An age-old idea runs through numerous 2025's blockbuster hits. This concept that stretches far back to the time of the Little Tramp. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the antagonist is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire wielding his immense fortune to defame Earth's greatest hero while manipulating world events to enrich himself. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the villain is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir squandering vast sums to trap the heroes into a dinosaur-packed danger zone for his own profit. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a family of extremely affluent lynxes who stole a kindly mom’s altruistic invention and framed her for murder, purely for their own profit.
A Lineage of Film Class Warfare
In the remake of *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin embodies a rich antagonist controlling a TV network that makes millions by preying upon and eliminating people enduring abject destitution, while using digital impersonations and a powerful smear campaign to portray them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight wealth disparity quite that directly, but its villains enjoy conspicuous opulence 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 movie, pits the scrappy people of a struggling farm town against condescending upper classes who live in extravagant gleaming towers in the sky. Even, the zany humorous remake of *The Naked Gun* focuses on a billionaire's plot to trigger global armageddon — for his own profit, needless to say.
It is not inherently notable in a string of movies presupposing that the wealthy have too much power, no morals or empathy, and a endless, demanding hunger for more wealth. "The wealthy are antagonists and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a theme stretches back to the birth of movies, with the Little Tramp's adventures pitting his always poor Little Tramp character against fat cats, authority figures, and bumbling wealthy fools. From 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 greedy, harmful tech-bro villain, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that wealth is incompatible with fundamental decency, and celebrate the neutralizing, defeat, and sometimes destruction of elite figures.
The Catharsis That Changes Nothing
Nevertheless, somehow, we never actually consuming the elite. On each occasion lawmakers follow a public shooting event by blaming violent video games, I feel exasperated, because if people really were that susceptible — if frequent consumption to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the societal mindset — undoubtedly American society wouldn’t still revere billionaires. But the news makes it obvious constantly that a significant portion of Americans subconsciously equate riches with intelligence and value to society, even after a century of cinema's biggest movies conveying the reverse.
Actually, it appears that the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has provided us with a relief valve that hinders substantive reform. Given a steady diet of predominantly triumphant stories 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 moral fairy tales, implying that institutions function, and that resourceful individuals will weed out any malicious actors among the generally industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded by their bootstraps.
An Angrier Tone in 2025
Although 2025's movies aren’t new in that regard, they certainly adhere to some recent trends among class warfare stories: They’re getting more furious, more incisive, more specific, and seemingly more violent. It’s rarely enough these days 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 exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, selfish, cruel rich individuals were slaughtered by fantastical monsters (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and executed point blank on national television (*The Running Man*). They were murdered with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the packed into a police car conclusion, perhaps because it’s become so apparent that rich people operate under different standards, and are highly probable to negotiate their release."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" resolution fails to deliver anymore. Rather, these villains are apt to meet their end at the end of their movies, often in notably grotesque, ironic ways.
Notable Outliers
There are exceptions, undoubtedly. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up exiled to the virtual grid, where he’s clearly being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* loses all his money and is reformed as a person. The antagonist family members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as frauds and deceivers, but they don’t meet|avoid
