A recurring theme runs through many of 2025's popular films. This concept that stretches far back to the days of Charlie Chaplin. In the new *Superman* film, the villain is a greedy, heartless billionaire using his vast wealth to defame Earth's greatest hero while controlling world events for his own profit. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the villain is a rich pharma-bro spending vast sums to cast the heroes into a monster-filled arena for personal amusement. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a family of ultra-rich lynxes who appropriated a altruistic inventor's beneficial creation and pinned the blame on her for murder, all for their dynasty's gain.
A Legacy of Cinematic Wealth Disparity
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin embodies a rich antagonist operating a TV network that makes millions by preying upon and eliminating people enduring extreme hardship, while leveraging digital impersonations and a well-honed media apparatus to portray them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about wealth disparity in such a blunt manner, but its antagonists enjoy clear extravagance while exploiting and abusing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, driving them into unemployment and into cages or slavery. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's top box-office hit, sets the resourceful people of a impoverished farm town against condescending upper classes who live in lavish gleaming towers above the clouds. Even, the zany comedy reboot *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's scheme to bring about planetary doom — for financial gain, of course.
It is not particularly surprising in a series of movies taking it as a given that the wealthy have disproportionate control, are devoid of conscience, and a insatiable, privileged desire for more wealth. "Rich people are villains and everyday folks are heroes" as a theme dates back to the dawn of cinema, with the Little Tramp's adventures setting his always poor iconic vagrant against corporate bosses, industrialists, 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 refreshed a similar story for the era of the greedy, harmful tech-bro villain, the whole legacy of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that affluence is contrary to fundamental decency, and applaud the neutralizing, defeat, and sometimes destruction of elite figures.
The Outlet That Changes Nothing
And yet, inexplicably, we consistently fail to consuming the elite. On each occasion elected officials respond to a new mass shooting event by pointing fingers at graphic media, I roll my eyes, because if people actually were that susceptible — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the societal mindset — surely American society would not continue to idolize billionaires. Still the headlines demonstrates regularly that a significant portion of Americans innately associate wealth with competence and value to society, even after one hundred years of history's most popular movies conveying the reverse.
Actually, it seems like the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has provided us with a relief valve that gets in the way of real-world action. Offered a regular dose of mostly happily-ever-after tales where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can leave the theater feeling good about right prevailing. These stories are like cautionary fables, implying that society is just, and that plucky heroes will root out any bad apples among the mostly industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who lifted themselves on their own merit.
A Sharper Edge in 2025
Even though 2025's movies aren’t new in that sense, they indeed follow some contemporary patterns among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more furious, more incisive, more specific, and seemingly more violent. It’s rarely enough these days to see rich people learn a useful lesson about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or be stripped of wealth to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious rich individuals were killed by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down at close range on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an ambitious rival (*Him*).
"Almost none of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the hauled off to jail ending, possibly since it’s become so clear that the wealthy live by different standards, and are very likely to purchase their freedom."
The "behind bars" outcome fails to deliver anymore. Instead, these villains are likely to meet their end at the conclusion of their movies, often in particularly horrific, fitting ways.
Significant Outliers
Some films diverge, of course. The iconic villain in *Superman* is simply disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself exiled to the virtual grid, where he’s clearly being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is reformed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
