An age-old idea permeates a host of 2025's popular films. It's an idea that stretches back in time to the era of Charlie Chaplin. In the new *Superman* film, the villain is a greedy, heartless billionaire wielding his enormous resources to defame Earth's greatest hero while controlling world events to enrich himself. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the bad guy is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir squandering a fortune to cast the heroes into a dinosaur-packed danger zone for personal amusement. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a dynasty of ultra-rich lynxes who appropriated a altruistic inventor's life-changing idea and set her up for murder, solely for their financial benefit.
A Lineage of Film Wealth Disparity
In the remake of *The Running Man*, the antagonist plays a affluent bad guy controlling a TV network that profits hugely by taking advantage of and killing people enduring desperate poverty, while employing AI forgeries and a well-honed propaganda machine to portray them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* doesn’t emphasize economic inequality quite that directly, but its antagonists reside in obvious luxury while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's poorest citizens, driving them into unemployment and into bondage. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one film, sets the tough residents of a hardscrabble farm town against condescending upper classes who dwell in opulent sky-high mansions in the sky. Interestingly, the zany farcical update *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's scheme to cause global armageddon — for financial gain, naturally.
There is little inherently notable in a series of movies taking it as a given that the affluent have disproportionate control, are devoid of conscience, and a endless, demanding desire for increased fortune. "Rich people are villains and plucky heroes are heroes" as a concept goes back to the early days of film, with Chaplin’s silent movies setting his chronically destitute iconic vagrant against tycoons, bosses, and inept, drunken millionaires. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" movies from that era to the 1980s dance movies that updated that very premise for the era of the rapacious, destructive tech-bro villain, the whole legacy of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that affluence is incompatible with basic human values, and applaud the defusing, routing, and sometimes demise of the rich and powerful.
The Catharsis That Changes Nothing
Nevertheless, inexplicably, we consistently fail to eating the rich. Whenever lawmakers react to a new mass shooting event by blaming popular entertainment, I feel exasperated, because if people truly were that impressionable — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the public consciousness — surely American society would not persistently revere billionaires. But the headlines makes it obvious every single day that a alarming number of Americans innately associate wealth with smartness and importance, even after one hundred years of cinema's biggest movies communicating a contradictory message.
If anything, it appears that the never-ending cycle of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has provided us with a pressure release that impedes real-world action. Offered a frequent serving of mostly uplifting stories where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can finish the film feeling good about justice being served. These stories are like ethical parables, implying that institutions function, and that plucky heroes will weed out any corrupt individuals among the largely industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded on their own merit.
A More Pointed Edge in 2025
Even though 2025's movies aren’t new in that regard, they indeed follow some contemporary patterns among class warfare stories: They’re getting angrier, sharper, more direct, and apparently more lethal. It is no longer satisfactory nowadays to see rich people be taught a lesson 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, avaricious, malicious affluent villains were slaughtered by mythological beasts (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and executed directly on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a wine opener (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the hauled off to jail conclusion, possibly since it’s become so apparent that the wealthy function with a separate justice system, and are all too likely to purchase their freedom."
The "off to face justice" ending no longer satisfies anymore. Rather, these villains are apt to die at the end of their movies, often in notably brutal, poetic ways.
Notable Exceptions
There are exceptions, certainly. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is simply disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself confined to the computer world, 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 exposed as culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
