A familiar idea permeates many of 2025's popular films. It's an idea which extends back in time to the time of silent film comedy. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the antagonist is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire wielding his immense fortune to tarnish Earth's greatest hero while controlling world events for personal gain. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the bad guy is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir spending a fortune to cast the heroes into a prehistoric danger zone for personal amusement. In *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a dynasty of ultra-rich lynxes who stole a well-meaning mother's altruistic invention and set her up for murder, all for their dynasty's gain.
A Tradition of On-Screen Class Warfare
In the remake of *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate portrays a wealthy villain controlling a TV network that makes millions by exploiting and murdering people enduring desperate poverty, while employing AI forgeries and a powerful smear campaign to depict them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* doesn't highlight economic inequality in such a blunt manner, but its antagonists enjoy clear extravagance while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's most vulnerable population, forcing them into unemployment and toward imprisonment or servitude. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one box-office hit, sets the resourceful residents of a struggling farm town against arrogant elites who inhabit opulent gold-and-jade palaces in the sky. Even, the agreeably goofy farcical update *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plot to bring about worldwide catastrophe — for his own profit, of course.
There’s nothing especially new in a series of movies presupposing that the wealthy have excessive influence, no morals or empathy, and a insatiable, privileged hunger for more wealth. "Elites are the bad guys and plucky heroes are heroes" as a theme dates back to the early days of film, with the Little Tramp's adventures setting his perpetually impoverished iconic vagrant against tycoons, authority figures, and bumbling wealthy fools. Beginning with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that refreshed the exact same bit for the era of the exploitative, damaging Silicon Valley antagonist, the whole legacy of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that wealth is at odds with core morality, and exalt the overthrowing, downfall, and sometimes destruction of elite figures.
The Catharsis That Fails to Transform
However, somehow, we consistently fail to eating the rich. On each occasion politicians follow a public shooting event by faulting violent video games, I roll my eyes, because if people truly 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 continue to revere billionaires. And yet the news reveals constantly that a significant portion of Americans subconsciously link affluence to intelligence and value to society, even after decades of history's most popular movies promoting the opposite.
Actually, it seems like the never-ending cycle of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has given us a relief valve that hinders substantive reform. Provided with a frequent serving of largely happily-ever-after tales where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can finish the film satisfied about good conquering evil. These stories are like cautionary fables, suggesting that society is just, and that determined protagonists will weed out any bad apples among the largely industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who lifted themselves through sheer effort.
A Sharper Tone in 2025
But while 2025's movies do not break new ground in that respect, they do follow some recent trends among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting angrier, more incisive, more direct, and observably more violent. It is seldom sufficient in the current era to see rich people gain some humility in empathy, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they oppressed, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, selfish, cruel rich individuals were killed by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down point blank on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the driven away in cuffs ending, possibly since it’s become so apparent that rich people live by different standards, and are very likely to purchase their freedom."
The "behind bars" ending isn’t cathartic anymore. Conversely, these villains are apt to meet their end at the end of their movies, often in especially horrific, fitting ways.
Notable Exceptions
A few stories differ, of course. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is merely disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself banished to the virtual grid, teasing that he is being saved for future installments. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* loses all his money and is redeemed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are unmasked as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
