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A familiar theme runs through many of 2025's popular films. This concept that goes all the way back to the time of silent film comedy. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the evil force is a greedy, heartless billionaire exploiting his immense fortune to defame Earth's mightiest protector while controlling world events for personal gain. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the antagonist is a privileged biotech mogul spending a fortune to trap the heroes into a monster-filled arena for personal amusement. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a clan of extremely affluent lynxes who appropriated a well-meaning mother's life-changing idea and framed her for murder, all for their dynasty's gain.

A Tradition of Film Class Warfare

In *The Running Man*, the antagonist plays a affluent bad guy running a TV network that earns a fortune by preying upon and eliminating people enduring extreme hardship, while employing digital impersonations and a powerful smear campaign to portray them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* doesn't highlight economic inequality quite that directly, but its antagonists enjoy clear extravagance while preying upon and oppressing Oz's most vulnerable population, forcing them out of jobs and into cages or slavery. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing box-office hit, contrasts the resourceful inhabitants of a struggling farm town against condescending upper classes who inhabit lavish gold-and-jade palaces floating overhead. Remarkably, the lighthearted farcical update *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's scheme to cause planetary doom — for financial gain, of course.

It is not particularly surprising in a series of movies assuming as fact that rich people have excessive influence, no morals or empathy, and a endless, demanding desire for more wealth. "Rich people are villains and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a plot device stretches back to the birth of movies, with Chaplin’s silent movies contrasting his perpetually impoverished beloved underdog against fat cats, bosses, and bumbling wealthy fools. Beginning 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 rapacious, destructive entrepreneurial bad guy, the entire history of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that riches is incompatible with basic human values, and exalt the neutralizing, defeat, and sometimes demise of the rich and powerful.

The Catharsis That Alters Little

However, somehow, we consistently fail to consuming the elite. On each occasion politicians react to a tragic gun violence event by blaming popular entertainment, I roll my eyes, because if people truly were that easily influenced — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the societal mindset — surely American society wouldn’t still idolize billionaires. But the daily reports demonstrates regularly that a alarming number of Americans innately equate riches with smartness and value to society, even after one hundred years of history's most popular movies communicating the opposite.

Actually, it looks as though the endless parade of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has created a pressure release that hinders real-world action. Provided with a frequent serving of largely triumphant fables where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can finish the film content about right prevailing. These films are like cautionary fables, implying that society is just, and that determined protagonists will weed out any malicious actors among the largely hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who succeeded by their bootstraps.

A More Pointed Edge in 2025

Even though 2025's movies are not novel in that sense, they do follow some contemporary patterns among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting more furious, more pointed, more targeted, and observably more violent. It is seldom sufficient nowadays 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 exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious rich individuals were eliminated by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face at close range on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).

"Almost none of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the driven away in cuffs ending, possibly since it’s become so obvious that rich people operate under a separate justice system, and are very likely to negotiate their release."

The "arrested and awaiting trial" resolution no longer satisfies anymore. Conversely, these villains are prone to perish at the final act of their movies, often in especially horrific, fitting ways.

Notable Exceptions

There are exceptions, undoubtedly. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is simply humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up exiled to the computer world, teasing that he is being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits 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