Recently, in a media interview, Pan Changjiang said that he struggled with his thoughts for a long time before filming the short drama "Uncle Pan's Attack," having many concerns: "Once you're labeled a 'veteran artist,' there's an invisible hierarchy." This statement accurately hits the mark on that invisible chain of contempt within the industry. His daughter, Pan Yang, added another practical concern: "The quality of the short drama is too rough." This is not only a dilemma for the Pan father and daughter, but also a chasm between many traditional actors and the new trend of short dramas—on one side is the "barrier" of identity, and on the other is the worry about quality.
Stills from the short drama "Uncle Pan's Attack"
At the same time, we are also seeing more and more celebrities not passively waiting for the quality of short dramas to improve, but actively taking the initiative to become a key force in reshaping the industry landscape.
Actress Lou Yixiao's lengthy post on Weibo can be seen as a clear declaration of her entry into the industry. She wrote, "For actors, there's no distinction between long and short plays. On stage, in front of the camera, even a minute is a performance; secondly, I personally have a positive outlook on the development prospects of short dramas." This first addresses the dual criticisms of her "identity" and "future prospects" from the perspectives of professional dignity and development vision. More importantly, her actions transcend her identity as an actress: "This time, I'm entering the short drama industry not just as an actress, but by establishing a dedicated brand for incubating short dramas and becoming a producer myself." From starring in leading roles to producing them, celebrities are directly injecting their experience, resources, and aesthetic sense accumulated in traditional film and television into the creative source of short dramas, which is the most powerful response to the criticism of "rough quality."
Lou Yixiao promotes her own short drama brand
Short dramas are not a new phenomenon, but public awareness lags, keeping them at the bottom of the social hierarchy. Screenwriter Song Fangjin, in his podcast "Luo Yonghao's Crossroads," offered a brilliant analogy: "If we watch a 90-minute football match now, whether or not a goal is scored, we've finished watching it; it's like a movie. But a short drama is a highlight reel of goals." This analogy provides a new perspective on understanding short dramas. From a media perspective, short dramas focus more on presenting dense dramatic conflict and emotional high points, which does have a functional similarity to a "highlight reel" of goals.
Of course, we must acknowledge that in its early stages, short dramas, in order to ensure that every "shot" hit the audience's emotional net, fell into the trap of "feel-good culture." Screenwriter Wang Hailin once pointed out incisively that a major flaw in current creative work is "mistaking the means of creation for the end." "Feeling good" should be one of the components of commercial works, a technique to attract viewers, but once it is regarded as the sole guiding principle, it leads to a decline in aesthetic taste and a huge deviation in creative work.
The public's prejudice against short dramas stems from this. In their early stages of development, short dramas, in order to capture users in a very short time, pushed the "satisfaction" technique to its extreme. Rebirth, counterattack, revenge, domineering CEOs... these highly refined "satisfaction points" became almost the entirety of short dramas during their period of rapid, unregulated growth. This created a stereotype: short dramas = formulaic, feel-good stories.
Just as films shouldn't be entirely dismissed because of some bad ones, we shouldn't negate the entire form of short dramas because of their early explorations. When Pan Changjiang finally overcame his mental block, when Lou Yixiao, as a producer, rigorously controlled quality, and when a host of talented actors like Huo Jianhua, Liu Xiaoqing, Wang Likun, and Shu Chang joined the project, they collectively delivered a "high-quality" upgrade. It's like in a "shooting highlights" compilation; we not only see powerful shots, but also appreciate elegant bicycle kicks like ballet and surgically precise curveballs. The "exhilaration" of short dramas is expanding from simple emotional stimulation to the precision of performance, the ingenuity of conception, and the depth of emotional resonance.
