A recurring motif courses through a host of 2025's genre movies. This notion which extends back in time to the time of silent film comedy. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the antagonist is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire using his vast wealth to tarnish Earth's mightiest protector while controlling world events for his own profit. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the antagonist is a rich pharma-bro spending tens of millions to trap the heroes into a prehistoric arena for personal amusement. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a family of ultra-rich lynxes who pilfered a kindly mom’s beneficial creation and pinned the blame on her for murder, solely for their financial benefit.
A Legacy of Film Class Warfare
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, the antagonist plays a affluent bad guy operating a TV network that earns a fortune by taking advantage of and killing people suffering through abject destitution, while leveraging deepfakes and a well-honed propaganda machine to label them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* is less direct about economic inequality quite that directly, but its villains reside in obvious luxury while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's most vulnerable population, forcing them from their homes and into bondage. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one film, pits the tough residents of a hardscrabble farm town against haughty aristocrats who live in opulent gold-and-jade palaces above the clouds. Even, the zany farcical update *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's plan to trigger worldwide catastrophe — to make money, naturally.
There’s nothing inherently notable in a run of movies taking it as a given that the wealthy have excessive influence, are devoid of conscience, and a insatiable, privileged appetite for greater riches. "Elites are the bad guys and everyday folks are heroes" as a plot device stretches back to the early days of film, with early comedies setting his perpetually impoverished iconic vagrant against fat cats, bosses, and inept, drunken millionaires. From 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 complete chronicle of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that riches is contrary to core morality, and applaud the overthrowing, routing, and sometimes elimination of elite figures.
The Catharsis That Fails to Transform
Nevertheless, for some reason, we never actually taking down the wealthy. Every time lawmakers react to a new mass shooting event by pointing fingers at popular entertainment, I feel exasperated, because if people truly were that susceptible — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the public consciousness — certainly American society wouldn’t still idolize billionaires. And yet the headlines makes it obvious every single day that a significant portion of Americans subconsciously associate wealth with competence and value to society, even after one hundred years of the world's most beloved movies communicating a contradictory message.
Actually, it appears that the never-ending cycle of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has created a relief valve that gets in the way of substantive reform. Given a steady diet of largely triumphant tales where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can walk away feeling good about justice being served. These films are like ethical parables, implying that the system works, and that plucky heroes will identify any malicious actors among the mostly industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded by their bootstraps.
A Sharper Message in 2025
Even though 2025's movies are not novel in that respect, they certainly adhere to some contemporary patterns among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more enraged, sharper, more specific, and seemingly more fatal. It’s rarely enough nowadays to see rich people gain some humility in empathy, 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 rich individuals were killed by mythological beasts (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down at close range on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a wine opener (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the driven away in cuffs conclusion, likely due to it’s become so clear that affluent individuals function with different standards, and are all too likely to negotiate their release."
The "off to face justice" ending no longer satisfies anymore. Conversely, these villains are apt to perish at the end of their movies, often in especially brutal, poetic ways.
Key Exclusions
Some films diverge, certainly. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up exiled to the digital realm, a setup that obviously being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is reformed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as frauds and deceivers, but they don’t meet|avoid
