A recurring theme runs through many of 2025's popular films. This concept that goes far back to the days of the Little Tramp. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the evil force is a greedy, heartless billionaire using his vast wealth to smear Earth's superhero icon while orchestrating world events for his own profit. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the antagonist is a privileged biotech mogul investing a fortune to throw the heroes into a dinosaur-packed danger zone for his own profit. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a dynasty of super-wealthy lynxes who pilfered a kindly mom’s life-changing idea and pinned the blame on her for murder, solely for their dynasty's gain.
A Lineage of Film Wealth Disparity
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, the antagonist embodies a wealthy villain controlling a TV network that profits hugely by taking advantage of and killing people enduring desperate poverty, while using digital impersonations and a powerful propaganda machine to label them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. *Wicked: For Good* doesn’t emphasize economic inequality in such a blunt manner, but its evil characters enjoy obvious luxury while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's poorest citizens, driving them out of jobs and toward imprisonment or servitude. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one film, pits the resourceful inhabitants of a struggling farm town against haughty aristocrats who live in extravagant gleaming towers in the sky. Remarkably, the zany humorous remake *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plan to cause worldwide catastrophe — to make money, of course.
It is not particularly surprising in a run of movies assuming as fact that the affluent have excessive influence, are devoid of conscience, and a bottomless, entitled appetite for more wealth. "The wealthy are antagonists and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a plot device stretches back to the dawn of cinema, with early comedies setting his perpetually impoverished Little Tramp character against fat cats, authority figures, and bumbling wealthy fools. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" movies from that era to the 1980s dance movies that updated the exact same bit for the era of the greedy, harmful entrepreneurial bad guy, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that wealth is contrary to basic human values, and exalt the overthrowing, routing, and sometimes destruction of elite figures.
The Release That Fails to Transform
And yet, somehow, we never actually taking down the wealthy. Whenever politicians respond to a tragic gun violence event by blaming popular entertainment, I sigh with frustration, because if people truly were that easily influenced — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the collective psyche — undoubtedly American society would not continue to worship billionaires. And yet the headlines demonstrates every single day that a frightening percentage of Americans innately link affluence to smartness and social worth, even after decades of cinema's biggest movies communicating a contradictory message.
If anything, it seems like the endless parade of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has given us a safety outlet that impedes real-world action. Offered a steady diet of mostly triumphant stories where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can finish the film satisfied about good conquering evil. These movies are like cautionary fables, pretending that institutions function, and that determined protagonists will weed out any bad apples among the largely industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who lifted themselves through sheer effort.
A Sharper Message in 2025
But while 2025's movies aren’t new in that sense, they indeed follow some recent trends among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more furious, more incisive, more targeted, and seemingly more fatal. It’s rarely enough in the current era to see rich people learn a useful lesson about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, selfish, cruel wealthy people were slaughtered by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and executed point blank on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a wine opener (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the packed into a police car ending, likely due to it’s become so obvious that affluent individuals live by different standards, and are very likely to purchase their freedom."
The "off to face justice" resolution fails to deliver anymore. Instead, these villains are likely to die at the conclusion of their movies, often in especially horrific, fitting ways.
Notable Exceptions
There are exceptions, of course. The iconic villain in *Superman* is only disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up banished to the virtual grid, where he’s clearly being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* is stripped of all his money and is transformed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are unmasked as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
