A familiar motif permeates numerous 2025's blockbuster hits. This notion which extends far back to the days of Charlie Chaplin. In the new *Superman* film, the evil force is a envious, ruthless billionaire using his immense fortune to tarnish Earth's mightiest protector while manipulating world events to enrich himself. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the antagonist is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir investing tens of millions to cast the heroes into a dinosaur-packed death trap for his own profit. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a dynasty of ultra-rich lynxes who pilfered a well-meaning mother's beneficial creation and set her up for murder, purely for their own profit.
A Lineage of Film Elite Villainy
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate embodies a rich antagonist running a TV network that makes millions by exploiting and murdering people suffering through extreme hardship, while using deepfakes and a sophisticated smear campaign to depict them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* is less direct about class division in such a blunt manner, but its antagonists reside in conspicuous opulence while preying upon and oppressing Oz's poorest citizens, driving them from their homes and into cages or slavery. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing film, pits the scrappy people of a impoverished farm town against arrogant elites who live in lavish gleaming towers floating overhead. Even, the lighthearted humorous remake *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's scheme to bring about planetary doom — to make money, needless to say.
There’s nothing particularly surprising in a series of movies assuming as fact that the wealthy have excessive influence, no morals or empathy, and a endless, demanding desire for more wealth. "Rich people are villains and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a theme dates back to the dawn of cinema, with early comedies contrasting his always poor Little Tramp character against fat cats, authority figures, and bumbling wealthy fools. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that revised a similar story for the era of the rapacious, destructive entrepreneurial bad guy, the entire history of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that affluence is incompatible with fundamental decency, and celebrate the defusing, defeat, and sometimes elimination of the rich and powerful.
The Outlet That Fails to Transform
However, inexplicably, we never get around to taking down the wealthy. On each occasion politicians respond to a tragic gun violence event by pointing fingers at graphic media, I roll my eyes, because if people truly were that impressionable — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the public consciousness — undoubtedly American society would not persistently revere billionaires. But the daily reports reveals regularly that a significant portion of Americans instinctively equate riches with smartness and social worth, even after a century of cinema's biggest movies promoting the opposite.
If anything, it appears that the never-ending cycle of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has given us a relief valve that gets in the way of substantive reform. Provided with a frequent serving of mostly happily-ever-after fables where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can finish the film satisfied about right prevailing. These films are like moral fairy tales, implying that institutions function, and that plucky heroes will root out any malicious actors among the mostly industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded by their bootstraps.
A More Pointed Tone in 2025
But while 2025's movies do not break new ground in that regard, they certainly adhere to some modern developments among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more furious, more incisive, more direct, and apparently more lethal. It is no longer satisfactory nowadays to see rich people be taught a lesson in empathy, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or be stripped of wealth to the people they exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful wealthy people were slaughtered by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and executed point blank on national television (*The Running Man*). They were murdered with a wine opener (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an ambitious rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the hauled off to jail conclusion, likely due to it’s become so clear that rich people live by a separate justice system, and are very likely to purchase their freedom."
The "off to face justice" outcome no longer satisfies anymore. Rather, these villains are likely to die at the final act of their movies, often in particularly grotesque, ironic ways.
Significant Exceptions
Some films diverge, undoubtedly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself exiled to the virtual grid, a setup that obviously 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 unmasked as culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
