🔗 Share this article

A familiar motif courses through many of 2025's blockbuster hits. It's an idea which extends back in time to the time of silent film comedy. In the new *Superman* film, the villain is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire using his immense fortune to smear Earth's superhero icon while manipulating world events to enrich himself. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the antagonist is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir investing tens of millions to throw the heroes into a monster-filled arena for personal amusement. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a dynasty of super-wealthy lynxes who appropriated a kindly mom’s life-changing idea and framed her for murder, purely for their dynasty's gain.

A Lineage of Film Wealth Disparity

Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate plays a affluent bad guy running a TV network that earns a fortune by taking advantage of and killing people suffering through abject destitution, while employing digital impersonations and a well-honed media apparatus to portray them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* doesn't highlight economic inequality quite that directly, but its villains enjoy clear extravagance while preying upon and oppressing Oz's most vulnerable population, pushing them from their homes and into cages or slavery. The box-office champion *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one box-office hit, sets the scrappy people of a struggling farm town against haughty aristocrats who inhabit lavish gold-and-jade palaces above the clouds. Even, the lighthearted comedy reboot of *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's scheme to trigger worldwide catastrophe — to make money, of course.

There’s nothing particularly surprising in a series of movies presupposing that rich people have excessive influence, are devoid of conscience, and a insatiable, privileged desire for more wealth. "Rich people are villains and plucky heroes are heroes" as a concept stretches back to the dawn of cinema, with early comedies setting his always poor beloved underdog against corporate bosses, bosses, and bumbling wealthy fools. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that updated the exact same bit for the era of the rapacious, destructive entrepreneurial bad guy, the complete chronicle of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that affluence is at odds with basic human values, and applaud the defusing, downfall, and sometimes elimination of elite figures.

The Outlet That Fails to Transform

Nevertheless, somehow, we consistently fail to consuming the elite. Whenever politicians follow a tragic gun violence event by faulting graphic media, I sigh with frustration, because if people truly were that impressionable — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the collective psyche — certainly American society would not persistently revere billionaires. But the daily reports demonstrates every single day that a alarming number of Americans instinctively link affluence to smartness and social worth, even after decades of the world's most beloved movies promoting a contradictory message.

If anything, it appears that the constant stream of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has provided us with a relief valve that hinders meaningful change. Offered a regular dose of predominantly uplifting stories where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can finish the film feeling good about right prevailing. These stories are like ethical parables, suggesting that institutions function, and that plucky heroes will identify any bad apples among the mostly industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded by their bootstraps.

A Sharper Tone in 2025

But while 2025's movies aren’t new in that sense, they certainly adhere to some modern developments among class warfare stories: They’re getting more furious, more incisive, more targeted, and apparently more fatal. It’s rarely enough in the current era to see rich people be taught a lesson in humility, 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 affluent villains were killed by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down point blank on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were murdered with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).

"Almost none of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the packed into a police car finale, perhaps because it’s become so clear that the wealthy function with different standards, and are all too likely to negotiate their release."

The "behind bars" ending no longer satisfies anymore. Instead, these villains are prone to die at the end of their movies, often in especially grotesque, ironic ways.

Key Exclusions

There are exceptions, certainly. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up banished to the computer world, where he’s clearly being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is transformed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid