A recurring theme permeates a host of 2025's popular films. It's an idea that stretches back in time to the era of silent film comedy. In the new *Superman* film, the evil force is a greedy, heartless billionaire using his immense fortune to smear Earth's superhero icon while controlling world events for his own profit. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the antagonist is a rich pharma-bro investing a fortune to throw the heroes into a dinosaur-packed arena for personal amusement. In *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a clan of super-wealthy lynxes who appropriated a altruistic inventor's life-changing idea and framed her for murder, all for their dynasty's gain.
A Lineage of On-Screen Wealth Disparity
In *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin portrays a wealthy villain running a TV network that profits hugely by exploiting and murdering people living in extreme hardship, while using digital impersonations and a well-honed media apparatus to portray them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about class division in such a blunt manner, but its villains live in conspicuous opulence while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's most vulnerable population, driving them into unemployment and into bondage. The box-office champion *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one film, sets the resourceful people of a hardscrabble farm town against arrogant elites who inhabit extravagant gold-and-jade palaces above the clouds. Interestingly, the lighthearted farcical update of *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plot to cause global armageddon — for financial gain, naturally.
There is little especially new in a series of movies taking it as a given that rich people have disproportionate control, no morals or empathy, and a bottomless, entitled appetite for more wealth. "Rich people are villains and plucky heroes are heroes" as a theme dates back to the early days of film, with the Little Tramp's adventures setting his perpetually impoverished Little Tramp character against fat cats, bosses, and bumbling wealthy fools. 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 rapacious, destructive entrepreneurial bad guy, the entire history of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that riches is contrary to basic human values, and exalt the defusing, defeat, and sometimes destruction of powerful, wealthy people.
The Outlet That Changes Nothing
Nevertheless, inexplicably, we consistently fail to consuming the elite. Every time elected officials respond to a new mass shooting event by blaming graphic media, I sigh with frustration, because if people really were that easily influenced — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the public consciousness — undoubtedly American society would not continue to idolize billionaires. But the daily reports makes it obvious every single day that a alarming number of Americans instinctively link affluence to smartness and value to society, even after one hundred years of cinema's biggest movies promoting the reverse.
Actually, it appears that the constant stream of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has created a pressure release that hinders meaningful change. Provided with a frequent serving of mostly happily-ever-after fables where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can leave the theater satisfied about right prevailing. These films are like moral fairy tales, implying that the system works, and that resourceful individuals will weed out any malicious actors among the generally hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who lifted themselves through sheer effort.
A Sharper Message in 2025
Although 2025's movies are not novel in that sense, they indeed follow some modern developments among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more enraged, more incisive, more specific, and seemingly more lethal. It is seldom sufficient these days to see rich people learn a useful lesson about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or be stripped of wealth to the people they oppressed, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious wealthy people were eliminated by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face directly on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the packed into a police car finale, likely due to it’s become so obvious that affluent individuals operate under a separate justice system, and are very likely to buy their way out."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" resolution fails to deliver anymore. Conversely, these villains are likely to die at the end of their movies, often in notably grotesque, ironic ways.
Notable Exceptions
Some films diverge, certainly. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is simply humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up exiled to the digital realm, where he’s clearly being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* loses all his money and is reformed as a person. The antagonist family members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
