A recurring motif permeates numerous 2025's popular films. This notion which extends back in time to the days of Charlie Chaplin. In the new *Superman* film, the villain is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire wielding his vast wealth to tarnish Earth's mightiest protector while controlling world events for his own profit. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the antagonist is a rich pharma-bro investing tens of millions to trap the heroes into a dinosaur-packed danger zone for his own profit. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a clan of ultra-rich lynxes who appropriated a well-meaning mother's life-changing idea and framed her for murder, purely for their dynasty's gain.
A Legacy of Film Elite Villainy
In *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin portrays a affluent bad guy operating a TV network that profits hugely by preying upon and eliminating people enduring extreme hardship, while using deepfakes and a well-honed media apparatus to portray them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. *Wicked: For Good* doesn’t emphasize class division as overtly, but its villains enjoy conspicuous opulence while preying upon and oppressing Oz's most vulnerable population, pushing them out of jobs and into bondage. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing box-office hit, sets the tough people of a impoverished farm town against haughty aristocrats who inhabit extravagant gleaming towers above the clouds. Interestingly, the agreeably goofy humorous remake *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's scheme to bring about worldwide catastrophe — for financial gain, needless to say.
There’s nothing especially new in a series of movies assuming as fact that the affluent have excessive influence, are devoid of conscience, and a bottomless, entitled appetite for greater riches. "The wealthy are antagonists and plucky heroes are heroes" as a theme stretches back to the early days of film, with Chaplin’s silent movies contrasting his chronically destitute Little Tramp character against corporate bosses, industrialists, 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 a similar story for the era of the greedy, harmful Silicon Valley antagonist, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that riches is at odds with basic human values, and celebrate the overthrowing, defeat, and sometimes elimination of the rich and powerful.
The Release That Fails to Transform
Nevertheless, somehow, we never get around to taking down the wealthy. On each occasion elected officials follow a new mass shooting event by pointing fingers at violent video games, I sigh with frustration, because if people really were that impressionable — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the public consciousness — undoubtedly American society wouldn’t still revere billionaires. Still the headlines demonstrates constantly that a frightening percentage of Americans innately equate riches with competence and importance, even after decades of history's most popular movies promoting the opposite.
Actually, it looks as though the endless parade of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has given us a pressure release that impedes real-world action. Offered a frequent serving of predominantly uplifting tales where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can leave the theater feeling good about justice being served. These movies are like cautionary fables, implying that institutions function, and that resourceful individuals will root out any malicious actors among the generally industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded on their own merit.
An Angrier Tone in 2025
Even though 2025's movies do not break new ground in that sense, they certainly adhere to some modern developments among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more enraged, more incisive, more specific, and observably more fatal. It is seldom sufficient nowadays to see rich people learn a useful lesson in empathy, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful wealthy people were eliminated by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down directly on national television (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a wine opener (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an ambitious rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the hauled off to jail finale, perhaps because it’s become so obvious that rich people live by their own legal rules, and are all too likely to negotiate their release."
The "behind bars" outcome fails to deliver anymore. Instead, these villains are prone to die at the end of their movies, often in notably horrific, fitting ways.
Key Exceptions
Some films diverge, undoubtedly. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is only disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up confined to the virtual grid, teasing that he is being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* is stripped of all his money and is transformed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
