An age-old theme courses through a host of 2025's genre movies. This notion that stretches far back to the days of the Little Tramp. In the new *Superman* film, the evil force is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire wielding his enormous resources to smear Earth's greatest hero while controlling world events for his own profit. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the antagonist is a rich pharma-bro investing vast sums to throw the heroes into a monster-filled death trap for his own profit. In *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a family of ultra-rich lynxes who stole a well-meaning mother's life-changing idea and framed her for murder, solely for their dynasty's gain.
A Tradition of Cinematic Class Warfare
In *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate embodies a affluent bad guy running a TV network that earns a fortune by preying upon and eliminating people living in abject destitution, while leveraging AI forgeries and a powerful media apparatus to portray them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* is less direct about class division as overtly, but its villains enjoy obvious luxury while exploiting and abusing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, driving them from their homes and into bondage. The box-office champion *Ne Zha 2*, the year's top movie, contrasts the tough residents of a struggling farm town against condescending upper classes who inhabit opulent sky-high mansions above the clouds. Remarkably, the zany farcical update *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's plot to trigger worldwide catastrophe — for his own profit, needless to say.
It is not particularly surprising in a string of movies assuming as fact that the affluent have disproportionate control, no morals or empathy, and a bottomless, entitled hunger for greater riches. "The wealthy are antagonists and everyday folks are heroes" as a plot device goes back to the birth of movies, with Chaplin’s silent movies setting his perpetually impoverished Little Tramp character against corporate bosses, authority figures, and bumbling wealthy fools. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that refreshed a similar story for the era of the rapacious, destructive tech-bro villain, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that riches is at odds with core morality, and celebrate the defusing, downfall, and sometimes elimination of elite figures.
The Outlet That Changes Nothing
And yet, inexplicably, we never get around to eating the rich. On each occasion lawmakers respond to a new mass shooting event by faulting popular entertainment, I sigh with frustration, because if people truly were that susceptible — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the public consciousness — undoubtedly American society would not persistently idolize billionaires. But the news makes it obvious every single day that a frightening percentage of Americans instinctively equate riches with competence and importance, even after a century of the world's most beloved movies communicating the opposite.
In fact, it looks as though the constant stream of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has provided us with a pressure release that impedes meaningful change. Given a steady diet of largely uplifting tales where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can leave the theater feeling good about justice being served. These films are like cautionary fables, implying that society is just, and that determined protagonists will root out any corrupt individuals among the largely industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded by their bootstraps.
A More Pointed Edge in 2025
Even though 2025's movies do not break new ground in that regard, they indeed follow some contemporary patterns among class warfare stories: They’re getting more enraged, more incisive, more direct, and observably more lethal. It is seldom sufficient 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 oppressed, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious wealthy people were killed by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and executed directly on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a wine opener (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Almost none of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the driven away in cuffs finale, possibly since it’s become so apparent that the wealthy function with different standards, and are very likely to purchase their freedom."
The "behind bars" outcome isn’t cathartic anymore. Instead, these villains are prone to die at the final act of their movies, often in especially grotesque, ironic ways.
Notable Exclusions
A few stories differ, of course. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is merely disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself confined to the digital realm, a setup that obviously being saved for future installments. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* loses all his money and is transformed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are unmasked as culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
