An age-old idea runs through numerous 2025's genre movies. It's an idea that stretches all the way back to the era of Charlie Chaplin. In the new *Superman* film, the villain is a greedy, heartless billionaire wielding his vast wealth to smear Earth's superhero icon while orchestrating world events to enrich himself. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the antagonist is a privileged biotech mogul squandering tens of millions to cast the heroes into a dinosaur-packed danger zone to boost his wealth. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a clan of extremely affluent lynxes who stole a kindly mom’s beneficial creation and pinned the blame on her for murder, solely for their own profit.
A Lineage of Film Wealth Disparity
In *The Running Man*, the antagonist plays a rich antagonist operating a TV network that earns a fortune by taking advantage of and killing people suffering through extreme hardship, while leveraging AI forgeries and a well-honed propaganda machine to label them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about wealth disparity quite that directly, but its villains enjoy obvious luxury while preying upon and oppressing Oz's most vulnerable population, driving them into unemployment and into cages or slavery. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's top film, contrasts the resourceful inhabitants of a impoverished farm town against haughty aristocrats who live in extravagant gold-and-jade palaces in the sky. Interestingly, the lighthearted humorous remake of *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's plot to cause worldwide catastrophe — for his own profit, of course.
There’s nothing inherently notable in a string of movies assuming as fact that rich people have too much power, lack ethics or compassion, and a endless, demanding hunger for increased fortune. "Elites are the bad guys and everyday folks are heroes" as a plot device goes back to the early days of film, with the Little Tramp's adventures pitting his perpetually impoverished Little Tramp character against tycoons, bosses, and bumbling wealthy fools. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that updated that very premise for the era of the rapacious, destructive Silicon Valley antagonist, the whole legacy of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that wealth is at odds with core morality, and exalt the overthrowing, routing, and sometimes destruction of the rich and powerful.
The Release That Alters Little
Nevertheless, inexplicably, we consistently fail to consuming the elite. Whenever lawmakers respond to a public shooting event by faulting violent video games, I roll my eyes, because if people really were that impressionable — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the societal mindset — certainly American society would not persistently idolize billionaires. Still the news makes it obvious constantly that a significant portion of Americans subconsciously link affluence to smartness and importance, even after a century of cinema's biggest movies promoting the reverse.
Actually, it looks as though the never-ending cycle of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has given us a pressure release that gets in the way of substantive reform. Provided with a frequent serving of mostly happily-ever-after stories where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can finish the film satisfied about good conquering evil. These stories are like cautionary fables, implying that the system works, and that determined protagonists will identify any corrupt individuals among the largely industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who lifted themselves on their own merit.
A Sharper Edge in 2025
Although 2025's movies aren’t new in that sense, they indeed follow some contemporary patterns among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more furious, sharper, more direct, and seemingly more fatal. It’s rarely enough in the current era to see rich people be taught a lesson in empathy, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they oppressed, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful affluent villains were slaughtered 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 murdered with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the packed into a police car finale, perhaps because it’s become so obvious that affluent individuals operate under a separate justice system, and are all too likely to buy their way out."
The "behind bars" resolution no longer satisfies anymore. Instead, these villains are likely to meet their end at the end of their movies, often in notably grotesque, ironic ways.
Notable Exceptions
A few stories differ, certainly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is simply humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up confined to the computer world, a setup that obviously being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is redeemed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
