A recurring idea permeates a host of 2025's genre movies. This notion that stretches far back to the time of silent film comedy. In the new *Superman* film, the evil force is a envious, ruthless billionaire using his immense fortune to defame Earth's superhero icon while controlling world events to enrich himself. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the villain is a privileged biotech mogul investing vast sums to trap the heroes into a monster-filled death trap to boost his wealth. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a clan of super-wealthy lynxes who stole a altruistic inventor's life-changing idea 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 portrays a affluent bad guy running a TV network that profits hugely by preying upon and eliminating people suffering through extreme hardship, while employing digital impersonations and a sophisticated media apparatus to label them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about economic inequality quite that directly, but its villains live in conspicuous opulence while preying upon and oppressing Oz's most vulnerable population, forcing them from their homes and into cages or slavery. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing box-office hit, contrasts the scrappy inhabitants of a impoverished farm town against arrogant elites who dwell in extravagant sky-high mansions in the sky. Remarkably, the lighthearted comedy reboot of *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's plot to bring about worldwide catastrophe — for financial gain, needless to say.
It is not particularly surprising in a string of movies taking it as a given that the affluent have disproportionate control, lack ethics or compassion, and a insatiable, privileged appetite for greater riches. "Elites are the bad guys and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a plot device dates back to the dawn of cinema, with the Little Tramp's adventures contrasting his chronically destitute iconic vagrant against tycoons, bosses, and bumbling wealthy fools. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" movies from that era to the 1980s dance movies that revised a similar story for the era of the greedy, harmful entrepreneurial bad guy, the whole legacy of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that affluence is incompatible with basic human values, and celebrate the neutralizing, routing, and sometimes demise of elite figures.
The Outlet That Fails to Transform
And yet, somehow, we consistently fail to taking down the wealthy. Whenever lawmakers react to a public shooting event by blaming graphic media, I feel exasperated, because if people actually were that easily influenced — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the public consciousness — undoubtedly American society would not continue to revere billionaires. Still the daily reports demonstrates constantly that a significant portion of Americans innately equate riches with intelligence and value to society, even after one hundred years of cinema's biggest movies communicating the opposite.
In fact, it appears that the constant stream of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has created a pressure release that gets in the way of meaningful change. Provided with a regular dose of predominantly happily-ever-after stories where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can walk away feeling good about right prevailing. These stories are like cautionary fables, suggesting that society is just, and that resourceful individuals will weed out any corrupt individuals among the largely hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who succeeded through sheer effort.
An Angrier Message in 2025
Although 2025's movies do not break new ground in that regard, they indeed follow some recent trends among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more enraged, more incisive, more specific, and apparently more violent. It is seldom sufficient these days to see rich people learn a useful lesson about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious wealthy people were eliminated by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face directly on national television (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a wine opener (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the hauled off to jail ending, possibly since it’s become so obvious that affluent individuals live by different standards, and are highly probable to purchase their freedom."
The "behind bars" ending isn’t cathartic anymore. Instead, these villains are apt to perish at the final act of their movies, often in especially horrific, fitting ways.
Key Exclusions
A few stories differ, of course. The iconic villain in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up confined to the digital realm, teasing that he is being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is transformed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are unmasked as frauds and deceivers, but they don’t meet|avoid
