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A familiar idea runs through a host of 2025's blockbuster hits. This concept that goes far back to the days of the Little Tramp. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the antagonist is a greedy, heartless billionaire exploiting his immense fortune to smear Earth's greatest hero while controlling world events to enrich himself. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the bad guy is a rich pharma-bro spending tens of millions to throw the heroes into a dinosaur-packed danger zone for his own profit. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a family of super-wealthy lynxes who pilfered a kindly mom’s altruistic invention and pinned the blame on her for murder, all for their financial benefit.

A Legacy of Film Wealth Disparity

In the remake of *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin embodies a rich antagonist operating a TV network that makes millions by preying upon and eliminating people enduring extreme hardship, while using deepfakes and a sophisticated smear campaign to depict them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. *Wicked: For Good* doesn’t emphasize economic inequality in such a blunt manner, but its antagonists live in conspicuous opulence while preying upon and oppressing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, pushing them out of jobs and into bondage. The box-office champion *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one movie, contrasts the resourceful inhabitants of a struggling farm town against condescending upper classes who live in opulent sky-high mansions above the clouds. Remarkably, the zany humorous remake *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's scheme to bring about global armageddon — to make money, needless to say.

There is little particularly surprising in a series of movies assuming as fact that the wealthy have excessive influence, lack ethics or compassion, and a insatiable, privileged hunger for increased fortune. "The wealthy are antagonists and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a theme goes back to the early days of film, with Chaplin’s silent movies pitting his chronically destitute beloved underdog against fat cats, bosses, and inept, drunken millionaires. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that revised the exact same bit for the era of the exploitative, damaging entrepreneurial bad guy, the entire history of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that affluence is incompatible with fundamental decency, and exalt the defusing, defeat, and sometimes destruction of powerful, wealthy people.

The Outlet That Alters Little

However, for some reason, we consistently fail to consuming the elite. Every time lawmakers follow a new mass shooting event by faulting popular entertainment, I sigh with frustration, 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 idolize billionaires. Still the daily reports makes it obvious regularly that a frightening percentage of Americans subconsciously equate riches with intelligence and social worth, even after a century of history's most popular movies communicating a contradictory message.

If anything, it appears that the endless parade of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has provided us with a pressure release that gets in the way of real-world action. Given a steady diet of predominantly uplifting stories where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can finish the film satisfied about right prevailing. These films are like ethical parables, suggesting that institutions function, and that plucky heroes will weed out any bad apples among the generally hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who pulled themselves up on their own merit.

A Sharper Tone in 2025

But while 2025's movies are not novel in that respect, they do follow some modern developments among class warfare stories: They’re getting angrier, more pointed, more targeted, and apparently more lethal. It is seldom sufficient these days to see rich people be taught a lesson about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or be stripped of wealth to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful affluent villains were killed 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 gunned down directly on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).

"Almost none of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the packed into a police car finale, possibly since it’s become so obvious that the wealthy live by different standards, and are highly probable to buy their way out."

The "off to face justice" outcome isn’t cathartic anymore. Conversely, these villains are prone to die at the conclusion of their movies, often in notably brutal, poetic ways.

Notable Exclusions

There are exceptions, undoubtedly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is only disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself exiled to the virtual grid, teasing that he is 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 revealed to be culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid