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A recurring theme courses through many of 2025's genre movies. It's an idea that goes back in time to the era of Charlie Chaplin. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the antagonist is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire wielding his immense fortune to tarnish Earth's superhero icon while orchestrating world events to enrich himself. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the villain is a rich pharma-bro investing tens of millions to throw the heroes into a dinosaur-packed death trap for his own profit. In *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of ultra-rich lynxes who appropriated a well-meaning mother's altruistic invention and pinned the blame on her for murder, purely for their own profit.

A Legacy of On-Screen Elite Villainy

In the remake of *The Running Man*, the antagonist plays a rich antagonist running a TV network that earns a fortune by exploiting and murdering people enduring abject destitution, while employing AI forgeries and a sophisticated media apparatus to label them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about economic inequality quite that directly, but its evil characters enjoy clear extravagance while exploiting and abusing Oz's poorest citizens, pushing them from their homes and into bondage. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing movie, contrasts the tough people of a impoverished farm town against arrogant elites who inhabit lavish gleaming towers above the clouds. Interestingly, the agreeably goofy humorous remake *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's plot to trigger global armageddon — to make money, naturally.

It is not especially new in a series of movies taking it as a given that the wealthy have excessive influence, lack ethics or compassion, and a endless, demanding desire for greater riches. "Rich people are villains and everyday folks are heroes" as a theme stretches back to the early days of film, with early comedies pitting his chronically destitute Little Tramp character against corporate bosses, industrialists, and inept, drunken millionaires. 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 entrepreneurial bad guy, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that affluence is contrary to basic human values, and celebrate the neutralizing, defeat, and sometimes demise of the rich and powerful.

The Release That Changes Nothing

Nevertheless, for some reason, we never actually taking down the wealthy. Every time lawmakers react to a tragic gun violence event by pointing fingers at violent video games, I sigh with frustration, because if people actually were that easily influenced — if frequent consumption to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the public consciousness — surely American society would not continue to revere billionaires. Still the headlines makes it obvious every single day that a alarming number of Americans subconsciously link affluence to smartness and value to society, even after a century of the world's most beloved movies conveying the reverse.

If anything, it appears that the constant stream of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has provided us with a safety outlet that gets in the way of meaningful change. Offered a frequent serving of mostly uplifting tales where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can walk away content about right prevailing. These movies are like ethical parables, pretending that the system works, and that plucky heroes will weed out any corrupt individuals among the largely hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who pulled themselves up on their own merit.

A Sharper Edge in 2025

Although 2025's movies do not break new ground in that respect, they certainly adhere to some recent trends among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more furious, sharper, more direct, and observably more fatal. It is no longer satisfactory 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 oppressed, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful affluent villains were eliminated by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face point blank on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an rising rival (*Him*).

"Hardly any of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the packed into a police car finale, perhaps because it’s become so clear that affluent individuals operate under different standards, and are all too likely to purchase their freedom."

The "off to face justice" outcome fails to deliver anymore. Rather, these villains are likely to perish at the end of their movies, often in especially brutal, poetic ways.

Key Exclusions

A few stories differ, certainly. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is simply disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself confined to the digital realm, 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