A recurring motif runs through numerous 2025's blockbuster hits. This notion that goes all the way back to the days of Charlie Chaplin. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the villain is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire using his vast wealth to defame Earth's mightiest protector while orchestrating world events for his own profit. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the bad guy is a privileged biotech mogul squandering vast sums to throw the heroes into a monster-filled danger zone to boost his wealth. In *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a family of extremely affluent lynxes who stole a well-meaning mother's altruistic invention and set her up for murder, purely for their dynasty's gain.
A Legacy of Film Class Warfare
In the remake of *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin embodies a wealthy villain operating a TV network that profits hugely by exploiting and murdering people enduring desperate poverty, while using digital impersonations and a sophisticated smear campaign to depict them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about economic inequality as overtly, but its antagonists enjoy conspicuous opulence while preying upon and oppressing Oz's poorest citizens, forcing 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 tough inhabitants of a impoverished farm town against arrogant elites who inhabit lavish gold-and-jade palaces floating overhead. Interestingly, the zany farcical update *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's scheme to trigger worldwide catastrophe — for financial gain, of course.
There is little particularly surprising in a string of movies assuming as fact that rich people have disproportionate control, no morals or empathy, and a insatiable, privileged hunger for greater riches. "Elites are the bad guys and plucky heroes are heroes" as a concept stretches back to the birth of movies, with the Little Tramp's adventures setting his always poor Little Tramp character against tycoons, bosses, and clueless rich men. Starting with 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 Silicon Valley antagonist, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that wealth is contrary to basic human values, and celebrate the overthrowing, defeat, and sometimes demise of powerful, wealthy people.
The Catharsis That Alters Little
However, somehow, we never get around to taking down the wealthy. Whenever politicians follow a public shooting event by blaming graphic media, I roll my eyes, because if people actually were that impressionable — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the public consciousness — undoubtedly American society wouldn’t still revere billionaires. But the daily reports demonstrates regularly that a significant portion of Americans instinctively link affluence to smartness and value to society, even after one hundred years of history's most popular movies communicating the reverse.
If anything, it seems like the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has provided us with a safety outlet that hinders real-world action. Given a steady diet of largely triumphant stories where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can leave the theater satisfied about justice being served. These films are like ethical parables, suggesting that the system works, and that plucky heroes will identify any bad apples among the mostly industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who lifted themselves by their bootstraps.
A Sharper Tone in 2025
Even though 2025's movies aren’t new in that respect, they do follow some modern developments among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more furious, sharper, more direct, and apparently more violent. It is seldom sufficient these days to see rich people be taught a lesson in empathy, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, selfish, cruel affluent villains were eliminated by mythological beasts (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down point blank on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the hauled off to jail finale, perhaps because it’s become so apparent that the wealthy operate under a separate justice system, and are highly probable to buy their way out."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" resolution fails to deliver anymore. Rather, these villains are likely to die at the conclusion of their movies, often in notably horrific, fitting ways.
Notable Exceptions
A few stories differ, of course. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is simply humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up banished to the computer world, where he’s clearly being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* is stripped of all his money and is redeemed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as frauds and deceivers, but they don’t meet|avoid
