A familiar idea permeates many of 2025's genre movies. This notion that stretches back in time to the time of the Little Tramp. In the new *Superman* film, the villain is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire wielding his immense fortune to defame Earth's superhero icon while manipulating world events for his own profit. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the villain is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir squandering tens of millions to trap the heroes into a dinosaur-packed arena for his own profit. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of super-wealthy lynxes who stole a kindly mom’s beneficial creation and pinned the blame on her for murder, all for their dynasty's gain.
A Legacy of Cinematic Elite Villainy
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin embodies a affluent bad guy running a TV network that profits hugely by preying upon and eliminating people enduring extreme hardship, while employing deepfakes and a powerful media apparatus to portray them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about economic inequality quite that directly, but its villains reside in conspicuous opulence while preying upon and oppressing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, forcing them into unemployment and into cages or slavery. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing movie, pits the tough people of a struggling farm town against arrogant elites who inhabit extravagant sky-high mansions above the clouds. Even, the zany comedy reboot of *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plan to cause global armageddon — for financial gain, naturally.
There’s nothing particularly surprising in a string of movies presupposing that rich people have too much power, are devoid of conscience, and a bottomless, entitled appetite for increased fortune. "Rich people are villains and plucky heroes are heroes" as a concept stretches back to the early days of film, with the Little Tramp's adventures contrasting his always poor iconic vagrant against tycoons, bosses, and clueless rich men. Beginning with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that updated that very premise for the era of the exploitative, damaging Silicon Valley antagonist, the whole legacy of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that affluence is at odds with core morality, and celebrate the overthrowing, downfall, and sometimes destruction of elite figures.
The Outlet That Changes Nothing
Nevertheless, inexplicably, we never get around to eating the rich. Every time lawmakers react to a new mass shooting event by faulting violent video games, I sigh with frustration, because if people truly were that easily influenced — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the societal mindset — undoubtedly American society wouldn’t still worship billionaires. But the daily reports demonstrates every single day that a frightening percentage of Americans subconsciously associate wealth with intelligence and social worth, even after decades of the world's most beloved movies conveying the opposite.
Actually, it seems like the endless parade of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has provided us with a safety outlet that impedes meaningful change. Provided with a frequent serving of largely triumphant stories where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can finish the film content about good conquering evil. These stories are like cautionary fables, implying that institutions function, and that resourceful individuals will weed out any malicious actors among the largely industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who lifted themselves through sheer effort.
A Sharper Tone in 2025
Although 2025's movies do not break new ground in that sense, they certainly adhere to some contemporary patterns among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more enraged, more incisive, more targeted, and seemingly more violent. It is no longer satisfactory nowadays to see rich people be taught a lesson in empathy, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they oppressed, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious affluent villains were slaughtered by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down directly on national television (*The Running Man*). They were murdered with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the driven away in cuffs conclusion, likely due to it’s become so apparent that affluent individuals live by a separate justice system, and are all too likely to purchase their freedom."
The "off to face justice" outcome isn’t cathartic anymore. Conversely, these villains are likely to meet their end at the end of their movies, often in especially horrific, fitting ways.
Notable Outliers
A few stories differ, certainly. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is merely humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up banished to the computer world, a setup that obviously being saved for future installments. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* is stripped of all his money and is reformed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are unmasked as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
