An age-old theme runs through numerous 2025's popular films. This notion which extends back in time to the time of Charlie Chaplin. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the evil force is a envious, ruthless billionaire using his enormous resources to defame Earth's greatest hero while controlling world events for his own profit. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the bad guy is a privileged biotech mogul spending tens of millions to throw the heroes into a dinosaur-packed danger zone to boost his wealth. In *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of extremely affluent lynxes who pilfered a altruistic inventor's life-changing idea and framed her for murder, solely for their dynasty's gain.
A Lineage of Film Wealth Disparity
In the remake of *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate embodies a wealthy villain running a TV network that profits hugely by taking advantage of and killing people suffering through desperate poverty, while employing digital impersonations and a well-honed media apparatus to portray them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* doesn't highlight wealth disparity quite that directly, but its antagonists live in clear extravagance while preying upon and oppressing Oz's most vulnerable population, pushing them into unemployment and into bondage. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing film, pits the resourceful residents of a struggling farm town against arrogant elites who live in lavish sky-high mansions floating overhead. Remarkably, the agreeably goofy comedy reboot *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's plan to cause planetary doom — to make money, naturally.
There’s nothing particularly surprising in a series of movies taking it as a given that the affluent have too much power, are devoid of conscience, and a bottomless, entitled appetite for greater riches. "The wealthy are antagonists and everyday folks are heroes" as a concept dates back to the birth of movies, with Chaplin’s silent movies pitting his always poor iconic vagrant against tycoons, authority figures, 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 rapacious, destructive tech-bro villain, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that wealth is incompatible with core morality, and applaud the neutralizing, downfall, and sometimes elimination of elite figures.
The Release That Fails to Transform
And yet, inexplicably, we never get around to taking down the wealthy. On each occasion politicians respond to a new mass shooting event by blaming violent video games, I roll my eyes, because if people truly were that susceptible — if frequent consumption to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the public consciousness — certainly American society wouldn’t still idolize billionaires. Still the news reveals constantly that a frightening percentage of Americans instinctively link affluence to competence and value to society, even after a century of the world's most beloved movies communicating a contradictory message.
If anything, it looks as though the constant stream of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has provided us with a relief valve that hinders substantive reform. Provided with a steady diet of mostly uplifting tales where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can walk away satisfied about right prevailing. These films are like moral fairy tales, suggesting that institutions function, and that resourceful individuals will weed out any bad apples among the generally 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 regard, they do follow some contemporary patterns among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more furious, more incisive, more targeted, and observably more fatal. It is seldom sufficient in the current era to see rich people gain some humility in humility, 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 wealthy people were slaughtered by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten by a enormous hybrid beast (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and executed directly on national television (*The Running Man*). They were murdered with a wine opener (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the driven away in cuffs conclusion, likely due to it’s become so obvious that affluent individuals operate under their own legal rules, and are highly probable to negotiate their release."
The "off to face justice" outcome isn’t cathartic anymore. Conversely, these villains are prone to meet their end at the end of their movies, often in notably horrific, fitting ways.
Significant Exclusions
A few stories differ, certainly. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is simply humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up confined to the virtual grid, where he’s clearly 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 wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are unmasked as culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
