An age-old motif permeates many of 2025's blockbuster hits. This concept that stretches all the way back to the time of Charlie Chaplin. In the new *Superman* film, the evil force is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire wielding his immense fortune to defame Earth's greatest hero while controlling world events to enrich himself. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the bad guy is a privileged biotech mogul investing vast sums to cast the heroes into a monster-filled danger zone for his own profit. In *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a clan of ultra-rich lynxes who appropriated a well-meaning mother's life-changing idea and set her up for murder, solely for their dynasty's gain.
A Tradition of Cinematic Elite Villainy
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate portrays a affluent bad guy running a TV network that profits hugely by exploiting and murdering people suffering through abject destitution, while leveraging AI forgeries and a sophisticated smear campaign to label them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight wealth disparity as overtly, but its antagonists enjoy conspicuous opulence while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's most vulnerable population, forcing them into unemployment and toward imprisonment or servitude. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing movie, sets the tough residents of a hardscrabble farm town against condescending upper classes who dwell in lavish sky-high mansions in the sky. Even, the lighthearted farcical update *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's scheme to trigger global armageddon — to make money, of course.
There is little particularly surprising in a series of movies taking it as a given that the affluent have too much power, are devoid of conscience, and a bottomless, entitled hunger for increased fortune. "Rich people are villains and everyday folks are heroes" as a theme dates back to the early days of film, with early comedies contrasting his chronically destitute Little Tramp character against tycoons, industrialists, and bumbling wealthy fools. Beginning with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" movies from that era to the 1980s dance movies that updated a similar story for the era of the rapacious, destructive entrepreneurial bad guy, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that riches is contrary to basic human values, and celebrate the neutralizing, routing, and sometimes demise of the rich and powerful.
The Outlet That Alters Little
And yet, somehow, we never actually consuming the elite. Every time elected officials respond to a new mass shooting event by pointing fingers at graphic media, I sigh with frustration, because if people actually were that easily influenced — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the societal mindset — certainly American society would not persistently revere billionaires. But the news demonstrates constantly that a frightening percentage of Americans subconsciously associate wealth with smartness and importance, even after one hundred years of the world's most beloved movies promoting a contradictory message.
Actually, it seems like the constant stream of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has given us a safety outlet that gets in the way of meaningful change. Provided with a steady diet of largely happily-ever-after tales where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can walk away satisfied about good conquering evil. These stories are like moral fairy tales, suggesting that society is just, and that resourceful individuals will identify any malicious actors among the largely hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who succeeded by their bootstraps.
An Angrier Edge in 2025
Although 2025's movies do not break new ground in that respect, they do follow some modern developments among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more furious, more pointed, more direct, and seemingly more fatal. It is seldom sufficient nowadays to see rich people gain some humility in empathy, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they oppressed, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful rich individuals were killed by mythological beasts (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down at close range on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the hauled off to jail conclusion, possibly since it’s become so apparent that rich people function with their own legal rules, and are very likely to buy their way out."
The "off to face justice" ending fails to deliver anymore. Rather, these villains are likely to perish at the end of their movies, often in especially grotesque, ironic ways.
Significant Outliers
There are exceptions, undoubtedly. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself confined to the virtual grid, a setup that obviously being saved for future installments. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is transformed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are unmasked as frauds and deceivers, but they don’t meet|avoid
