A recurring idea runs through numerous 2025's genre movies. This concept that goes back in time to the era of the Little Tramp. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the evil force is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire using his enormous resources to tarnish Earth's greatest hero while manipulating world events for his own profit. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the bad guy is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir investing vast sums to cast the heroes into a dinosaur-packed danger zone to boost his wealth. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of super-wealthy lynxes who pilfered a kindly mom’s altruistic invention and set her up for murder, purely for their own profit.
A Legacy of Film Wealth Disparity
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate embodies a affluent bad guy controlling a TV network that profits hugely by preying upon and eliminating people enduring abject destitution, while using deepfakes and a well-honed media apparatus to label them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about class division quite that directly, but its villains live in conspicuous opulence while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's poorest citizens, forcing them out of jobs and toward imprisonment or servitude. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's top film, pits the scrappy people of a struggling farm town against condescending upper classes who dwell in extravagant sky-high mansions in the sky. Even, the agreeably goofy humorous remake *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's scheme to cause worldwide catastrophe — for his own profit, needless to say.
There is little especially new in a run of movies assuming as fact that rich people have too much power, lack ethics or compassion, and a insatiable, privileged appetite for greater riches. "The wealthy are antagonists and plucky heroes are heroes" as a concept dates back to the birth of movies, with the Little Tramp's adventures pitting his chronically destitute Little Tramp character against tycoons, authority figures, and inept, drunken millionaires. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that updated that very premise for the era of the greedy, harmful Silicon Valley antagonist, the entire history of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that wealth is incompatible with basic human values, and applaud the neutralizing, defeat, and sometimes destruction of elite figures.
The Outlet That Fails to Transform
Nevertheless, inexplicably, we consistently fail to taking down the wealthy. Whenever elected officials respond to a public shooting event by pointing fingers at violent video games, I sigh with frustration, because if people really were that susceptible — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the societal mindset — undoubtedly American society wouldn’t still worship billionaires. Still the daily reports makes it obvious regularly that a frightening percentage of Americans innately equate riches with competence and value to society, even after a century of history's most popular movies promoting the opposite.
In fact, it looks as though the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has created a pressure release that hinders real-world action. Offered a steady diet of largely happily-ever-after tales where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can leave the theater feeling good about right prevailing. These movies are like ethical parables, suggesting that society is just, and that resourceful individuals will identify any corrupt individuals among the mostly industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who pulled themselves up by their bootstraps.
A Sharper Edge in 2025
But while 2025's movies aren’t new in that sense, they do follow some contemporary patterns among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more furious, more incisive, more specific, and observably more lethal. It is no longer satisfactory nowadays to see rich people be taught a lesson about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they oppressed, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious rich individuals were eliminated by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face point blank on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a wine opener (*Companion*) and beaten to death 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 operate under different standards, and are very likely to negotiate their release."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" ending fails to deliver anymore. Rather, these villains are prone to meet their end at the final act of their movies, often in particularly grotesque, ironic ways.
Significant Exceptions
A few stories differ, certainly. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself banished to the computer world, where he’s clearly being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is redeemed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are unmasked as culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
