2025's Most Popular Films Told Us to Take Down the Elite Again. We Yet Aren't Listening.

A familiar theme runs through many of 2025's blockbuster hits. This concept that stretches back in time to the days of the Little Tramp. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the villain is a greedy, heartless billionaire exploiting his immense fortune to smear Earth's mightiest protector while orchestrating world events to enrich himself. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the villain is a wealthy pharmaceutical heir investing a fortune to cast the heroes into a prehistoric danger zone for his own profit. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the antagonists are a family of ultra-rich lynxes who appropriated a well-meaning mother's life-changing idea and framed her for murder, solely for their dynasty's gain.

A Legacy of Film Elite Villainy

In the remake of *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate plays a wealthy villain operating a TV network that profits hugely by exploiting and murdering people suffering through abject destitution, while using deepfakes and a well-honed propaganda machine to portray them as greedy, lazy, scary criminals. *Wicked: For Good* doesn’t emphasize economic inequality as overtly, but its antagonists enjoy clear extravagance while exploiting and abusing Oz's disadvantaged inhabitants, driving them from their homes and into bondage. *Ne Zha 2*, the year's number one film, sets the scrappy people of a struggling farm town against haughty aristocrats who live in lavish gold-and-jade palaces above the clouds. Interestingly, the agreeably goofy farcical update *The Naked Gun* revolves around a billionaire's plot to trigger worldwide catastrophe — to make money, of course.

There is little particularly surprising in a series of movies assuming as fact that rich people have too much power, are devoid of conscience, and a endless, demanding hunger for greater riches. "Rich people are villains and scrappy underdogs are heroes" as a plot device stretches back to the birth of movies, with early comedies pitting his always poor Little Tramp character against corporate bosses, bosses, 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 a similar story for the era of the greedy, harmful entrepreneurial bad guy, the complete chronicle of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which take it for granted that riches is at odds with basic human values, and celebrate the overthrowing, defeat, and sometimes destruction of elite figures.

The Catharsis That Fails to Transform

Nevertheless, somehow, we consistently fail to eating the rich. Whenever elected officials follow a tragic gun violence event by faulting graphic media, I feel exasperated, 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 — surely American society would not persistently worship billionaires. Still the daily reports makes it obvious every single day that a significant portion of Americans innately equate riches with intelligence and value to society, even after one hundred years of cinema's biggest movies communicating the opposite.

Actually, it appears that the endless parade of eat-the-rich storylines in American cinema has provided us with a safety outlet that gets in the way of real-world action. Provided with a regular dose of largely happily-ever-after stories where the hero prevails, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can finish the film content about good conquering evil. These films are like cautionary fables, suggesting that society is just, and that resourceful individuals will weed out any malicious actors among the largely hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who pulled themselves up by their bootstraps.

An Angrier Edge in 2025

Although 2025's movies do not break new ground in that sense, they certainly adhere to some contemporary patterns among class warfare stories: They’re getting angrier, more incisive, more targeted, and observably more lethal. It is seldom sufficient nowadays to see rich people gain some humility in humility, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or be stripped of wealth to the people they exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, selfish, cruel wealthy people were slaughtered by mythological beasts (*Death of a Unicorn*) and consumed by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were obliterated on a distant sphere (*Mickey 17*) and gunned down point blank on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a improvised weapon (*Companion*) and bludgeoned by an ambitious rival (*Him*).

"Hardly any of 2025’s extremely affluent villains get the packed into a police car finale, likely due to it’s become so clear that affluent individuals live by a separate justice system, and are very likely to negotiate their release."

The "off to face justice" outcome isn’t cathartic anymore. Conversely, these villains are likely to die at the conclusion of their movies, often in especially brutal, poetic ways.

Key Outliers

There are exceptions, of course. Lex Luthor in *Superman* is only humiliated, exposed, and sent to prison. Evil mastermind Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* winds up 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 transformed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are revealed to be thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid