A familiar idea permeates a host of 2025's blockbuster hits. It's an idea that goes all the way back to the era of silent film comedy. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the antagonist is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire exploiting his vast wealth to tarnish Earth's mightiest protector while controlling world events to enrich himself. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the bad guy is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir spending vast sums to trap the heroes into a dinosaur-packed arena for personal amusement. 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, solely for their dynasty's gain.
A Tradition of Cinematic Wealth Disparity
In *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin embodies a wealthy villain controlling a TV network that earns a fortune by exploiting and murdering people enduring desperate poverty, while using digital impersonations and a sophisticated propaganda machine to portray them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about wealth disparity quite that directly, but its evil characters enjoy obvious luxury while preying upon and oppressing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, pushing them from their homes and into cages or slavery. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's top film, pits the scrappy inhabitants of a hardscrabble farm town against condescending upper classes who live in extravagant gleaming towers in the sky. Interestingly, the lighthearted comedy reboot *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plan to cause global armageddon — to make money, naturally.
There is little particularly surprising in a series of movies presupposing that the affluent have excessive influence, no morals or empathy, and a endless, demanding desire for more wealth. "Elites are the bad guys and plucky heroes are heroes" as a concept goes back to the early days of film, with Chaplin’s silent movies contrasting his perpetually impoverished Little Tramp character against fat cats, bosses, and bumbling wealthy fools. Beginning with 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 exploitative, damaging Silicon Valley antagonist, the whole legacy of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that riches is contrary to basic human values, and celebrate the neutralizing, routing, and sometimes destruction of the rich and powerful.
The Outlet That Alters Little
And yet, inexplicably, we never actually consuming the elite. Whenever politicians react to a new mass shooting event by blaming violent video games, I sigh with frustration, because if people truly were that impressionable — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the public consciousness — surely American society would not persistently worship billionaires. But the news makes it obvious regularly that a alarming number of Americans innately equate riches with smartness and value to society, even after decades of cinema's biggest movies communicating a contradictory message.
Actually, it appears that the never-ending cycle of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has given us a safety outlet that hinders meaningful change. Given a steady diet of largely uplifting fables where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can walk away content about justice being served. These movies are like cautionary fables, suggesting that society is just, and that determined protagonists will root out any malicious actors among the mostly hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who lifted themselves on their own merit.
A Sharper Message in 2025
Even though 2025's movies are not novel in that respect, they certainly adhere to some modern developments among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more enraged, more incisive, more specific, and apparently more violent. It is seldom sufficient these days to see rich people be taught a lesson in empathy, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they subjugated, 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 blown up on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face directly on national television (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a wine opener (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the hauled off to jail finale, possibly since it’s become so apparent that affluent individuals function with different standards, and are very likely to buy their way out."
The "off to face justice" outcome isn’t cathartic anymore. Instead, these villains are likely to die at the final act of their movies, often in especially grotesque, ironic ways.
Significant Exclusions
Some films diverge, certainly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is only disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up confined to the virtual grid, where he’s clearly being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* is stripped of all his money and is transformed as a person. The antagonist family members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
