A recurring theme runs through many of 2025's blockbuster hits. This concept that goes far back to the time of the Little Tramp. In the new *Superman* film, the evil force is a envious, ruthless billionaire using his enormous resources to defame Earth's mightiest protector while controlling world events to enrich himself. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the bad guy is a privileged biotech mogul spending tens of millions to trap the heroes into a monster-filled death trap for personal amusement. In Disney's *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a clan of extremely affluent lynxes who appropriated a altruistic inventor's altruistic invention and framed her for murder, purely for their own profit.
A Lineage of Cinematic Class Warfare
In the remake of *The Running Man*, Josh Brolin plays a wealthy villain running a TV network that makes millions by taking advantage of and killing people living in abject destitution, while using digital impersonations and a powerful smear campaign to label them as selfish, shiftless, dangerous criminals. The musical *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight economic inequality quite that directly, but its villains live in clear extravagance while preying upon and oppressing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, driving them from their homes and into cages or slavery. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one movie, contrasts the scrappy inhabitants of a hardscrabble farm town against condescending upper classes who dwell in extravagant gold-and-jade palaces in the sky. Even, the agreeably goofy humorous remake *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plan to bring about planetary doom — for financial gain, needless to say.
There is little especially new in a series of movies taking it as a given that the wealthy have too much power, are devoid of conscience, and a insatiable, privileged hunger for more wealth. "Elites are the bad guys and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a plot device dates back to the dawn of cinema, with early comedies contrasting his perpetually impoverished beloved underdog against tycoons, authority figures, and inept, drunken millionaires. Starting with 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 exploitative, damaging entrepreneurial bad guy, the whole legacy of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that wealth is contrary to basic human values, and applaud the overthrowing, routing, and sometimes destruction of the rich and powerful.
The Catharsis That Alters Little
However, somehow, we never actually eating the rich. Whenever politicians react to a public shooting event by faulting popular entertainment, I sigh with frustration, because if people truly were that susceptible — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to cause it to infiltrate the public consciousness — surely American society would not continue to worship billionaires. Still the news reveals every single day that a significant portion of Americans instinctively equate riches with intelligence and social worth, even after one hundred years of history's most popular movies communicating a contradictory message.
Actually, it appears that the never-ending cycle of class-conscious storylines in American cinema has provided us with a safety outlet that impedes substantive reform. Given a frequent serving of mostly happily-ever-after fables where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can walk away satisfied about justice being served. These films are like cautionary fables, implying that society is just, and that determined protagonists will root out any corrupt individuals among the mostly hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who succeeded through sheer effort.
A More Pointed Message in 2025
Even though 2025's movies aren’t new in that regard, they certainly adhere to some modern developments among class warfare stories: They’re getting more enraged, sharper, more specific, and apparently more lethal. It is no longer satisfactory in the current era to see rich people be taught a lesson about modesty, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they subjugated, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, greedy, hateful rich individuals were eliminated by mythological beasts (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a giant mutant dinosaur (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face directly on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death 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 clear that the wealthy operate under a separate justice system, and are highly probable to negotiate their release."
The "off to face justice" outcome fails to deliver anymore. Conversely, these villains are likely to perish at the conclusion of their movies, often in especially horrific, fitting ways.
Key Exclusions
Some films diverge, of course. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is simply disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* ends up confined to the virtual grid, teasing that he is being saved for possible sequels. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* loses all his money and is reformed as a person. The antagonist family members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
