A recurring motif permeates numerous 2025's blockbuster hits. It's an idea that stretches back in time to the time of silent film comedy. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the evil force is a greedy, heartless billionaire wielding his immense fortune to smear Earth's greatest hero while orchestrating world events to enrich himself. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the villain is a rich pharma-bro squandering a fortune to trap the heroes into a dinosaur-packed death trap for his own profit. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a clan of super-wealthy lynxes who pilfered a altruistic inventor's altruistic invention and set her up for murder, all for their dynasty's gain.
A Tradition of Film Class Warfare
In the remake of *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate embodies a affluent bad guy controlling a TV network that profits hugely by taking advantage of and killing people enduring desperate poverty, while employing digital impersonations and a well-honed media apparatus to label them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight class division in such a blunt manner, but its evil characters enjoy conspicuous opulence while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's poorest citizens, pushing them into unemployment and toward imprisonment or servitude. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing movie, pits the resourceful residents of a impoverished farm town against arrogant elites who live in extravagant sky-high mansions above the clouds. Interestingly, the zany comedy reboot of *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's plot to bring about global armageddon — to make money, naturally.
It is not especially new in a series of movies presupposing that rich people have excessive influence, are devoid of conscience, and a insatiable, privileged desire for more wealth. "Rich people are villains and plucky heroes are heroes" as a plot device dates back to the early days of film, with Chaplin’s silent movies pitting his perpetually impoverished iconic vagrant against tycoons, industrialists, and clueless rich men. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that revised that very premise for the era of the greedy, harmful Silicon Valley antagonist, the whole legacy of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that wealth is incompatible with basic human values, and applaud the neutralizing, routing, and sometimes demise of the rich and powerful.
The Outlet That Fails to Transform
Nevertheless, for some reason, we never get around to eating the rich. On each occasion politicians react to a tragic gun violence event by blaming popular entertainment, I roll my eyes, because if people actually were that susceptible — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the collective psyche — certainly American society wouldn’t still revere billionaires. And yet the news reveals regularly that a frightening percentage of Americans subconsciously associate wealth with competence and value to society, even after one hundred years of history's most popular movies communicating the reverse.
If anything, it seems like the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has created a relief valve that hinders substantive reform. Given a steady diet of largely triumphant tales where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can walk away content about justice being served. These films are like cautionary fables, suggesting that institutions function, and that resourceful individuals will weed out any bad apples among the generally hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who succeeded by their bootstraps.
An Angrier Edge in 2025
Even though 2025's movies do not break new ground in that respect, they indeed follow some contemporary patterns among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting angrier, sharper, more specific, and observably more lethal. It is no longer satisfactory these days to see rich people gain some humility in empathy, 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 slaughtered by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and executed directly on national television (*The Running Man*). They were murdered with a wine opener (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Almost none of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the packed into a police car ending, perhaps because it’s become so apparent that affluent individuals operate under different standards, and are all too likely to negotiate their release."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" ending isn’t cathartic anymore. Instead, these villains are likely to meet their end at the conclusion of their movies, often in notably horrific, fitting ways.
Key Exceptions
Some films diverge, of course. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is merely humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself exiled to the computer world, where he’s clearly being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is transformed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
