A recurring motif permeates many of 2025's blockbuster hits. This notion that stretches back in time to the time of Charlie Chaplin. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the villain is a envious, ruthless billionaire wielding his vast wealth to defame Earth's greatest hero while manipulating world events for personal gain. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the antagonist is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir squandering vast sums to trap the heroes into a monster-filled death trap for his own profit. In *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a family of super-wealthy lynxes who appropriated a altruistic inventor's beneficial creation and pinned the blame on her for murder, purely for their own profit.
A Tradition of Film Elite Villainy
In *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin plays a affluent bad guy running a TV network that earns a fortune by preying upon and eliminating people enduring desperate poverty, while employing digital impersonations and a powerful media apparatus to label them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight class division quite that directly, but its evil characters enjoy obvious luxury while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, driving them from their homes and into cages or slavery. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one film, contrasts the scrappy residents of a hardscrabble farm town against condescending upper classes who dwell in extravagant gold-and-jade palaces in the sky. Interestingly, the agreeably goofy comedy reboot *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plot to trigger planetary doom — to make money, of course.
It is not particularly surprising in a series of movies assuming as fact that rich people have too much power, lack ethics or compassion, and a insatiable, privileged appetite for increased fortune. "Rich people are villains and everyday folks are heroes" as a theme goes back to the early days of film, with early comedies contrasting his always poor beloved underdog against tycoons, authority figures, and bumbling wealthy fools. Beginning with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" movies from that era to the 1980s dance movies that updated a similar story for the era of the rapacious, destructive Silicon Valley antagonist, the whole legacy of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that affluence is at odds with basic human values, and celebrate the neutralizing, routing, and sometimes elimination of powerful, wealthy people.
The Catharsis That Changes Nothing
However, somehow, we consistently fail to consuming the elite. Whenever lawmakers respond to a tragic gun violence event by pointing fingers at popular entertainment, I roll my eyes, because if people actually were that impressionable — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the public consciousness — surely American society would not persistently worship billionaires. Still the headlines makes it obvious constantly that a significant portion of Americans subconsciously equate riches with competence and value to society, even after a century of cinema's biggest movies conveying the opposite.
If anything, it seems like the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has created a relief valve that gets in the way of substantive reform. Provided with a regular dose of largely triumphant fables where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can leave the theater satisfied about justice being served. These stories are like ethical parables, implying that institutions function, and that plucky heroes will root out any corrupt individuals among the generally hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who pulled themselves up on their own merit.
An Angrier Edge in 2025
Even though 2025's movies aren’t new in that sense, they do follow some modern developments among class warfare stories: They’re getting angrier, more pointed, more direct, and observably more fatal. It’s rarely enough these days to see rich people be taught a lesson about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious rich individuals were killed by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down point blank on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Very few of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the packed into a police car finale, perhaps because it’s become so clear that rich people operate under a separate justice system, and are all too likely to negotiate their release."
The "off to face justice" ending no longer satisfies anymore. Conversely, these villains are apt to perish at the final act of their movies, often in notably grotesque, ironic ways.
Notable Exclusions
There are exceptions, undoubtedly. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up exiled to the virtual grid, where he’s clearly being saved for future installments. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is transformed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
