An age-old idea runs through numerous 2025's popular films. This concept which extends all the way back to the era of Charlie Chaplin. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the villain is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire using his vast wealth to defame Earth's greatest hero while controlling world events for personal gain. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the antagonist is a privileged biotech mogul investing a fortune to throw the heroes into a prehistoric danger zone to boost his wealth. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a dynasty of ultra-rich lynxes who appropriated a altruistic inventor's beneficial creation and framed her for murder, all for their dynasty's gain.
A Tradition of On-Screen Elite Villainy
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, the antagonist plays a affluent bad guy operating a TV network that earns a fortune by taking advantage of and killing people suffering through extreme hardship, while employing digital impersonations and a well-honed propaganda machine to portray them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* doesn't highlight wealth disparity in such a blunt manner, but its villains reside in clear extravagance while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's most vulnerable population, pushing them into unemployment and into bondage. The box-office champion *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one film, pits the resourceful inhabitants of a impoverished farm town against arrogant elites who inhabit opulent gleaming towers in the sky. Interestingly, the zany humorous remake *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's scheme to cause worldwide catastrophe — to make money, needless to say.
There’s nothing particularly surprising in a run of movies taking it as a given that the affluent have too much power, no morals or empathy, and a bottomless, entitled desire for greater riches. "Rich people are villains and everyday folks are heroes" as a plot device goes back to the dawn of cinema, with Chaplin’s silent movies contrasting his always poor beloved underdog against corporate bosses, bosses, and bumbling wealthy fools. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" movies from that era to the 1980s dance movies that revised a similar story for the era of the rapacious, destructive entrepreneurial bad guy, the whole legacy of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that wealth is at odds with core morality, and applaud the defusing, routing, and sometimes destruction of powerful, wealthy people.
The Catharsis That Changes Nothing
And yet, inexplicably, we never actually eating the rich. Every time elected officials react to a new mass shooting event by faulting graphic media, I roll my eyes, because if people really were that easily influenced — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the public consciousness — certainly American society would not persistently worship billionaires. And yet the daily reports reveals regularly that a frightening percentage of Americans instinctively link affluence to smartness and value to society, even after decades of history's most popular movies promoting the opposite.
In fact, it appears that the endless parade of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has given us a safety outlet that hinders substantive reform. Given a frequent serving of mostly triumphant stories where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can leave the theater satisfied about justice being served. These stories are like ethical parables, implying that institutions function, and that resourceful individuals will weed out any bad apples among the largely hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who succeeded by their bootstraps.
A More Pointed Message in 2025
Even though 2025's movies aren’t new in that respect, they do follow some contemporary patterns among class warfare stories: They’re getting angrier, more incisive, more specific, and apparently more lethal. It is seldom sufficient these days to see rich people gain some humility in empathy, 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, selfish, cruel affluent villains were killed by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten 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 murdered with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the packed into a police car ending, perhaps because it’s become so apparent that the wealthy function with their own legal rules, and are very likely to negotiate their release."
The "off to face justice" outcome no longer satisfies anymore. Conversely, these villains are likely to meet their end at the final act of their movies, often in notably horrific, fitting ways.
Notable Exceptions
Some films diverge, undoubtedly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is merely disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself confined to the digital realm, a setup that obviously being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* is stripped of all his money and is transformed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as culprits, but they don’t meet|avoid
