate riches with competence and value to society, even after a century of the world's most beloved movies communicating the opposite.
Actually, it seems like the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has given us a safety outlet that hinders real-world action. Provided with a frequent serving of mostly happily-ever-after fables where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can leave the theater satisfied about justice being served. These movies are like moral fairy tales, suggesting that society is just, and that determined protagonists will root out any corrupt individuals among the largely industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who lifted themselves through sheer effort.
A Sharper Edge in 2025
But while 2025's movies aren’t new in that respect, they do follow some modern developments among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more enraged, more pointed, more specific, and apparently more lethal. It’s rarely enough nowadays 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, selfish, cruel affluent villains were killed by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face directly on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an ambitious rival (*Him*).
"Almost none of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the packed into a police car conclusion, perhaps because it’s become so obvious that rich people function with different standards, and are very likely to buy their way out."
The "behind bars" outcome isn’t cathartic anymore. Instead, these villains are prone to meet their end at the conclusion of their movies, often in especially horrific, fitting ways.
Significant Outliers
A few stories differ, certainly. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is simply disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself exiled to the computer world, where he’s clearly 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 unmasked as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
