Think about what TV and movies have fed us over the past few years. Succession gave us the Roys, a family ripping each other apart over scraps of a media empire. The White Lotus locked wealthy tourists in paradise and showed how fast that paradise rots. Glass Onion blew up a tech bro’s private island. Triangle of Sadness literally made us watch rich people puke, collapse, and crawl.
And now comes Billionaires’ Bunker, a Spanish series where the world’s wealthiest discover that all the money in the world can’t help you when the bunker door closes.
Why We Love Watching the Rich Fall
It’s not just about schadenfreude (though, come on, that’s part of it). These shows give us permission to laugh, cry, and gawk at wealth without feeling guilty.
That’s the fun. Watching billionaires realize that family grudges, heartbreak, and loneliness can’t be solved with money feels both entertaining and somewhat righteous.
Why Now?
This trend didn’t pop up randomly. We’re living in an age where billionaires really are building bunkers, buying up social platforms like toys, and shooting themselves into space while everyday folks can’t afford rent.
Billionaires’ Bunker just pushes reality to its logical extreme: when the world ends, your billions don’t mean squat. You’re stuck underground, fighting with other rich people who are just as petty, paranoid, and human as you are.
We’re angry about wealth inequality, yes. But we’re also obsessed. We want to peek inside their brains. We want to watch what happens when the safety nets vanish.
What’s wild is how global this theme has become. Succession was very American, but audiences everywhere tuned in. The White Lotus focused on “ugly Americans abroad,” but people worldwide ate it up.
And now a Spanish show like Billionaires’ Bunker feels just as relevant, because wealth inequality is universal. Rich people act rich everywhere, and audiences everywhere like watching them fall apart.
Álex Pina, who gave us Money Heist, gets it. Back then, his robbers were fighting the system. Now he’s turned the camera on the system itself: the billionaires who built it, trapped with no way out.
It’s Not Just “Eat the Rich”
The best of these shows don’t just serve up revenge fantasies. They mess with us.
That’s what keeps the stories interesting. Wealth doesn’t automatically make you evil; it just turns the volume up on who you already are while protecting you from consequences. Until, of course, it doesn’t.
Are We at Peak “Rich People Meltdown”?
Probably not. Streaming services are still betting big on class-warfare thrillers. Premium TV keeps pouring money into prestige dramas about the wealthy and powerful. And audiences keep showing up.
Why? Because as long as billionaires keep flaunting their rockets, islands, and bunkers while the rest of us struggle, we’re going to crave stories where money doesn’t fix everything.
The Uncomfortable Truth
What makes Billionaires’ Bunker so compelling isn’t that it’s a wild fantasy. It’s that it feels almost inevitable. Of course, the ultra-rich would build luxury bunkers. Of course, they’d drag their petty feuds and addictions inside. Of course, they’d learn that money can’t save you from being human.
These shows scratch an itch. They give us the fantasy that wealth can’t insulate you forever. That karma, at least on TV, always finds its way, whether in a boardroom, a resort, or an underground panic room.
In real life, billionaires may get away with everything. But on screen? They get trapped, they get exposed, and they get taken down a notch. And maybe, just maybe, that’s enough for us, at least until the next binge.
