An age-old idea runs through a host of 2025's genre movies. This notion that stretches far back to the era of Charlie Chaplin. In the new *Superman* film, the evil force is a envious, ruthless billionaire using his vast wealth to smear Earth's superhero icon while orchestrating world events to enrich himself. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the villain is a privileged biotech mogul squandering tens of millions to throw the heroes into a prehistoric death trap to boost his wealth. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of extremely affluent lynxes who appropriated a kindly mom’s beneficial creation and pinned the blame on her for murder, all for their financial benefit.
A Tradition of On-Screen Wealth Disparity
In the remake of *The Running Man*, the antagonist portrays a affluent bad guy operating a TV network that makes millions by exploiting and murdering people enduring abject destitution, while using AI forgeries and a powerful media apparatus to portray them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight class division as overtly, but its antagonists reside in conspicuous opulence while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's poorest citizens, forcing them into unemployment and into cages or slavery. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one movie, sets the scrappy inhabitants of a hardscrabble farm town against haughty aristocrats who inhabit extravagant gleaming towers above the clouds. Remarkably, the agreeably goofy farcical update of *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plot to bring about worldwide catastrophe — for his own profit, needless to say.
There’s nothing especially new in a string of movies presupposing that rich people have disproportionate control, are devoid of conscience, and a endless, demanding hunger for increased fortune. "Rich people are villains and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a concept stretches back to the birth of movies, with early comedies setting his perpetually impoverished iconic vagrant against tycoons, authority figures, and bumbling wealthy fools. Beginning 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 rapacious, destructive entrepreneurial bad guy, the whole legacy of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that affluence is at odds with core morality, and celebrate the overthrowing, downfall, and sometimes elimination of the rich and powerful.
The Outlet That Fails to Transform
Nevertheless, somehow, we never actually eating the rich. Every time elected officials react to a public shooting event by faulting graphic media, I feel exasperated, because if people actually were that susceptible — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the public consciousness — certainly American society wouldn’t still idolize billionaires. And yet the news demonstrates regularly that a frightening percentage of Americans instinctively equate riches with competence and importance, even after decades of the world's most beloved movies promoting the reverse.
In fact, it seems like the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has provided us with a pressure release that gets in the way of real-world action. Provided with a steady diet of mostly happily-ever-after stories where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can leave the theater content about right prevailing. These movies are like moral fairy tales, pretending that the system works, and that resourceful individuals will root out any corrupt individuals among the generally hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who lifted themselves through sheer effort.
A Sharper Edge in 2025
Even though 2025's movies do not break new ground in that respect, they do follow some modern developments among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting angrier, more incisive, more targeted, and apparently more lethal. It is no longer satisfactory in the current era to see rich people gain some humility in empathy, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they oppressed, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, selfish, cruel affluent villains were eliminated by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and executed directly on national television (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a wine opener (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an ambitious rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the packed into a police car ending, possibly since it’s become so clear that the wealthy operate under their own legal rules, and are highly probable to buy their way out."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" outcome no longer satisfies anymore. Instead, these villains are apt to perish at the conclusion of their movies, often in especially horrific, fitting ways.
Significant Exclusions
There are exceptions, undoubtedly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is only disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up exiled to the computer world, where he’s clearly being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* loses all his money and is redeemed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
