An age-old theme permeates numerous 2025's genre movies. It's an idea which extends back in time to the time of the Little Tramp. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the villain is a greedy, heartless billionaire exploiting his enormous resources to defame Earth's greatest hero while orchestrating world events for personal gain. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the villain is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir investing vast sums to cast the heroes into a prehistoric arena to boost his wealth. In *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of ultra-rich lynxes who pilfered a kindly mom’s beneficial creation and framed her for murder, all for their dynasty's gain.
A Tradition of On-Screen Elite Villainy
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate embodies a wealthy villain operating a TV network that profits hugely by taking advantage of and killing people enduring desperate poverty, while using deepfakes and a powerful propaganda machine to label them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about economic inequality as overtly, but its antagonists enjoy obvious luxury while preying upon and oppressing Oz's poorest citizens, driving them from their homes and into bondage. The box-office champion *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing box-office hit, contrasts the scrappy residents of a struggling farm town against condescending upper classes who dwell in extravagant gleaming towers floating overhead. Remarkably, the agreeably goofy comedy reboot *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plot to bring about global armageddon — for financial gain, naturally.
It is not inherently notable in a series of movies presupposing that rich people have too much power, no morals or empathy, and a insatiable, privileged desire for more wealth. "The wealthy are antagonists and plucky heroes are heroes" as a concept goes back to the birth of movies, with Chaplin’s silent movies pitting his chronically destitute beloved underdog against tycoons, authority figures, and inept, drunken millionaires. From 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 exploitative, damaging Silicon Valley antagonist, the complete chronicle of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that wealth is at odds with basic human values, and exalt the overthrowing, defeat, and sometimes elimination of elite figures.
The Release That Alters Little
However, inexplicably, we never get around to eating the rich. On each occasion elected officials follow a public shooting event by pointing fingers at graphic media, I roll my eyes, because if people really were that impressionable — if frequent consumption to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the collective psyche — certainly American society would not persistently revere billionaires. But the news reveals constantly that a significant portion of Americans innately associate wealth with intelligence and importance, even after one hundred years of history's most popular movies promoting the opposite.
Actually, it looks as though the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has given us a pressure release that gets in the way of meaningful change. Offered a regular dose of largely triumphant fables where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can finish the film feeling good about right prevailing. These films are like moral fairy tales, implying that institutions function, and that plucky heroes will identify any corrupt individuals among the generally industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who pulled themselves up by their bootstraps.
An Angrier Message in 2025
Although 2025's movies do not break new ground in that regard, they indeed follow some modern developments among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more furious, more pointed, more specific, and observably more lethal. It is no longer satisfactory these days to see rich people be taught a lesson in humility, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious rich individuals were killed by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face directly on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the driven away in cuffs finale, perhaps because it’s become so clear that rich people function with their own legal rules, and are highly probable to negotiate their release."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" ending no longer satisfies anymore. Conversely, these villains are apt to perish at the final act of their movies, often in notably grotesque, ironic ways.
Key Exceptions
Some films diverge, certainly. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is merely disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself confined to the computer world, 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 reformed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are unmasked as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
