🔗 Share this article

A recurring idea permeates numerous 2025's blockbuster hits. This concept which extends all the way back to the time of silent film comedy. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the villain is a greedy, heartless billionaire using his vast wealth to smear Earth's greatest hero while controlling world events for personal gain. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the antagonist is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir squandering a fortune to throw the heroes into a dinosaur-packed death trap to boost his wealth. In *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a clan of super-wealthy lynxes who stole a well-meaning mother's beneficial creation and pinned the blame on her for murder, solely for their dynasty's gain.

A Legacy of Cinematic Elite Villainy

In *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate plays a wealthy villain running a TV network that profits hugely by preying upon and eliminating people living in desperate poverty, while employing AI forgeries and a sophisticated media apparatus to depict them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* is less direct about economic inequality quite that directly, but its evil characters live in clear extravagance while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's most vulnerable population, forcing them out of jobs and into bondage. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's top box-office hit, pits the resourceful residents of a hardscrabble farm town against arrogant elites who dwell in opulent sky-high mansions in the sky. Remarkably, the agreeably goofy comedy reboot *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's plot to bring about worldwide catastrophe — for his own profit, needless to say.

There is little inherently notable in a series of movies presupposing that rich people have disproportionate control, lack ethics or compassion, and a endless, demanding appetite for increased fortune. "Rich people are villains and plucky heroes are heroes" as a theme goes back to the early days of film, with the Little Tramp's adventures pitting his chronically destitute iconic vagrant against corporate bosses, industrialists, 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 refreshed a similar story for the era of the exploitative, damaging Silicon Valley antagonist, the complete chronicle of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that affluence is contrary to fundamental decency, and exalt the neutralizing, routing, and sometimes destruction of the rich and powerful.

The Outlet That Changes Nothing

And yet, inexplicably, we never actually eating the rich. On each occasion lawmakers react to a public shooting event by faulting graphic media, I roll my eyes, because if people actually were that susceptible — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the societal mindset — certainly American society would not persistently revere billionaires. But the headlines makes it obvious every single day that a significant portion of Americans innately link affluence to competence and social worth, even after one hundred years of cinema's biggest movies conveying the opposite.

If anything, it seems like the never-ending cycle of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has provided us with a safety outlet that gets in the way of real-world action. Provided with a steady diet of predominantly happily-ever-after stories where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are defanged and humiliated, everyone can walk away content about justice being served. These stories are like cautionary fables, pretending that the system works, and that plucky heroes will root out any malicious actors among the mostly industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded on their own merit.

A More Pointed Edge in 2025

Although 2025's movies aren’t new in that sense, they certainly adhere to some contemporary patterns among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more furious, sharper, more targeted, and apparently more lethal. It is no longer satisfactory in the current era to see rich people be taught a lesson in humility, 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, greedy, hateful affluent villains were killed by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and executed point blank on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an rising rival (*Him*).

"Very few of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the hauled off to jail finale, possibly since it’s become so obvious that affluent individuals live by a separate justice system, and are all too likely to purchase their freedom."

The "behind bars" outcome fails to deliver anymore. Conversely, these villains are apt to die at the conclusion of their movies, often in particularly horrific, fitting ways.

Key Exceptions

Some films diverge, undoubtedly. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is simply humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up exiled to the computer world, teasing that he is being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* is stripped of all his money and is reformed as a person. The antagonist family members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as frauds and deceivers, but they don’t meet|avoid