A familiar theme courses through many of 2025's blockbuster hits. It's an idea which extends all the way back to the days of Charlie Chaplin. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the evil force is a greedy, heartless billionaire wielding his immense fortune to defame Earth's greatest hero while orchestrating world events for personal gain. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the antagonist is a rich pharma-bro investing vast sums to throw the heroes into a dinosaur-packed death trap for personal amusement. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a dynasty of super-wealthy lynxes who pilfered a altruistic inventor's altruistic invention and set her up for murder, purely for their financial benefit.
A Tradition of Film Class Warfare
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate portrays a affluent bad guy operating a TV network that earns a fortune by taking advantage of and killing people enduring desperate poverty, while using digital impersonations and a powerful media apparatus to portray them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about class division in such a blunt manner, but its evil characters reside in conspicuous opulence while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's poorest citizens, forcing them into unemployment and into bondage. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing film, pits the resourceful residents of a impoverished farm town against arrogant elites who inhabit extravagant sky-high mansions in the sky. Interestingly, the lighthearted comedy reboot *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's plan to bring about planetary doom — to make money, naturally.
There’s nothing especially new in a series of movies assuming as fact that rich people have too much power, lack ethics or compassion, and a insatiable, privileged desire for greater riches. "The wealthy are antagonists and everyday folks are heroes" as a theme goes back to the dawn of cinema, with early comedies setting his perpetually impoverished iconic vagrant against tycoons, industrialists, and inept, drunken millionaires. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" movies from that era to the 1980s dance movies that updated that very premise for the era of the rapacious, destructive tech-bro villain, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that riches is contrary to core morality, and exalt the overthrowing, defeat, and sometimes elimination of elite figures.
The Release That Changes Nothing
However, for some reason, we never actually eating the rich. On each occasion lawmakers respond to a tragic gun violence event by blaming graphic media, I sigh with frustration, because if people truly were that susceptible — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the collective psyche — surely American society would not continue to worship billionaires. And yet the headlines makes it obvious regularly that a significant portion of Americans subconsciously equate riches with smartness and importance, even after a century of history's most popular movies communicating the opposite.
If anything, it appears that the endless parade of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has provided us with a relief valve that hinders real-world action. Provided with a regular dose of largely happily-ever-after fables where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can leave the theater content about good conquering evil. These films are like ethical parables, implying that society is just, and that determined protagonists will root out any corrupt individuals among the generally industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded through sheer effort.
A Sharper Message in 2025
Although 2025's movies are not novel in that sense, they do follow some modern developments among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more furious, more pointed, more direct, and seemingly more violent. It is seldom sufficient nowadays to see rich people gain some humility in humility, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful affluent villains were killed by mythological beasts (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down at close range on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a wine opener (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an ambitious rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the packed into a police car conclusion, perhaps because it’s become so obvious that rich people operate under a separate justice system, and are highly probable to negotiate their release."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" outcome no longer satisfies anymore. Rather, these villains are prone to meet their end at the final act of their movies, often in particularly brutal, poetic ways.
Significant Outliers
A few stories differ, certainly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is only disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up banished to the computer world, teasing that he is being saved for possible sequels. 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 unmasked as frauds and deceivers, but they don’t meet|avoid
