A recurring idea permeates a host of 2025's blockbuster hits. This concept which extends all the way back to the era of silent film comedy. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the antagonist is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire exploiting his immense fortune to defame Earth's greatest hero while manipulating world events for personal gain. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the bad guy is a rich pharma-bro spending a fortune to throw the heroes into a monster-filled arena to boost his wealth. In *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a clan of ultra-rich lynxes who appropriated a altruistic inventor's beneficial creation and set her up for murder, solely for their dynasty's gain.
A Tradition of Cinematic Class Warfare
In the remake of *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate portrays a rich antagonist operating a TV network that profits hugely by exploiting and murdering people enduring abject destitution, while leveraging digital impersonations and a well-honed propaganda machine to depict them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about economic inequality as overtly, but its evil characters reside in obvious luxury 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 top box-office hit, sets the tough people of a hardscrabble farm town against condescending upper classes who inhabit extravagant sky-high mansions above the clouds. Remarkably, the agreeably goofy humorous remake *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's scheme to cause planetary doom — for his own profit, of course.
There’s nothing inherently notable in a series of movies taking it as a given that rich people have disproportionate control, are devoid of conscience, and a insatiable, privileged hunger for more wealth. "Rich people are villains and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a theme stretches back to the early days of film, with Chaplin’s silent movies contrasting his always poor Little Tramp character against tycoons, industrialists, and inept, drunken millionaires. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that updated that very premise for the era of the rapacious, destructive tech-bro villain, the entire history of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that affluence is contrary to core morality, and applaud the overthrowing, downfall, and sometimes demise of the rich and powerful.
The Catharsis That Alters Little
Nevertheless, for some reason, we never actually consuming the elite. Every time politicians respond to a tragic gun violence event by pointing fingers at popular entertainment, I sigh with frustration, because if people really were that susceptible — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the societal mindset — certainly American society would not continue to worship billionaires. But the news demonstrates constantly that a alarming number of Americans instinctively equate riches with smartness and social worth, even after one hundred years of the world's most beloved movies promoting the opposite.
If anything, it appears that the never-ending cycle of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has provided us with a safety outlet that impedes real-world action. Offered a regular dose of largely happily-ever-after fables where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can finish the film content about right prevailing. These films are like ethical parables, pretending that the system works, and that resourceful individuals will weed out any corrupt individuals among the largely industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who lifted themselves by their bootstraps.
An Angrier Message in 2025
But while 2025's movies do not break new ground in that sense, they indeed follow some recent trends among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting angrier, more pointed, more specific, and observably more fatal. It is no longer satisfactory these days to see rich people learn a useful lesson in humility, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or be stripped of wealth to the people they oppressed, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, selfish, cruel affluent villains were slaughtered by mythological beasts (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down point blank on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the hauled off to jail finale, perhaps because it’s become so apparent that the wealthy function with a separate justice system, and are highly probable to buy their way out."
The "off to face justice" resolution isn’t cathartic anymore. Conversely, these villains are likely to perish at the end of their movies, often in particularly horrific, fitting ways.
Notable Exceptions
Some films diverge, certainly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is merely humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself banished to the computer world, where he’s clearly being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* loses all his money and is redeemed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
