A familiar theme runs through a host of 2025's popular films. It's an idea that stretches all the way back to the era of Charlie Chaplin. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the villain is a greedy, heartless billionaire exploiting his vast wealth to defame Earth's superhero icon while controlling world events for his own profit. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the villain is a privileged biotech mogul squandering a fortune to trap the heroes into a dinosaur-packed danger zone for personal amusement. In *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a clan of ultra-rich lynxes who stole a altruistic inventor's life-changing idea and framed her for murder, purely for their dynasty's gain.
A Legacy of On-Screen Wealth Disparity
In *The Running Man*, the antagonist portrays a wealthy villain running a TV network that earns a fortune by taking advantage of and killing people suffering through desperate poverty, while employing deepfakes and a well-honed media apparatus to portray them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight wealth disparity in such a blunt manner, but its antagonists reside in obvious luxury while preying upon and oppressing Oz's poorest citizens, pushing them out of jobs and into bondage. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one box-office hit, pits the tough residents of a struggling farm town against condescending upper classes who live in extravagant sky-high mansions above the clouds. Even, the lighthearted humorous remake *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plan to bring about global armageddon — for financial gain, naturally.
There’s nothing particularly surprising in a series of movies taking it as a given that rich people have excessive influence, lack ethics or compassion, and a bottomless, entitled desire for increased fortune. "Elites are the bad guys and everyday folks are heroes" as a plot device dates back to the dawn of cinema, with early comedies setting his perpetually impoverished Little Tramp character against corporate bosses, authority figures, and clueless rich men. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that updated a similar story for the era of the exploitative, damaging entrepreneurial bad guy, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that riches is contrary to fundamental decency, and celebrate the defusing, routing, and sometimes destruction of the rich and powerful.
The Outlet That Fails to Transform
Nevertheless, inexplicably, we never actually taking down the wealthy. On each occasion elected officials follow a new mass shooting event by pointing fingers at violent video games, I sigh with frustration, because if people truly were that susceptible — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the collective psyche — undoubtedly American society would not persistently revere billionaires. But the daily reports reveals regularly that a frightening percentage of Americans instinctively associate wealth with intelligence and value to society, even after a century of the world's most beloved movies conveying the reverse.
Actually, it looks as though the endless parade of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has provided us with a safety outlet that gets in the way of real-world action. Provided with a regular dose of mostly happily-ever-after tales where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can leave the theater feeling good about justice being served. These films are like moral fairy tales, suggesting that the system works, and that plucky heroes will root out any corrupt individuals among the largely hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who pulled themselves up through sheer effort.
A Sharper Edge in 2025
But while 2025's movies aren’t new in that regard, they do follow some recent trends among class warfare stories: They’re getting more furious, more pointed, more specific, and apparently more fatal. It is seldom sufficient in the current era to see rich people gain some humility about modesty, 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, avaricious, malicious rich individuals were slaughtered by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down directly on national television (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an ambitious rival (*Him*).
"Almost none of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the packed into a police car conclusion, possibly since it’s become so apparent that affluent individuals operate under a separate justice system, and are highly probable to negotiate their release."
The "behind bars" ending no longer satisfies anymore. Conversely, these villains are apt to die at the conclusion of their movies, often in particularly grotesque, ironic ways.
Notable Exclusions
A few stories differ, of course. The iconic villain in *Superman* is simply humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up banished to the computer world, a setup that obviously 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 wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid