A recurring idea runs through many of 2025's popular films. This concept that goes back in time to the time of Charlie Chaplin. In the new *Superman* film, the villain is a envious, ruthless billionaire wielding his vast wealth to defame Earth's greatest hero while manipulating world events to enrich himself. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the antagonist is a rich pharma-bro investing a fortune to trap the heroes into a monster-filled danger zone for personal amusement. In *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a dynasty of ultra-rich lynxes who pilfered a altruistic inventor's life-changing idea and set her up for murder, all for their own profit.
A Lineage of Cinematic Elite Villainy
In the remake of *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin portrays a affluent bad guy running a TV network that profits hugely by preying upon and eliminating people enduring desperate poverty, while using AI forgeries and a sophisticated propaganda machine to depict them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* doesn’t emphasize wealth disparity in such a blunt manner, but its villains live in conspicuous opulence while preying upon and oppressing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, driving them into unemployment and into cages or slavery. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one movie, sets the resourceful people of a hardscrabble farm town against condescending upper classes who dwell in extravagant gleaming towers above the clouds. Interestingly, the zany farcical update *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's scheme to trigger global armageddon — for his own profit, naturally.
There’s nothing particularly surprising in a string of movies presupposing that the affluent have excessive influence, no morals or empathy, and a endless, demanding hunger for more wealth. "Elites are the bad guys and plucky heroes are heroes" as a concept stretches back to the dawn of cinema, with Chaplin’s silent movies pitting his always poor Little Tramp character against fat cats, bosses, and clueless rich men. 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 exploitative, damaging entrepreneurial bad guy, the entire history of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that riches is contrary to core morality, and exalt the overthrowing, routing, and sometimes destruction of powerful, wealthy people.
The Outlet That Fails to Transform
Nevertheless, inexplicably, we never actually taking down the wealthy. On each occasion politicians react to a tragic gun violence 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 collective psyche — undoubtedly American society would not continue to revere billionaires. But the headlines makes it obvious regularly that a frightening percentage of Americans subconsciously link affluence to competence and social worth, even after one hundred years of the world's most beloved movies communicating the opposite.
Actually, it looks as though the constant stream of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has created a safety outlet that gets in the way of substantive reform. Offered a frequent serving of mostly happily-ever-after fables where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can finish the film satisfied about good conquering evil. These films are like cautionary fables, pretending that the system works, and that plucky heroes will weed out any corrupt individuals among the generally hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who lifted themselves through sheer effort.
A Sharper Tone in 2025
Although 2025's movies are not novel in that respect, they certainly adhere to some modern developments among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting angrier, more incisive, more targeted, and observably more lethal. It is no longer satisfactory nowadays to see rich people gain some humility about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful wealthy people were eliminated by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down point blank on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were murdered with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an ambitious rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the driven away in cuffs conclusion, perhaps because it’s become so clear that the wealthy function with a separate justice system, and are all too likely to negotiate their release."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" outcome no longer satisfies anymore. Rather, these villains are apt to meet their end at the end of their movies, often in notably grotesque, ironic ways.
Significant Exclusions
Some films diverge, of course. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is simply humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up confined to the digital realm, teasing that he is being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* loses all his money and is transformed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
