An age-old motif courses through a host of 2025's popular films. This notion that goes all the way back to the time of Charlie Chaplin. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the antagonist is a envious, ruthless billionaire exploiting his immense fortune to tarnish Earth's greatest hero while controlling world events to enrich himself. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the villain is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir investing a fortune to throw the heroes into a prehistoric death trap to boost his wealth. In *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a dynasty of super-wealthy lynxes who stole a kindly mom’s life-changing idea and framed her for murder, solely for their dynasty's gain.
A Legacy of Film Wealth Disparity
In *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate portrays a rich antagonist controlling a TV network that profits hugely by taking advantage of and killing people enduring desperate poverty, while using digital impersonations and a powerful media apparatus to portray them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight economic inequality quite that directly, but its antagonists enjoy obvious luxury while preying upon and oppressing Oz's most vulnerable population, pushing them out of jobs and into bondage. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing box-office hit, sets the scrappy people of a struggling farm town against condescending upper classes who inhabit extravagant sky-high mansions floating overhead. Interestingly, the agreeably goofy comedy reboot of *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's plan to trigger worldwide catastrophe — for financial gain, naturally.
There’s nothing especially new in a string of movies presupposing that the affluent have disproportionate control, lack ethics or compassion, and a bottomless, entitled hunger for greater riches. "Rich people are villains and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a concept stretches back to the birth of movies, with Chaplin’s silent movies pitting his perpetually impoverished iconic vagrant against corporate bosses, bosses, and inept, drunken millionaires. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that updated the exact same bit for the era of the rapacious, destructive Silicon Valley antagonist, the entire history of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that riches is at odds with fundamental decency, and celebrate the overthrowing, routing, and sometimes demise of powerful, wealthy people.
The Outlet That Changes Nothing
And yet, somehow, we never get around to taking down the wealthy. On each occasion politicians follow a public shooting event by blaming popular entertainment, I roll my eyes, because if people really were that susceptible — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the public consciousness — surely American society would not persistently idolize billionaires. And yet the daily reports demonstrates regularly that a significant portion of Americans instinctively associate wealth with smartness and importance, even after decades of cinema's biggest movies communicating the reverse.
In fact, it looks as though the endless parade of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has created a safety outlet that hinders meaningful change. Given a regular dose of mostly triumphant stories where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can leave the theater satisfied about good conquering evil. These movies are like ethical parables, suggesting that institutions function, and that plucky heroes will weed out any bad apples among the generally hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who succeeded on their own merit.
An Angrier Tone in 2025
But while 2025's movies aren’t new in that respect, they do follow some contemporary patterns among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more furious, more pointed, more direct, and observably more lethal. It is no longer satisfactory these days to see rich people gain some humility about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they oppressed, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, selfish, cruel affluent villains were slaughtered by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down point blank on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were murdered with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the hauled off to jail ending, possibly since it’s become so obvious that rich people operate under different standards, and are all too likely to purchase their freedom."
The "off to face justice" outcome isn’t cathartic anymore. Conversely, these villains are likely to die at the end of their movies, often in particularly grotesque, ironic ways.
Notable Outliers
A few stories differ, certainly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is simply humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself banished to the digital realm, where he’s clearly being saved for future installments. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* is stripped of 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
