An age-old motif permeates a host of 2025's blockbuster hits. This concept which extends all the way back to the era of silent film comedy. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the evil force is a greedy, heartless billionaire exploiting his enormous resources to tarnish Earth's mightiest protector while orchestrating world events for personal gain. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the antagonist is a rich pharma-bro spending vast sums to trap the heroes into a monster-filled death trap for his own profit. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a family of extremely affluent lynxes who stole a kindly mom’s altruistic invention and framed her for murder, all for their dynasty's gain.
A Legacy of Film Class Warfare
In *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin portrays a affluent bad guy controlling a TV network that makes millions by preying upon and eliminating people suffering through abject destitution, while leveraging digital impersonations and a sophisticated media apparatus to depict them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* doesn't highlight economic inequality as overtly, but its antagonists reside in conspicuous opulence while exploiting and abusing Oz's poorest citizens, pushing them out of jobs and into cages or slavery. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing film, pits the scrappy residents of a hardscrabble farm town against arrogant elites who live in extravagant sky-high mansions above the clouds. Remarkably, the zany comedy reboot of *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's plan to cause global armageddon — to make money, naturally.
It is not especially new in a series of movies taking it as a given that the affluent have disproportionate control, lack ethics or compassion, and a endless, demanding desire for greater riches. "Rich people are villains and everyday folks are heroes" as a concept dates back to the dawn of cinema, with Chaplin’s silent movies setting his chronically destitute iconic vagrant against tycoons, bosses, and clueless rich men. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that refreshed that very premise for the era of the rapacious, destructive tech-bro villain, the whole legacy of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that affluence is incompatible with basic human values, and exalt the neutralizing, downfall, and sometimes elimination of powerful, wealthy people.
The Release That Fails to Transform
Nevertheless, for some reason, we consistently fail to consuming the elite. Whenever politicians respond to a public shooting event by pointing fingers at violent video games, I roll my eyes, because if people truly were that easily influenced — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the collective psyche — surely American society would not continue to revere billionaires. Still the news reveals regularly that a significant portion of Americans innately equate riches with smartness and importance, even after a century of the world's most beloved movies conveying the reverse.
Actually, it looks as though the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has provided us with a relief valve that hinders substantive reform. Given a steady diet of mostly happily-ever-after stories where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can finish the film satisfied about right prevailing. These movies are like cautionary fables, pretending that society is just, and that resourceful individuals will identify any malicious actors among the mostly industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded through sheer effort.
A Sharper Edge in 2025
Although 2025's movies are not novel in that regard, they certainly adhere to some recent trends among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more furious, more pointed, more targeted, and seemingly more fatal. It is seldom sufficient 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 exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful wealthy people were killed by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and executed point blank on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the packed into a police car finale, likely due to it’s become so clear that rich people function with different standards, and are highly probable to negotiate their release."
The "off to face justice" outcome fails to deliver anymore. Rather, these villains are apt to perish at the final act of their movies, often in especially brutal, poetic ways.
Key Outliers
A few stories differ, certainly. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is merely disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up exiled to the computer world, where he’s clearly being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is reformed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
