Micro Drama, Vertical Storytelling and the New Scripted Economy

Micro drama is one of the fastest-growing scripted formats in global digital video, and UK producers are only just beginning to understand its scale, speed and commercial potential.

In this episode of TellyCast, Justin Crosby is joined by micro drama producer Samantha Sun from ReelForce to unpack how vertical, app-based scripted series really work. Samantha shares her journey from early Chinese-backed micro drama platforms to producing some of the biggest-budget vertical dramas made in the UK, and explains why this format is not a downgrade from television, but a fundamentally different production and monetisation model.

The conversation explores how micro drama platforms acquire audiences through social video, why the first ten episodes matter more than anything else, how payment and revenue-share models actually function, and what UK TV producers often misunderstand when they approach the space with traditional assumptions.

Samantha also addresses talent, diversity, AI in post-production, genre limitations, audience behaviour, and why micro drama is attracting serious attention from Hollywood, platforms, brands and investors. This is an essential listen for producers, commissioners, and digital-first studios trying to understand where scripted content is heading next.

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Transcript

Samantha Sun: [00:00:00] And I told my investor at the time, I said, this is the new, the next big thing we need to get involved. We have made arguably one of the biggest budget of, for vertical that UK have ever done. Vertical drama has a problem that I, I, I'm not afraid to say out loud. Once you convert the audience to the app Yeah.

Then you are. More than halfway choose succeed. What do you think the UK TV producers might misunderstand about the economics of micro drama and the approach in micro drama?

Justin Crosby: Hi, I am Justin Crosby and welcome to another telecast. This week my guest is Samantha Sun, an emerging force in the micro drama space here in the uk. She's a producer at Real Force, a studio focused on high volume, data-driven vertical storytelling for social video platforms. Her work centers. On fast turnaround, scripted micro series blending creative [00:01:00] development with analytics LED iteration.

Samantha, welcome to Telecast. How you doing? Thank you for having me. I'm doing great. How are you? I'm all right. Yeah, I'm okay. This is our new set, so if you'd have been with us a couple of weeks ago, we'd have been at a round table that I've been using for ages, but this is we, for anybody who's just listening on audio, we're on Nice.

Comfy sofas now. Right? It's okay. I, I watched your previous episode before and, um, yeah. This is better. Right. For me it's a, it's a lot more cozy. Yeah, exactly. I feel like I'm sort of, uh, morning TV or something like that on the sofa. Anyway. Well, listen, welcome to the show. Thank you for joining us. So you've been involved in micro drama series for a number of years?

Yeah, one of the, uh, people at the cutting edge of the, of the industry. It's obviously a fascinating area. A lot of people in there. Traditional TV industry in the content creation space are talking about this now. So before we get into that, tell us a bit about your experience, because I know you're a producer for real Force now.

Yeah. [00:02:00] But actually, you know, before real force, you've, you've been established as a, uh, as a micro drama producer. Tell us about what you've done in your career up to this space since 2023. I was at the time working for another company. At the beginning we were doing like interactive film slash game kind of thing, but at the end of 2023, I personally think at the time we already seen the, uh, the rising of, uh, drama box and real short at the time, those are like the.

Maybe the only big two. And I told my investor at the time, I said, this is the new, the next big thing we need to get involved. And, uh, since then for that company, we were internally developing our own platform and I was in charge of the, the content creation. So we were, since 2023, we, uh, the end of it, we were developing our own script and produced, arguably maybe one of the first five verticals that have been made in uk uh, working with Dan Winston, who's [00:03:00] our amazing director.

Shout out to Dan. I made two, another two in America, made another two in China, and then. Unfortunately the platform did not come to life, so I ended up selling all the show that we have made to drama box. Ever since then, I was a freelancer producer that working with the business partner that we have done a lot of commission from, uh, platforms.

Uh, like vertical platform. And then I joined Real Force last year, August, around August time. Uh, and we have ever since, we have made arguably one of the biggest budget of, for Vertical that UK have ever done. Yeah. And it's on air now. Okay. Yeah. Can you talk about what that budget is? I would say double like a regular vertical.

Okay. 'cause it's a medieval fantasy genre and there's a lot of costume, big majestic locations and a lot of post-production involved. We have wig master on [00:04:00] set. Oh right. Yeah. Like the, the. On one day, we have more than 90 people on set involved all Korean cars. Uh, and we have a real historical castle as one of our location.

So yeah, the scale is different for that one. So give so to, in terms of, I'm not going to ask you to give me a, a, a real, a full amount, but are we talking between under a million? Under a million pounds in budget? Oh, of course. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, but more than half a million? Uh, no. Okay. Okay. So it's under half a million, but it's, but that is still significant, right?

If you're getting it to the top end of that, uh, half of that, less than half of that. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Fascinating. Any drama pro, any TV drama producers are like listening to this and be like, oh my God, how, how the hell did you do that? But we're gonna come on to that. Yeah. So how many macro drama series have you produced then roughly up to this point?

Uh, I would say at this. Point. More than 10, close to 15. Right? Yeah. [00:05:00] Okay. And is it interesting, you, you talked about your, one of your first roles, obviously there's a lot of parallels, uh, between the games industry and micro drama apps. Yeah. In terms of, you know, micropayments, et cetera. Yeah. Was that an important part of your career?

Do you think that informs really how you approach producing micro dramas now? Um, not necessarily like from the, uh, the application end. Yes. The, the monetization is kind of like game fight in a way. Hmm. But, uh, in terms of how to make, I think the idea from vertical drama or slash micro drama is that how to make people addictive to it.

Like how mobile phone, a mobile, uh, game made people. Addicted to, you know, spending more and more time on their phone, on the, the small little game. So for that, I think the concept is like similar but not necessarily the same. And my interactive [00:06:00] film slash game experience haven't really brought to life into vertical yet.

But I know there are platform like real short, that have uh, already explored that genre. I think because they're charging people more to unlock more options for that kind of interaction. They're not doing that well at the time in the vertical world at least. Okay. Okay. So, well, I mean, let's talk about micro drama as as a, as a genre as a whole.

I mean, it's obviously incredibly popular in Asia, really exploded there about three, four years ago is, or maybe has it been prevalent a lot longer than that? I think that. Exploding. The, the, it had been, it probably started 2021, but there are things going on way before that. But, uh, I think the reason for that is, um, my personal understanding is that China.

Got hit by the pandemic before the rest of the world. So the industry has been completely shut [00:07:00] down for that reason and have been really quiet for a really long time. Uh, so the investor with the capital, with the money, they were more withhold, like practical when it come to investing anything. Like big scale, uh, traditional long film and television, that kind of stuff.

So they're looking for something that are more flexible, more low, quicker turnaround for to returns as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And also. The, the idea of TikTok also come from the, you know, the, the Chinese like better is a, is a Chinese company. I think that the Chinese people already like are so hooked to the, the vertical digital format of as their way of cons consuming entertainment.

And it's obviously been picked up in the states as well. We've seen a lot of activity, a lot of investment coming in. Now Fox have obviously invested into Holy Water and there's a, there's a number of different investments from various different businesses across Europe as well. [00:08:00] We're starting to see what do you think has really sort of triggered, has there been a tipping point, do you think, in the states that made this a.

Obviously, you know, the business model, the, the amount of money that a lot of these really successful drama shows are making. Yeah, that's probably the, the tipping point. I'm probably answering my own question here. Do you think there are any shows or is any moments that you can see that have made a me major leap forward in the last couple of years that, particularly in the states?

I think it's the Hollywood turn to. Micro drama. It's not only because what micro drama has been done, it is also about what happening in Hollywood at the time. If they're doing that well, they probably won't be that interested, but apparently for whatever reason, Hollywood is not doing that great. Even the traditional film and television industry in this country, in UK where we're talking about it like it's not doing that well.

So it might be many, many like different [00:09:00] reason behind why it's. It the way it is, but I think that the people. Are more hooked to smaller screen rather than the bigger screen. It's probably one of the reasons. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So well, let's talk about this payment model then. Yeah. Um, and, uh, and we're gonna talk a a lot about, you know, how you develop a, a show to, to sit within that payment model.

But typically for anybody that hasn't, hasn't watched a, a micro drama series and gone through the process of paying, you know, making Mica a payment, tell us about, you know, how that. You know how many episodes you need to, can you watch on an app before? Because most of them are obviously sat within apps, aren't they?

Yeah. You mentioned drama box and uh, real shorts, and there are obviously lots of others. Now take us through the typical, uh. Uh, view a process of going through watching free episodes and then being asked to pay. Take us through that a little bit. So it's normally one episode from one minute [00:10:00] to probably two minutes and a half, and normally it is from.

30 to 70 episode per show. It really depends on the, the platform. Each platform has their own way to approach it. And Norm, what the platform do is that they put their either trailer or like the first three, couple other episodes, uh, on social media like Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, so. Uh, and use paid ad to make it into people's feed.

And when people see that and they get hooked, then, then, then they will find out, they will be asked to jump to the Apple Store or Google Play to download an app and registered on the app. Then when you turn to the app, you already, you can still see the, again, the free episode that you already watch on the social media, but then you have to unlock to pay, unlock to watch the, the rest of the show.

And when you. When it come to that business model, there are platforms that are [00:11:00] doing subscription. Sometimes the subscription give you like ad free, or sometime it give you still ad, but you can pay to, you know, remove the ad or if you can, if you don't want to subscribe, you can also, uh, pay to unlock each.

Episode by episode where you can unlock the, the rest of all the episode as a package for a discount. And they also have this game of game fight kind of model that is, if you. For example, they have the coin system. You have, you can top up and the more you top up, they give you more in reward. And you can, like, for example, if you keep logging in for a whole week, they will give you some free coin for, uh, for free to, uh, the rewards encouraging you to spend more time on their app.

Yeah. Okay. And presumably that works then, because traditionally I suppose, you know, migrating. A viewer from a YouTube short for ex to downloading an an app and going [00:12:00] to their app store and downloading app. There's this sort of a clunky process, right? That's like, you know, taking them, taking them outside of YouTube, taking them onto the app store, and then downloading and registering and what is it, you know, that that trailer, those initial trailers must be.

They must be incredibly attractive to encourage that. So how do you make them attractive? We, mm, how can I put it? It's like this is. Not negotiable to us that to make the first, uh, no matter if the first eight free episode or the first 10 episode, make it as extravagant as possible. We spend the most resource on those episode the best location, the best, um, the best post production, uh, value, the, um, the, and because the script also written in that way, like they spend the first 10 episodes really like trying to snatch people's attention and make people hook and.[00:13:00] 

From the production, uh, side of side of it is that we spend the most time, we spend the most money on it to make sure the first 10 episode always look as best as po as good as possible, right? And the acting, we spend more time polishing the acting for the first 10 episode always. Okay. Once you convert the audience to the app, yeah, then you are more than halfway to succeed.

Yeah. That's it. But that's the big challenge is converting them. Yeah. Yeah. I can imagine. Okay. Well, well, let's talk about talent as well. What qualities or characteristics are there within the talent that you choose to portray? Roles in, in micro dramas. I mean, what, what, obviously, you know, you just, are they just great actors that you're looking at?

Is there anything in particular you are looking for the type of talent that you cast in micro dramas, um, that you might not cast them in a normal TV drama? Um, I would say first of all, especially when I [00:14:00] work with the the Chinese background platform, they are looking for a specific look. Okay. Yeah. What is the look.

Okay. Uh, I'm gonna put it really straightforward. Yeah. I would say they're looking for Barbie and Ken, right? Yeah. Okay. Uh, there's vertical drama has a problem that I, I am not afraid to say out loud. That is, the lack of diversity is incredibly horrible. Mm-hmm. I. Don't think that I have the position to say why is that or how we can solve it.

Because, you know, I'm not like work for, I'm not a CEO of the big platform, but I do think that is, um, I understand that we need attractive people, but attractive people to, yeah. Well cast every tv, drama, ethnicity, drama. Yeah, of course. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But they probably think that, uh, you know, the majority of the audience are like.

White women. Mm-hmm. So they probably only wanna see white women and white men. But from what? Living in the [00:15:00] uk from what I understand, that's not necessarily the truth. Yeah. I, I tried to convince them multiple times, but never worked out. Right. But I had, I had, I can see there's more diversity coming into it.

Yeah. From the, the platform that have like American background or like, uh, Ukraine background, let's say. Uh, my drama. Yeah. Yeah. That's one thing. And the other thing is we are looking for talent that, um. Really flexible in terms of like, can quickly adapt to a new way of working because it's really, really fast.

We need you to learn your line really quick. We need you to give, uh, your emotion like as quick as possible, like you are on it. Yeah. Action. Then you are on it. Like, give us 100. So give us a, a, an idea of. So obviously the production is really compressed into a series, what, being shot over a week or so week or 10 days.

Yeah. And we are looking at a, a script that is like a regular modern romcom setting. We would be, no, normally we would do it [00:16:00] in, uh, eight days for a, a script that had 100 pages. Right. Yeah. Okay. And how long does the cast have the script to, to work with, to, to learn their lines? On average on a couple of days.

I would say, uh, if they get the script be a week before, that would be a really smooth one. Yeah. But if they, they're given the script like three days before, that would be considered not too bad. Okay. Yeah. Okay. That's interesting. What is it? It's, uh. Well, hopefully, you know, you, you're talking about talent and being sort of fairly stereotypical in terms of this, but I, I guess we're still fairly young in the evolution of micro drama, certainly in the uk Yeah.

For a UK audience. Yeah. Hopefully we'll see that sort of dier as, as the audience gets bigger. Talking about each episode, we've talked about, you know, the focus on the first few episodes to obviously drive that adoption. How about, you know, that two minute or [00:17:00] 92nd episode? When you are developing the script for that, and I know you're not a script writer and that's not your area, you don't, you're working on the creative side.

I actually to, I actually went to university to study script writing for four years in China, right? Yeah. But I don't do that in vertical. Okay. Yeah. I'm a producer in vertical. Okay. All right. Sorry, that was the kind of assumption from my, but, um, but, uh, but you're more involved in the production side necessarily than the, than than the creative side.

Definitely. Yeah. What is it within that? 90 seconds or two minutes that you have to ensure that every episode delivers. I mean, are there a number of beats, a number of, number of non-negotiables that you have to incorporate in that short amount of time? What are they and and how many are there? I would say it's, I still like those classic three acts.

Right. But within every 92nd, the beginning, middle, and end in every second X. Yeah. And with the click hangar. If you [00:18:00] end with the hook, that's a, that's a must. Yeah. So the but the cliffhanger, there's so many way to do it, right? Like we can end with the two character, kiss each other, and the audience will be like, what gonna happen?

And you can end with someone, slap someone in the face. And you can, and when someone say something really awful about another person and we need to see, uh, we wanna see in the next episode if the, the other character gonna fight back or they, they just gonna take it so many and we can do it physically as well.

Like someone jump out of the building like we're gonna have next. We have actually done it before, like. Jumping off the, uh, off the rooftop, uh, in your wedding dress. Yeah. Something crazy like that. And that it's like that moment in, in east Enders with the drumbeat that comes in up on the end, you know?

Yeah. There's always, always there. It's that, but obviously, you know, incorporated into 90 seconds. It, it might be corny, but it work. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, that's it. It does work. Clearly. It does work. I mean, some of these. Major [00:19:00] drama, uh, micro drama apps are talking about EE extraordinary amounts of money.

That, that some of these, uh, I mean, what we do you g given, uh, what are, what sort of figures do you think are the most successful micro dramas actually generating when it comes to revenue, but in terms of revenue, we are talking about, are we saying the revenues are generated? To the, for the platform or to the production?

Uh, to, for the platform. To the platform. I think one. Okay. So here's the thing. When they put a hundred show on, not necessarily a hundred, that would be, uh, an exaggeration. But when, let's say they put like 30 shows on their app every single month, not all of them gonna be a hit. Many of them gonna be flopped.

But one show, if it's really like a hit, hit. It can cover all of the, the rest of the floop, the, the budget, the cost for all of the rest of the, the flops in the show, [00:20:00] but also still make revenue. So that's how big the number can get. Right? Yeah. So going back to sort of the story beats and the type of content, so the often, you know, it does play to stereotype still a little bit, you know, and, and I suppose the kind of mills and boon.

Type of romance, you know, the, whether it's the secretary falling in love with the CEO or you know, we've seen a number of these different sites. It's Cinderella in a different way, Cinderella in a different way. Do you see that expanding a little bit and growing from that sort of, you said it was like slightly cheesy, slightly corny, kind of.

Obviously they work for a certain audience, but in, in the uk. Yeah. Do you see new genres developing, do you think, over the next year or so? 'cause we're still very early in our, in our growth period, in, in micro drama in the uk and I wonder how sustainable that is to just create the mills and boon type shows for a UK audience.

Surely there is, [00:21:00] there have gotta be new genres coming through. Yeah. In terms of genre, I, I believe the audience eventually gonna get tired. Of if we just keep making romance all the time. But I think we can try different stuff. Like we can try sci-fi, we can try, uh, horror, we can try a thriller, we can try something with like sport or comedy.

Comedy are like quite common now for vertical drama, but the comedy bit are not that great. Right. Okay. That's no opinion. Um, most of the time. Yeah. But we, there's so many different things that we can do, but. From my perspective, you still have to involve a bit of a romance into it, right? Based on who the audience are, based on what the audience want to see.

But it, but by doing so, you embrace other genre into this, rather than just purely romance story, you get to attract. Different demographic of audience into this new format, but you also get to keep your current romance [00:22:00] audience because there's still some romance element into it. There's still a man and woman falling in love.

So romance, do you think is the absolute non-negotiable? Uh, in terms of micro drama? I'm thinking if there one platform that's not doing romance at all. Maybe they're just doing like a thriller last day, for example. Or action adventure or something. Yeah, action. Yeah. Yeah. Then you are facing a different type of audience and the business format can be completely changed.

Yeah. But if we're talking about the current base fan base. That already exists. I think woman is still a key. And who are the current fan base then? Uh, if we're talking about that, I, I highly shout out to Jen Cooper, who is the amazing woman behind vertical drama love. Uh, she actually conducted, um, fan survey report that 1,600 people use their valuable time in life filling, filling in.

And she generates this, um, really detailed report. Those are the people that behind. We always [00:23:00] say the vertical drama is a data driven industry, which is not wrong. It's absolutely correct, but behind the data there are real people. The real people are paying their real hard earned money, like into to finances.

These kind of thing. Keep going. Uh, I, I highly recommend that anyone that are interested in this industry, especially for a production company platform, et cetera, go and download her, her survey report. It's completely free. So by reading that report from the very beginning to the end, I see there's people in their, uh, you know, probably like late 20 to mid 40 that are mostly teacher care, worker housewife, or some even.

You. I have like difficulties in life that are, maybe they're disabled or they, they cannot, like, life can be a bit harder for some of the audience for vertical, uh, content. And they, in the survey there was one saying that I see someone written down. [00:24:00] That it really touched me, and I will keep thinking about what they said because they, there's a question that Jen want, uh, everyone to literally write down their own unique answers.

Say, why are you, why you watch this? And this person said, because I'm disabled and, uh, I'm in wheelchair on a daily basis, but I still have to work. So I don't have, cinema is less accessible for me and because I still have to take care of my kid and I have, I have worked two jobs, so I only have the time to watch something or have some me time, like long time my, my time, uh, before I go to bed.

And that time probably only gonna be like 20 or 30 minutes. It's not even long enough for me to finish a um, Netflix TV series. Uh, like just one episode of the Netflix TV series is not, uh, enough time for me to do so, and I don't wanna watch something. And I would like to watch something scripted, not like, like brilliantly like scrolling on my, on my TikTok.

Yeah. And I [00:25:00] see those are the people that are behind the code number that the industry have not really talked about or think about. Okay. Yeah. As they deserved. Yeah. Okay. So what do you think There's, you know, there's a lot of, I think there's a lot of broadcast, there's a lot of production companies starting to get interested in this space.

Yeah. In the UK in particular, I'm sure that we've seen lots in the states already. What do you think that UK TV producers might misunderstand about the economics of micro drama and the approach in micro drama? Um, I think by, if you watch 10 vertical drama, you kind of already know how it looked like. But I think one thing is that when you look at it from a traditional film and television background, because I did the same, like when I first heard vertical drama, the thing I was heard from the chin, uh, the Chinese vertical drama, even before real short and drama box did this.

I look at it and I was like, ask someone who [00:26:00] work in the industry, I like what the emphasis. Like, I wouldn't wanna be part of this. Yeah. But you need to understand why this thing exists. That's the, that's number one. Like, don't think of it as a downgrade. Think of it something different. And say humble in a way that you are willing, if you wanna make money out of it, at least spend your time to research why this format exists.

It makes sense with the technology development, it makes sense with why the user want to watch it. It makes sense psychologically how they, they're denied to get people hooked. Yeah. The production value, yes, there's still you, you can, the more money you spend, the more production value you can, you can have.

It's not necessarily an unsolvable problem. And the second thing is understand the distribution game. It's not the same as how a regular low budget film will be distributed. Like the whole licensing thing is played completely differently at the moment. Maybe it will change in the future, I don't know.

But [00:27:00] it have developed since I was doing it for the first time, and then now it has like multiple different way to do it rather than just one. Simple way. So I think those are the two things. The, for someone that have more of a traditional background that will wanting to get into vertical, those are the two things that I think they need to like, do the research and step in and then probably learn about it and then figure how they're gonna approach it.

Yeah, yeah. And you said that the, the business models are changing all the time in a number of different ways that, that the app businesses are working with producers. Are they commissioning at the moment or. Commissioning is one way to do it. Yeah. Commissioning, the good side of it is you are not gonna lose your money.

Yeah. They give you the money to do it. You keep your profit and that, that, that will be it. Like no matter how, how flopped the show is, no matter how successful the show is, has nothing to do with you. That's right. A t typical TV industry sort of transaction, that's, that's traditional. And there's [00:28:00] another way is co-finance.

Co-finance means. You put half of the money, mostly half, but it depends on the percentage. Uh, and the platform put half of the money in it. Uh, the, the, the script can come from the production company or it can come from the, the platform and you get to share the revenue that made So revenue share at that point.

Yep. But that is the. A high risk game from what I understand, right? That because the not you, uh, as a production company, you put down your money to. Cover half of the production. But for the platform, not only they gonna spend money on the production, they're also gonna spend time on the paid ad, on social media to promote the show.

Mm-hmm. And that is a lot of money, sometime even more than the actual production budget for the show. And when they share their, their profit with you. They have to take that part out. Yeah. They have to recoup that first and then share with you the rest. Yeah. And so for them, the budget is not [00:29:00] just whatever spent on the production.

It's actually double probably. What? What? Yeah. Double would potentially even more. Okay. So think of that and think how much money you can actually get backwards. Yeah. Uh, and the other way to do it is you self-finance. Or you find, you find other investors to do this show and then approach the, the platform and say, Hey, I'm gonna sell this show to you.

Are you interested? Look at it. And you can license, you can then be in a position to license it and yeah, give different windows and, yes. Um, does it have to be exclusive? I mean, could you It it can do many different ways. It can be exclusive, it can be non-exclusive, and it can also be the first window.

Second window. Third window. Okay. Yeah, as long as the IP is yours. You can. You can do whatever you want. But the thing is, because there were so many vertical being produced every single month, how great your show is for the platform to offer you a really good deal because they are producing their own stuff as well.

If they think that your yourself is [00:30:00] better than theirs. That's when they can offer you a good deal. If they don't think yourself is better than them, they will offer you a really shitty deal. And just one more show on their, their platform. Yeah. That that's the only thing that it's gonna mean to them.

Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Okay. Well, obviously we know it's super low budget. We've talked about that. The challenges that come with that, potentially really high rewards depending on which way you, you are certainly for the apps and maybe for the producers as well, depending on how you're approaching it. But AI is clearly really important sort of driver in the background to the whole micro, micro drama industry.

How do you. Use AI in the production process. Do you use it through every different stage of the process? At the moment, we are only using AI for the post-production. Okay. Uh, and for, I know people like, especially in a western world, we always talk about the [00:31:00] the moral behind. You the, the, the usage of ai. Um, and for me, I just genuinely don't believe that people will pay that much money to watch a completely AI generated show.

So it's not healthy for the environment. Like it's not equal, fairly, and it's not sustainable for providing a. Uh, healthy industry environment as well, like long term, long run. In the long run, people will lose their job. We'll have less talent that contribute to the growth of the industry, so I'm highly against that.

Using AI to replace real actors. But for post-production, yes. I, I did a medieval fantasy. I don't have Hollywood budget to do all the post-production, like how they would do. So that is the, the only way of us using AI for now. I don't know what the future gonna hold, but yeah, for now, that's the only way.

Yeah. Okay. So if you had to give one piece of advice then to, I can imagine there's [00:32:00] lots of UK drama producers now. Who are not getting the opportunities. The commissioning in the traditional TV industry has gone away. Opportunities are, are, are certainly fewer, but there are many drama companies who've got great experience at making, you know, really high quality shows.

What single piece of advice would you give them if they're thinking about. Exploring the micro drama space? What, what, what, what would be your advice to them? I would probably have two if allowed. Yeah. One is understand the format. Yeah. The second would be smart with your money, where to spend it. You, uh, in doing vertical, the budget that you have, you are not gonna be able to do it all.

You need to figure what you can sacrifice and what cannot. Yeah. Yeah. And make sure all of the money [00:33:00] goes on screen, basically. Yeah, that's exactly seems to be the key. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. And then wh where do you, where do you see the, the future of micro drama going now in the next sort of two, three years?

Because, uh, I mean, you are really experienced producer now. It's, it must be exciting time for you because. Everybody's talking about it in the industry, there's lots of potential for it to go in lots of different directions when it starts to evolve and mature in different markets. So where, yeah. Where do you, where do you see it going there?

I see. I think that personally I, I really thank vertical drama because as a. As a foreigner that come to the country that before vertical was a thing. The industry is really difficult for us, people like myself to break in, but thanks to vertical that come, really come from a Chinese background, that me being a Chinese person that actually gave me the opportunity to be.

Where I am today. Uh, it gave me a, a smooth start and it, it helped me grow as I'm [00:34:00] helping, like have, bring in more and more production here in the uk creating job opportunity for the Korean cars and stuff. And yeah, and I think the, in the future, as we can see, the Hollywood is stepping in. So from that.

For that. I think we are gonna see a really interesting thing happening. That vertical will be, I believe, will be shift into a different type of storytelling. At least there are more type of storytelling gonna happen. Not necessarily the only one, like we talk about earlier, that I'm really interested in and I, I believe it will, it will be something more like.

The Chinese vertical and Hollywood in between. Now it's just like English, but Chinese vertical. Mm. But with Hollywood and more people have like a high production value experience, traditional film and television people coming into this genre. I think it would be somewhere in the middle. [00:35:00] From, uh, the Chinese vertical type of thing and the Hollywood type of thing.

And somewhere in the middle of that, which is the balance of this unique storytelling and a more morally correct and more high end, more diverse type of story. Yeah. Uh. Selling, uh, entertainment format. Yeah. Which I'm really excited about. I wonder if one day we'll see a Tom Cruise Mission Impossible. Uh, micro drama series.

So, you know, I mean, uh, well, we saw that with Fox Entertainment, they're gonna be bringing a lot of their talent to their partnership with Yeah. Maybe the holy water. Right? So, yeah, if. If Tom Cruise is down for it. Yeah, I, I would like to be the runner for that show. Okay. All right. Okay. Yeah. Well, let's, uh, let's hope he listens to the show.

I'm not sure if he does, but maybe he should. It's time now for a story of the week here, of the week and getting the bin. Let's start with. Story of the week, what is the main story in the TV and broader [00:36:00] content industry that caught your eye in the past seven days? Uh, obviously I'll be focusing on vertical drama, and I saw this piece of news that, uh, I think I would like to share.

So basically in the past week, CES. 2026 in Las Vegas, Disney announced a major shift in, uh, strategy for Disney Plus by planning to introduce vertical short form video content to the platform later in 2023. Yeah. Uh, in later 2026. Yeah. So yeah, Disney is. On it as well. Yeah. Disney Sonic. And we also, we actually, we also saw recently that, uh, tiktoks launched a micro drama app as well.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think it's now exclusively in the us this Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's called Pine something. Pine, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. And they also have their own, uh, TikTok Mini. That you can at the independent production company or producer, uh, you can upload your own show and people can just page and watch on TikTok directly, right?

So they don't have to download any [00:37:00] app. And as the content creator, you don't have to worry about building your own app. But obviously the, potentially they're gonna take a cut and Apple Pay and Google Pay that help people, you know, make the transaction on, on TikTok, uh, they're gonna take a cut as well.

Yeah. But it save you from, um, the, the hustle of distribution and building an app and stuff like that. So I think it's a really good opportunity for more independent people. Maybe they have lower budget or they don't know how to reach out to the big name vertical platform, but you can still find your way to monetize it without having to go through someone else's app or building your own app.

Or get a brand to fund it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Maybe you can do like a pilot thing and put it out there and test the water first, and then use that to ask for some, uh, investment, or then reach out to the platform to say, Hey. See, I'm doing well now. Yeah, you do This is this thing have potential? Yeah. So TikTok is doing that.

Yeah, so I think it's a good thing for [00:38:00] independent. It's really, it is really interesting. We saw recently that, uh, talking about brands, we've seen Pcta and Gamble launching PG studios. We've seen Starbucks, lots of other brands that are launch. They're own production studios. So, you know, you would imagine that, uh, there's gonna be more and more sort of drama series that may be totally brand funded as well coming up.

So yeah, I would love to make a, a show like, uh, like a sitcom kind of vertical that happened, like, uh, two barista working at Starbucks. Yeah, yeah. Well it could be like, you know, what's it But that too, Bo go. What is it like in, in France as well, when they go to the, the coffee of the per, what's it called?

The, the, the cafe in Uh, yeah. In France. That's it central. Thank you. Yeah. Who knows? You know, there's lots of different, lots of different formats that can work. Okay. Um, so how about your hero of the week? I think my hero of the week is that the people that. Even though they might not have like a a platform background or there are many [00:39:00] people that in the UK they're more independent, that they're actively trying to breaking in to vertical, even though as a production company that we might face some sort of challenge, but.

At the same time, I believe it's a competitive industry. It is a healthy industry. If no one is doing it, it's about to die. Yeah. So the more people are doing it, if we have the platform from the very top to the very end, we have more, uh, people that are building their platform in the uk, we have more producer working on it more.

Like crew are working on it and more audience from the uk. Yeah, based in the UK that are watching it, they're consuming it. We internally can build a healthy industry within the uk. Yeah. Because now the platform will come from China. But if they want that, they decided, you know what, we are not all, we're all not gonna go to UK to do, to give them our commission.

Then we have, we are, we have. Big been kicking out of this industry because [00:40:00] we have no infrastructure within the country ourself. Yeah. Yeah. So your hero of the week is basically everybody that's working within the micro drama ecosystem? Yeah. Everyone that in the uk everyone that, you know, posting things on, sharing information on, uh, LinkedIn, everyone talking about it on the street or like everyone, they're trying to, you know, network with people, let's say, talk about how we can get in.

Or even like, like the drop media that are posting article about it. Just, just spreading it everywhere so more people hear about it, the more opportunities there will be. Yeah. And the digital video awards, of course. Yeah, of course. We're recognizing that iama. I'm definitely gonna submit. Fantastic. Well we're, we're recognizing micro drama apps and also series for the first time this year, so that's, uh, exciting.

And, uh, and finally, uh, who or what are you telling to get in the bin, Samantha? Ah, that will be, I don't know, new Year resolution, Uhhuh. I don't know already. [00:41:00] He, I, I try to do it every year and this year I was like, you know what, I'm not gonna do it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because, um, some, you can't, you can't be so determined to do something.

And life just hit you in the face. It does. Yeah. And then you feel like a failure. Yeah. And you feel like a failure. And now I'm just like, you know what? I'm gonna try everything my very best and see how the future, uh, how the future gonna go. Yeah. Without having a set goal and feel like a failure when something happen.

And I, I wouldn't be able to achieve that. 100%. Let's all chuck New Year's resolutions. Yeah, sure. In the bin. Alright, let's, let's show a bit. Yeah. Alright, fantastic. Samantha, thank you so much for joining me you so much this week. It's been really fascinating speaking to you and Lovely Justin. Thank you for having me.

And, and I can't wait to hear about, uh, the next project you working on. Yeah. In micro drama if you invite me back a again. Yeah, absolutely. Let's do it. Let's do it. Let's do it. And maybe we'll do something on the drop as well. But thanks again for coming. Lovely. Thank you for having me. Bye everyone.[00:42:00] 

Well, that's all for this week's show. Telecast was produced by Spirit Studios and recorded in London. We'll be back next week with another show. In the meantime, stay safe.