An age-old idea permeates numerous 2025's genre movies. This notion that goes far back to the era of the Little Tramp. In the new *Superman* film, the evil force is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire wielding his enormous resources to smear Earth's superhero icon while controlling world events for personal gain. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the villain is a privileged biotech mogul squandering tens of millions to trap the heroes into a prehistoric death trap to boost his wealth. In *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a dynasty of extremely affluent lynxes who stole a well-meaning mother's beneficial creation and framed her for murder, all for their dynasty's gain.
A Legacy of On-Screen Class Warfare
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin plays a rich antagonist operating a TV network that earns a fortune by taking advantage of and killing people enduring desperate poverty, while employing deepfakes and a well-honed smear campaign to depict them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. *Wicked: For Good* doesn’t emphasize class division quite that directly, but its villains enjoy clear extravagance while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's most vulnerable population, forcing them from their homes and into bondage. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's top box-office hit, contrasts the resourceful people of a hardscrabble farm town against condescending upper classes who inhabit lavish sky-high mansions in the sky. Even, the zany humorous remake *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's plot to bring about worldwide catastrophe — for his own profit, of course.
It is not especially new in a series of movies assuming as fact that the affluent have excessive influence, are devoid of conscience, and a endless, demanding hunger for more wealth. "Rich people are villains and everyday folks are heroes" as a plot device dates back to the early days of film, with early comedies pitting his always poor beloved underdog against tycoons, bosses, and inept, drunken millionaires. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that updated the exact same bit for the era of the rapacious, destructive entrepreneurial bad guy, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that affluence is contrary to core morality, and exalt the defusing, routing, and sometimes destruction of powerful, wealthy people.
The Release That Changes Nothing
Nevertheless, for some reason, we never actually consuming the elite. Every time politicians react to a tragic gun violence event by blaming violent video games, I sigh with frustration, because if people truly were that impressionable — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the societal mindset — undoubtedly American society would not persistently idolize billionaires. Still the news reveals constantly that a significant portion of Americans subconsciously associate wealth with intelligence and value to society, even after a century of history's most popular movies conveying the reverse.
In fact, it looks as though the never-ending cycle of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has provided us with a safety outlet that hinders meaningful change. Offered a regular dose of mostly uplifting tales where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can leave the theater feeling good about good conquering evil. These stories are like moral fairy tales, suggesting that institutions function, and that resourceful individuals will weed out any malicious actors among the largely industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who pulled themselves up through sheer effort.
A More Pointed Tone in 2025
Although 2025's movies aren’t new in that sense, they certainly adhere to some contemporary patterns among class warfare stories: They’re getting more furious, more incisive, more direct, and observably more fatal. It’s rarely enough in the current era to see rich people be taught a lesson about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or be stripped of wealth to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious wealthy people were slaughtered by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and executed point blank on national television (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an ambitious rival (*Him*).
"Almost none of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the packed into a police car finale, likely due to it’s become so obvious that the wealthy operate under different standards, and are very likely to purchase their freedom."
The "off to face justice" outcome isn’t cathartic anymore. Instead, these villains are prone to perish at the conclusion of their movies, often in notably grotesque, ironic ways.
Key Outliers
Some films diverge, undoubtedly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is simply humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up confined to the virtual grid, 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
