The Year's Biggest Films Instructed Us to Consume the Wealthy Again. We Continue to Aren't Listening.

An age-old idea courses through many of 2025's popular films. This notion that goes back in time to the era of the Little Tramp. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the antagonist is a greedy, heartless billionaire wielding his vast wealth to defame Earth's superhero icon while orchestrating world events for his own profit. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the villain is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir squandering vast sums to cast the heroes into a prehistoric death trap for personal amusement. In *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of extremely affluent lynxes who appropriated a kindly mom’s life-changing idea and pinned the blame on her for murder, all for their financial benefit.

A Tradition of Cinematic Wealth Disparity

In *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin plays a wealthy villain running a TV network that earns a fortune by preying upon and eliminating people suffering through extreme hardship, while using digital impersonations and a well-honed media apparatus to depict them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. *Wicked: For Good* is less direct about wealth disparity in such a blunt manner, but its evil characters enjoy clear extravagance while preying upon and oppressing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, pushing them from their homes and into bondage. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing movie, pits the resourceful residents of a impoverished farm town against haughty aristocrats who dwell in extravagant gleaming towers in the sky. Interestingly, the agreeably goofy humorous remake *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plot to cause planetary doom — to make money, of course.

There is little inherently notable in a string of movies presupposing that the affluent have excessive influence, lack ethics or compassion, and a insatiable, privileged hunger for greater riches. "Rich people are villains and everyday folks are heroes" as a plot device stretches back to the birth of movies, with early comedies setting his chronically destitute beloved underdog against corporate bosses, industrialists, and inept, drunken millionaires. Beginning with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that updated that very premise for the era of the greedy, harmful tech-bro villain, the entire history of cinema is replete with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that wealth is incompatible with basic human values, and exalt the overthrowing, defeat, and sometimes demise of the rich and powerful.

The Catharsis That Alters Little

And yet, inexplicably, we never actually eating the rich. On each occasion politicians react to a public shooting event by blaming graphic media, I sigh with frustration, because if people actually were that impressionable — if frequent consumption to an idea via media was enough to allow it to permeate the collective psyche — surely American society wouldn’t still worship billionaires. Still the daily reports reveals every single day that a significant portion of Americans innately associate wealth with smartness and importance, even after one hundred years of the world's most beloved movies conveying a contradictory message.

Actually, it seems like the endless parade of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has created a pressure release that gets in the way of substantive reform. Offered a frequent serving of largely triumphant fables where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can walk away satisfied about justice being served. These stories are like ethical parables, implying that society is just, and that plucky heroes will identify any bad apples among the mostly hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who succeeded through sheer effort.

A More Pointed Edge in 2025

Although 2025's movies aren’t new in that respect, they certainly adhere to some recent trends among anti-wealth stories: They’re getting angrier, more incisive, more specific, and apparently more lethal. It is seldom sufficient in the current era to see rich people gain some humility in humility, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious affluent villains were eliminated by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face at close range on live TV (*The Running Man*). They were murdered with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and assaulted fatally by an rising rival (*Him*).

"Hardly any of 2025’s super-wealthy villains get the driven away in cuffs finale, possibly since it’s become so obvious that affluent individuals function with different standards, and are very likely to negotiate their release."

The "off to face justice" outcome no longer satisfies anymore. Rather, these villains are apt to meet their end at the final act of their movies, often in especially horrific, fitting ways.

Notable Exclusions

A few stories differ, undoubtedly. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is merely humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself exiled to the computer world, a setup that obviously 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 wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid