A familiar motif courses through a host of 2025's popular films. This notion which extends all the way back to the time of the Little Tramp. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the villain is a envious, ruthless billionaire using his enormous resources to smear Earth's greatest hero while manipulating world events for his own profit. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the bad guy is a rich pharma-bro squandering tens of millions to throw the heroes into a dinosaur-packed arena to boost his wealth. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of super-wealthy lynxes who pilfered a altruistic inventor's altruistic invention and framed her for murder, all for their own profit.
A Tradition of Cinematic Class Warfare
In the remake of *The Running Man*, the antagonist embodies a rich antagonist running a TV network that makes millions by taking advantage of and killing people enduring extreme hardship, while using digital impersonations and a sophisticated smear campaign to depict them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* doesn't highlight economic inequality quite that directly, but its antagonists enjoy obvious luxury while preying upon and oppressing Oz's most vulnerable population, driving them into unemployment and toward imprisonment or servitude. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing movie, pits the tough residents of a impoverished farm town against condescending upper classes who inhabit lavish sky-high mansions in the sky. Interestingly, the lighthearted humorous remake *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's plan to bring about global armageddon — for financial gain, needless to say.
It is not especially new in a series of movies presupposing that the affluent have excessive influence, lack ethics or compassion, and a endless, demanding appetite for more wealth. "Elites are the bad guys and everyday folks are heroes" as a concept stretches back to the early days of film, with early comedies setting his perpetually impoverished Little Tramp character against tycoons, industrialists, and clueless rich men. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" movies from that era to the 1980s dance movies that refreshed a similar story for the era of the rapacious, destructive tech-bro villain, the complete chronicle of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that affluence is at odds with basic human values, and celebrate the defusing, downfall, and sometimes elimination of elite figures.
The Outlet That Alters Little
And yet, somehow, we never actually taking down the wealthy. Whenever elected officials follow a public shooting event by faulting graphic media, I feel exasperated, because if people truly were that susceptible — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the public consciousness — undoubtedly American society wouldn’t still revere billionaires. But the headlines makes it obvious constantly that a frightening percentage of Americans subconsciously equate riches with smartness and value to society, even after decades of the world's most beloved movies communicating the opposite.
If anything, it looks as though the constant stream of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has provided us with a relief valve that gets in the way of substantive reform. Offered a frequent serving of mostly uplifting tales where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can leave the theater satisfied about right prevailing. These films are like moral fairy tales, implying that society is just, and that determined protagonists will identify any bad apples among the mostly industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who lifted themselves by their bootstraps.
An Angrier Edge in 2025
Although 2025's movies aren’t new in that regard, they certainly adhere to some modern developments among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting angrier, sharper, more direct, and observably more fatal. It is no longer satisfactory these days to see rich people learn a useful lesson about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or be stripped of wealth to the people they oppressed, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful affluent villains were eliminated by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face point blank on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a wine opener (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the hauled off to jail finale, likely due to it’s become so apparent that affluent individuals function with a separate justice system, and are all too likely to buy their way out."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" ending fails to deliver anymore. Conversely, these villains are prone to perish at the conclusion of their movies, often in particularly horrific, fitting ways.
Notable Outliers
Some films diverge, undoubtedly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is merely humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up exiled to the computer world, a setup that obviously being saved for future installments. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* loses all his money and is reformed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
