🔗 Share this article

A familiar motif runs through many of 2025's blockbuster hits. This concept which extends far back to the days of Charlie Chaplin. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the villain is a greedy, heartless billionaire wielding his enormous resources to defame Earth's greatest hero while controlling world events for personal gain. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the antagonist is a rich pharma-bro spending tens of millions to cast the heroes into a prehistoric arena for personal amusement. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of ultra-rich lynxes who stole a well-meaning mother's life-changing idea and set her up for murder, all for their own profit.

A Legacy of Cinematic Elite Villainy

Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin portrays a rich antagonist operating a TV network that profits hugely by taking advantage of and killing people living in desperate poverty, while using deepfakes and a well-honed propaganda machine to label them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight class division in such a blunt manner, but its evil characters reside in clear extravagance while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's poorest citizens, driving them from their homes and toward imprisonment or servitude. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing movie, pits the tough residents of a impoverished farm town against condescending upper classes who inhabit opulent gleaming towers in the sky. Interestingly, the zany farcical update of *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's plan to trigger planetary doom — for financial gain, of course.

There’s nothing especially new in a string of movies taking it as a given that the wealthy have excessive influence, no morals or empathy, and a bottomless, entitled desire for increased fortune. "Rich people are villains and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a concept goes back to the birth of movies, with the Little Tramp's adventures pitting his always poor Little Tramp character against corporate bosses, bosses, and clueless rich men. From the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that refreshed that very premise for the era of the rapacious, destructive entrepreneurial bad guy, the entire history of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that wealth is contrary to basic human values, and applaud the defusing, routing, and sometimes destruction of powerful, wealthy people.

The Outlet That Fails to Transform

However, inexplicably, we never actually eating the rich. Every time elected officials follow a new mass shooting event by faulting violent video games, I roll my eyes, because if people really were that susceptible — if frequent consumption to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the public consciousness — undoubtedly American society would not persistently worship billionaires. Still the news reveals constantly that a significant portion of Americans innately equate riches with smartness and importance, even after a century of history's most popular movies communicating a contradictory message.

In fact, it looks as though the constant stream of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has given us a safety outlet that gets in the way of real-world action. Given a regular dose of predominantly happily-ever-after stories where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can leave the theater content about good conquering evil. These movies are like moral fairy tales, pretending that institutions function, and that plucky heroes will root out any bad apples among the generally industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded by their bootstraps.

A Sharper Edge in 2025

But while 2025's movies aren’t new in that sense, they indeed follow some recent trends among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more furious, sharper, more direct, and seemingly more fatal. It is seldom sufficient these days to see rich people learn a useful 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 killed by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down at close range on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an ambitious rival (*Him*).

"Almost none of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the hauled off to jail ending, possibly since it’s become so obvious that rich people function with a separate justice system, and are all too likely to purchase their freedom."

The "behind bars" ending no longer satisfies anymore. Instead, these villains are apt to meet their end at the end of their movies, often in especially horrific, fitting ways.

Notable Exceptions

A few stories differ, certainly. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up confined to the digital realm, where he’s clearly being saved for future installments. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is reformed as a person. The antagonist family members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be frauds and deceivers, but they don’t meet|avoid