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An age-old idea courses through many of 2025's blockbuster hits. This concept which extends far back to the era of Charlie Chaplin. In the new *Superman* film, the antagonist is a greedy, heartless billionaire using his enormous resources to smear Earth's superhero icon while manipulating world events for personal gain. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the bad guy is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir investing vast sums to cast the heroes into a dinosaur-packed arena for his own profit. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of super-wealthy lynxes who pilfered a well-meaning mother's beneficial creation and framed her for murder, all for their financial benefit.

A Lineage of Cinematic Class Warfare

In the remake of *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin portrays a rich antagonist controlling a TV network that makes millions by preying upon and eliminating people enduring abject destitution, while employing AI forgeries and a sophisticated media apparatus to label them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* doesn’t emphasize economic inequality quite that directly, but its villains enjoy obvious luxury while preying upon and oppressing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, forcing them from their homes and into bondage. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing movie, pits the resourceful people of a impoverished farm town against arrogant elites who inhabit extravagant sky-high mansions above the clouds. Remarkably, the agreeably goofy farcical update *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's scheme to trigger planetary doom — for financial gain, of course.

There is little especially new in a string of movies assuming as fact that the wealthy have excessive influence, no morals or empathy, and a endless, demanding hunger for increased fortune. "The wealthy are antagonists and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a plot device goes back to the birth of movies, with early comedies contrasting his always poor Little Tramp character against corporate bosses, industrialists, and inept, drunken millionaires. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that updated a similar story for the era of the exploitative, damaging tech-bro villain, the complete chronicle of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which presume that affluence is contrary to basic human values, and applaud the defusing, routing, and sometimes destruction of elite figures.

The Outlet That Fails to Transform

Nevertheless, inexplicably, we never actually taking down the wealthy. Whenever lawmakers react to a new mass shooting event by pointing fingers at popular entertainment, I sigh with frustration, because if people truly were that easily influenced — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the public consciousness — undoubtedly American society would not continue to worship billionaires. Still the headlines makes it obvious constantly that a significant portion of Americans innately link affluence to smartness and value to society, even after one hundred years of cinema's biggest movies conveying a contradictory message.

If anything, it looks as though the constant stream of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has provided us with a pressure release that hinders real-world action. Offered a frequent serving of largely happily-ever-after fables where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can finish the film content about good conquering evil. These films are like moral fairy tales, pretending that institutions function, and that plucky heroes will root out any malicious actors among the largely industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded through sheer effort.

A Sharper Message in 2025

But while 2025's movies aren’t new in that respect, they do follow some recent trends among eat-the-rich stories: They’re getting more enraged, more incisive, more specific, and observably more fatal. It’s rarely enough these days to see rich people learn a useful lesson about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful wealthy people were killed by mythological beasts (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and executed at close range on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an rising rival (*Him*).

"Almost none of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the packed into a police car ending, possibly since it’s become so apparent that affluent individuals operate under a separate justice system, and are all too likely to negotiate their release."

The "off to face justice" ending fails to deliver anymore. Conversely, these villains are apt to die at the conclusion of their movies, often in especially horrific, fitting ways.

Notable Exceptions

There are exceptions, certainly. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is merely humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself confined to the virtual grid, where he’s clearly being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* loses 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