An age-old motif runs through numerous 2025's blockbuster hits. This concept which extends back in time to the era of the Little Tramp. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the antagonist is a greedy, heartless billionaire exploiting his immense fortune to defame Earth's superhero icon while manipulating world events to enrich himself. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the antagonist is a rich pharma-bro spending tens of millions to throw the heroes into a monster-filled arena for personal amusement. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a dynasty of super-wealthy lynxes who pilfered a kindly mom’s altruistic invention and set her up for murder, all for their own profit.
A Tradition of Film Wealth Disparity
In the remake of *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate embodies a wealthy villain operating a TV network that earns a fortune by exploiting and murdering people living in desperate poverty, while using AI forgeries and a sophisticated propaganda machine to portray them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* doesn't highlight wealth disparity quite that directly, but its antagonists live in obvious luxury while exploiting and abusing Oz's most vulnerable population, forcing them from their homes and toward imprisonment or servitude. The box-office champion *Ne Zha 2*, the year's top movie, contrasts the scrappy residents of a impoverished farm town against condescending upper classes who live in lavish gold-and-jade palaces floating overhead. Even, the lighthearted humorous remake *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's plot to trigger global armageddon — to make money, needless to say.
There’s nothing especially new in a string of movies taking it as a given that the wealthy have excessive influence, no morals or empathy, and a endless, demanding desire for increased fortune. "The wealthy are antagonists and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a theme stretches back to the early days of film, with Chaplin’s silent movies contrasting his perpetually impoverished Little Tramp character against corporate bosses, authority figures, and inept, drunken millionaires. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that revised the exact same bit for the era of the rapacious, destructive Silicon Valley antagonist, the whole legacy of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that riches is at odds with fundamental decency, and exalt the neutralizing, downfall, and sometimes elimination of elite figures.
The Catharsis That Alters Little
Nevertheless, somehow, we never actually consuming the elite. Whenever lawmakers respond to a tragic gun violence event by pointing fingers at graphic media, I roll my eyes, because if people really were that easily influenced — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the public consciousness — surely American society would not continue to revere billionaires. But the news demonstrates every single day that a frightening percentage of Americans subconsciously associate wealth with competence and social worth, even after one hundred years of history's most popular movies communicating a contradictory message.
Actually, it looks as though the never-ending cycle of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has created a safety outlet that gets in the way of substantive reform. Given a steady diet of mostly uplifting fables where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can finish the film feeling good about justice being served. These stories are like ethical parables, pretending that the system works, and that plucky heroes will identify any malicious actors among the mostly industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded by their bootstraps.
A More Pointed Edge in 2025
Although 2025's movies do not break new ground in that respect, they do follow some recent trends among class warfare stories: They’re getting more furious, more incisive, more direct, and observably more fatal. It is seldom sufficient 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 exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful affluent villains were killed by mythological beasts (*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 at close range on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were murdered with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the driven away in cuffs conclusion, possibly since it’s become so obvious that affluent individuals live by a separate justice system, and are highly probable to purchase their freedom."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" ending fails to deliver anymore. Rather, these villains are apt to die at the final act of their movies, often in notably horrific, fitting ways.
Significant Exceptions
Some films diverge, certainly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is only disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up exiled to the virtual grid, where he’s clearly being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is redeemed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
