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A recurring idea runs through a host of 2025's genre movies. It's an idea that stretches all the way back to the time of the Little Tramp. Within the DCU reboot *Superman*, the evil force is a jealous, sociopathic billionaire exploiting his enormous resources to smear Earth's superhero icon while manipulating world events for his own profit. Within the dinosaur sequel *Rebirth*, the villain is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir spending a fortune to cast the heroes into a prehistoric danger zone to boost his wealth. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the wrongdoers are a family of ultra-rich lynxes who pilfered a well-meaning mother's altruistic invention and pinned the blame on her for murder, all for their own profit.

A Tradition of Film Class Warfare

In the remake of *The Running Man*, the antagonist plays a affluent bad guy running a TV network that makes millions by exploiting and murdering people enduring desperate poverty, while employing deepfakes and a well-honed propaganda machine to depict them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about wealth disparity quite that directly, but its villains reside in conspicuous opulence while exploiting and abusing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, driving them from their homes and toward imprisonment or servitude. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one movie, contrasts the resourceful inhabitants of a impoverished farm town against arrogant elites who inhabit opulent sky-high mansions in the sky. Remarkably, the lighthearted farcical update *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's plan to trigger planetary doom — for financial gain, needless to say.

There is little especially new in a series of movies presupposing that the wealthy have too much power, no morals or empathy, and a insatiable, privileged desire for more wealth. "Elites are the bad guys and plucky heroes are heroes" as a theme dates back to the birth of movies, with Chaplin’s silent movies setting his chronically destitute Little Tramp character against tycoons, industrialists, and bumbling wealthy fools. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" classic musicals to the 1980s dance movies that revised the exact same bit for the era of the rapacious, destructive tech-bro villain, the entire history of cinema is packed with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that affluence is at odds with basic human values, and celebrate the overthrowing, defeat, and sometimes destruction of elite figures.

The Release That Changes Nothing

And yet, for some reason, we never actually consuming the elite. On each occasion politicians react to a tragic gun violence event by blaming violent video games, I roll my eyes, because if people truly were that easily influenced — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the collective psyche — surely American society would not persistently idolize billionaires. Still the headlines demonstrates every single day that a alarming number of Americans instinctively link affluence to intelligence and value to society, even after one hundred years of the world's most beloved movies conveying the reverse.

In fact, it seems like the never-ending cycle of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has created a safety outlet that impedes meaningful change. Offered a frequent serving of predominantly triumphant fables where the underdog wins, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can leave the theater content about right prevailing. These films are like cautionary fables, implying that the system works, and that determined protagonists will root out any corrupt individuals among the mostly industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who lifted themselves through sheer effort.

An Angrier Message in 2025

But while 2025's movies are not novel in that respect, they certainly adhere to some modern developments among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting angrier, sharper, more specific, and apparently more fatal. It is no longer satisfactory these days to see rich people gain some humility in empathy, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful affluent villains were slaughtered by mythological beasts (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a hostile planet (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face at close range on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a wine opener (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an ambitious rival (*Him*).

"Very few of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the driven away in cuffs finale, possibly since it’s become so apparent that rich people function with a separate justice system, and are very likely to negotiate their release."

The "behind bars" ending isn’t cathartic anymore. Rather, these villains are apt to meet their end at the end of their movies, often in especially brutal, poetic ways.

Significant Exclusions

A few stories differ, of course. The iconic villain in *Superman* is simply disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Sinful schemer Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up exiled to the computer world, a setup that obviously being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is redeemed as a person. The Lynxley family members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid