This Year's Biggest Movies Told Us to Eat the Rich Again. We Still Ignore the Message.
A recurring theme runs through a host of 2025's popular films. It's an idea that stretches back in time to the days of silent film comedy. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the antagonist is a envious, ruthless billionaire exploiting his enormous resources to smear Earth's superhero icon while manipulating world events for personal gain. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the villain is a rich pharma-bro spending tens of millions to throw the heroes into a monster-filled arena to boost his wealth. In *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a family of ultra-rich lynxes who appropriated a well-meaning mother's beneficial creation and framed her for murder, all for their financial benefit.
A Tradition of Film Elite Villainy
Within the dystopian thriller *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin plays a wealthy villain controlling a TV network that makes millions by exploiting and murdering people suffering through extreme hardship, while employing AI forgeries and a sophisticated media apparatus to label them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. The Oz-based film *Wicked* is less direct about wealth disparity in such a blunt manner, but its villains enjoy clear extravagance while taking advantage of and mistreating Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, pushing them out of jobs and into bondage. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one box-office hit, contrasts the scrappy people of a hardscrabble farm town against haughty aristocrats who live in extravagant gleaming towers above the clouds. Even, the zany farcical update *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plan to trigger global armageddon — to make money, naturally.
There is little particularly surprising in a run of movies presupposing that the affluent have disproportionate control, no morals or empathy, and a insatiable, privileged desire for greater riches. "Elites are the bad guys and everyday folks are heroes" as a concept goes back to the birth of movies, with Chaplin’s silent movies contrasting his always poor beloved underdog against tycoons, bosses, and bumbling wealthy fools. Starting with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that updated the exact same bit for the era of the rapacious, destructive entrepreneurial bad guy, the complete chronicle of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that affluence is contrary to fundamental decency, and exalt the defusing, downfall, and sometimes destruction of powerful, wealthy people.
The Catharsis That Fails to Transform
And yet, for some reason, we never get around to taking down the wealthy. Whenever elected officials respond to a public shooting event by pointing fingers at graphic media, I roll my eyes, because if people really were that susceptible — if regular exposure to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the collective psyche — certainly American society wouldn’t still revere billionaires. But the news reveals constantly that a significant portion of Americans instinctively equate riches with smartness and value to society, even after decades of the world's most beloved movies conveying a contradictory message.
If anything, it looks as though the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has created a relief valve that hinders substantive reform. Offered a steady diet of largely happily-ever-after stories where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are stripped of power and embarrassed, everyone can finish the film content about justice being served. These films are like ethical parables, suggesting that institutions function, and that plucky heroes will root out any corrupt individuals among the largely industrious, moral, worthy wealthy who succeeded through sheer effort.
An Angrier Message in 2025
But while 2025's movies aren’t new in that respect, they indeed follow some contemporary patterns among class warfare stories: They’re getting more furious, more pointed, more direct, and seemingly more violent. It’s rarely enough in the current era to see rich people be taught a lesson in humility, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or forfeit their fortune to the people they exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful rich individuals were killed by mythological beasts (*Death of a Unicorn*) and eaten by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were destroyed on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down directly on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were killed with a corkscrew (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an rising rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the packed into a police car finale, possibly since it’s become so clear that the wealthy function with a separate justice system, and are very likely to buy their way out."
The "arrested and awaiting trial" ending no longer satisfies anymore. Conversely, these villains are prone to meet their end at the end of their movies, often in particularly brutal, poetic ways.
Notable Exceptions
A few stories differ, undoubtedly. The iconic villain in *Superman* is only disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up confined to the virtual grid, teasing that he is being saved for a follow-up film. 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 unmasked as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
