🔗 Share this article

A familiar motif runs through many of 2025's popular films. This notion that goes all the way back to the time of the Little Tramp. In the new *Superman* film, the evil force is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire exploiting his enormous resources to smear Earth's mightiest protector while manipulating world events for personal gain. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the antagonist is a rich pharma-bro squandering a fortune to throw the heroes into a prehistoric arena for personal amusement. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of ultra-rich lynxes who stole a kindly mom’s altruistic invention and set her up for murder, solely for their own profit.

A Lineage of Cinematic Wealth Disparity

Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, the antagonist plays a affluent bad guy controlling a TV network that makes millions by taking advantage of and killing people suffering through desperate poverty, while leveraging deepfakes and a powerful smear campaign to depict them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about economic inequality in such a blunt manner, but its evil characters reside in clear extravagance while exploiting and abusing Oz's most vulnerable population, driving them into unemployment and into cages or slavery. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one film, contrasts the tough residents of a struggling farm town against arrogant elites who dwell in opulent sky-high mansions above the clouds. Remarkably, the lighthearted humorous remake *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's scheme to bring about worldwide catastrophe — for financial gain, of course.

There’s nothing inherently notable in a series of movies presupposing that the affluent have disproportionate control, lack ethics or compassion, and a bottomless, entitled hunger for increased fortune. "The wealthy are antagonists and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a concept dates back to the dawn of cinema, with early comedies contrasting his always poor iconic vagrant against fat cats, bosses, and bumbling wealthy fools. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that updated that very premise for the era of the rapacious, destructive Silicon Valley antagonist, the entire history of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that riches is at odds with fundamental decency, and applaud the defusing, defeat, and sometimes elimination of powerful, wealthy people.

The Catharsis That Fails to Transform

Nevertheless, for some reason, we consistently fail to consuming the elite. Every time lawmakers follow a new mass shooting event by pointing fingers at violent video games, I feel exasperated, because if people truly were that easily influenced — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the public consciousness — certainly American society wouldn’t still revere billionaires. Still the news reveals every single day that a alarming number of Americans instinctively equate riches with smartness and value to society, even after a century of history's most popular movies promoting the reverse.

Actually, it seems like the endless parade of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has given us a safety outlet that impedes real-world action. Given a steady diet of predominantly uplifting tales where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can leave the theater feeling good about justice being served. These films are like cautionary fables, suggesting that the system works, and that resourceful individuals will root out any bad apples among the generally industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who pulled themselves up through sheer effort.

A Sharper Message in 2025

Although 2025's movies aren’t new in that regard, they certainly adhere to some recent trends among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more furious, more incisive, more direct, and apparently more fatal. It’s rarely enough these days to see rich people gain some humility in humility, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, selfish, cruel affluent villains were killed by mythological beasts (*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 shot in the face point blank on national television (*The Running Man*). They were murdered with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an ambitious rival (*Him*).

"Hardly any of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the packed into a police car ending, likely due to it’s become so clear that the wealthy operate under their own legal rules, and are all too likely to purchase their freedom."

The "behind bars" outcome isn’t cathartic anymore. Rather, these villains are apt to meet their end at the conclusion of their movies, often in especially horrific, fitting ways.

Notable Exclusions

There are exceptions, undoubtedly. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is simply humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself banished to the digital realm, a setup that obviously being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is reformed as a person. The antagonist family members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid