A familiar motif runs through a host of 2025's genre movies. It's an idea which extends all the way back to the time of the Little Tramp. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the evil force is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire exploiting his vast wealth to smear Earth's mightiest protector while controlling world events for personal gain. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the bad guy is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir spending tens of millions to throw the heroes into a dinosaur-packed arena for personal amusement. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a clan of extremely affluent lynxes who pilfered a altruistic inventor's altruistic invention and framed her for murder, all for their own profit.
A Lineage of Film Elite Villainy
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin embodies a wealthy villain running a TV network that earns a fortune by exploiting and murdering people suffering through abject destitution, while employing digital impersonations and a powerful propaganda machine to label them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about wealth disparity as overtly, but its villains reside in obvious luxury while preying upon and oppressing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, forcing them out of jobs and into bondage. The box-office champion *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing box-office hit, contrasts the tough people of a struggling farm town against haughty aristocrats who dwell in opulent gold-and-jade palaces in the sky. Even, the agreeably goofy comedy reboot of *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's scheme to bring about worldwide catastrophe — for his own profit, needless to say.
There’s nothing especially new in a run of movies presupposing that rich people have excessive influence, lack ethics or compassion, and a endless, demanding hunger for increased fortune. "The wealthy are antagonists and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a plot device stretches back to the birth of movies, with the Little Tramp's adventures pitting his chronically destitute iconic vagrant against corporate bosses, bosses, and inept, drunken millionaires. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" movies from that era to the 1980s dance movies that refreshed the exact same bit for the era of the exploitative, damaging tech-bro villain, the entire history of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that affluence is contrary to fundamental decency, and celebrate the overthrowing, defeat, and sometimes elimination of elite figures.
The Release That Fails to Transform
Nevertheless, somehow, we never actually eating the rich. On each occasion lawmakers respond to a tragic gun violence event by pointing fingers at popular entertainment, I feel exasperated, because if people really were that impressionable — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the public consciousness — surely American society wouldn’t still worship billionaires. And yet the daily reports reveals regularly that a alarming number of Americans instinctively link affluence to competence and social worth, even after a century of history's most popular movies conveying the reverse.
Actually, it appears that the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has given us a relief valve that hinders substantive reform. Given a frequent serving of predominantly happily-ever-after tales where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can finish the film content about justice being served. These films are like moral fairy tales, suggesting that the system works, and that resourceful individuals will root out any corrupt individuals among the generally hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who pulled themselves up on their own merit.
An Angrier Edge in 2025
Although 2025's movies aren’t new in that sense, they indeed follow some contemporary patterns among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more enraged, more pointed, more direct, and seemingly more lethal. It’s rarely enough nowadays to see rich people gain some humility in humility, 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, avaricious, malicious wealthy people were eliminated by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and executed point blank on national television (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a wine opener (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the packed into a police car conclusion, perhaps because it’s become so obvious that rich people operate under their own legal rules, and are highly probable to purchase their freedom."
The "off to face justice" resolution isn’t cathartic anymore. Conversely, these villains are likely to die at the end of their movies, often in notably grotesque, ironic ways.
Significant Outliers
There are exceptions, undoubtedly. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself confined to the digital realm, teasing that he is being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* is stripped of all his money and is transformed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as frauds and deceivers, but they don’t meet|avoid
