An age-old theme courses through a host of 2025's genre movies. This notion that stretches all the way back to the days of the Little Tramp. In the new *Superman* film, the villain is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire wielding his enormous resources to tarnish Earth's mightiest protector while manipulating world events for personal gain. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the antagonist is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir squandering vast sums to trap the heroes into a monster-filled arena to boost his wealth. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of ultra-rich lynxes who appropriated a well-meaning mother's beneficial creation and set her up for murder, solely for their dynasty's gain.
A Lineage of On-Screen Class Warfare
In *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate plays a wealthy villain controlling a TV network that earns a fortune by taking advantage of and killing people suffering through extreme hardship, while leveraging digital impersonations and a sophisticated smear campaign to portray them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* doesn’t emphasize wealth disparity as overtly, but its antagonists live in obvious luxury while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's most vulnerable population, forcing them into unemployment and into cages or slavery. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one movie, sets the tough residents of a impoverished farm town against condescending upper classes who dwell in opulent gleaming towers in the sky. Even, the zany humorous remake of *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plot to bring about planetary doom — for his own profit, naturally.
It is not inherently notable in a string of movies presupposing that the wealthy have disproportionate control, lack ethics or compassion, and a bottomless, entitled desire for increased fortune. "Rich people are villains and everyday folks are heroes" as a concept goes back to the birth of movies, with Chaplin’s silent movies setting his perpetually impoverished Little Tramp character against fat cats, industrialists, and bumbling wealthy fools. Starting 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 greedy, harmful tech-bro villain, the entire history of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that affluence is at odds with core morality, and applaud the overthrowing, defeat, and sometimes destruction of powerful, wealthy people.
The Release That Fails to Transform
Nevertheless, inexplicably, we never get around to eating the rich. Whenever lawmakers follow a tragic gun violence event by blaming violent video games, 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 collective psyche — undoubtedly American society would not persistently idolize billionaires. Still the news reveals constantly that a alarming number of Americans subconsciously associate wealth with smartness and value to society, even after one hundred years of the world's most beloved movies communicating a contradictory message.
If anything, it seems like the constant stream of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has provided us with a relief valve that gets in the way of meaningful change. Offered a steady diet of mostly triumphant stories where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can walk away feeling good about justice being served. These stories are like cautionary fables, implying that the system works, and that plucky heroes will identify any corrupt individuals among the generally hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who pulled themselves up through sheer effort.
An Angrier Edge in 2025
Although 2025's movies are not novel in that regard, they indeed follow some modern developments among class warfare stories: They’re getting angrier, more incisive, more direct, and apparently more violent. It’s rarely enough nowadays to see rich people learn a useful lesson in humility, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or be stripped of wealth to the people they oppressed, 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 obliterated on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and executed point blank on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the hauled off to jail conclusion, likely due to it’s become so obvious that the wealthy operate under their own legal rules, and are very likely to purchase their freedom."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" outcome no longer satisfies anymore. Conversely, these villains are prone to perish at the final act of their movies, often in particularly brutal, poetic ways.
Key Exclusions
A few stories differ, of course. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is merely disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up banished to the virtual grid, where he’s clearly 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 antagonist family members in *Zootopia 2* are unmasked as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
