Watch: BBC goes on the set of a micro-drama"More anger, more anger, please!" Director Kang Mi-so shouts across the set at an actor playing the role of the "wicked" aunt.The camera rolls to the woman. Face scrunched up, she lets out a torrent of abuse: the kind that you would never hear in a Korean soap.But this is not the usual K-drama – this is a "micro-drama", the viral ultra-short format that has been shredding attention online. A single episode can last as little as a minute, but there can be more than 50 of them in a series. They are made vertically, for your phone and your TikTok, Instagram or YouTube feeds."We need spectacular moments to snatch their attention in one stroke," Kang, the director, explains. Unlike streaming or TV, where viewers are "ready and willing to give up their time," micro-dramas are competing with the allure of scrolling.So, they serve up an array of the outlandish – mid-scroll, viewers stumble upon a lover's fight or a menacing standoff. The characters could be at school, or in a medieval castle, complete in period costumes."They are hooked by the scenes," Kang says. That might explain why the show she is directing has more than 10 scenes where someone is slapped across the face. The business depends on packing a punch right away because the first five to 10 episodes are free, after which viewers are nudged to move to the app where they pay to watch further.ViglooDramatic scenes are key to the genre's appealThe theatrics have certainly paid off for Chinese micro-dramas, which reportedly outperformed the box office in 2024. They still dominate an industry that is now estimated to be worth billions across the globe. But increasingly, South Korean entertainment is making a play for what analysts believe is a booming market. Now, artificial intelligence (AI) is poking its head round the corner, promising lower costs and more opportunities."South Korea has shown the world its power to create music, TV, and films. The same content makers are now coming over [to micro-dramas] and I think they are world-class," says Neil Choi, CEO of Vigloo, one of South Korea's biggest micro-drama apps.Kang, for instance, used to make reality TV. Now she is directing Vigloo's latest micro-drama, The Return of the Nation's Heir. When we visited the set on a recent freezing afternoon in Paju city, just north of Seoul, filming was moving at breakneck speed. Everything was shot in vertical mode, and nothing was subtle.Running across 63 episodes, the show tells the tale of a billionaire who falls into a vegetative state after a mysterious car accident. It is, Vigloo promises, "a story that pushes Korean romance to its extreme – power, love, family and revenge collide, and one man moves an entire nation to protect the woman he loves".BBC/Hosu LeeDirector Kang Mi-so says the genre requires spectacular momentsAround two dozen crew members were setting up the pivotal scene. The unmistakably pompous uncle of the female lead flipped the table, throwing everything on it into the air. As he yelled, the camera zoomed in on the hand of his daughter's fiancĂ©, the wheelchair-bound billionaire and the male lead. His fingers moved ever so slightly.This is the fourth episode but it's only been six minutes into the show because each episode is just 120 seconds. And rather than being a cliffhanger, this is how the episode opens."We start with the climax," explained actor An Chae-hee, who plays the female lead. "We need to make clear what the story is and who the characters are immediately."Because they are short of the one thing that regular shows liberally use – time.How little time it takes to watch a micro-drama is exactly what seems to attract viewers."This is my life now," said Molly Doroban, a software engineer and mother of three living in Florida, who said she saw a Google ad and got "sucked into" micro-dramas.She found them easier to watch than the lengthy TV shows which would keep her up all night.In one month, she watches what her friends would take a year to watch. "But at least I'm not online shopping!"TV shows made for your phone are not a new idea. Quibi, an American startup which raised $1.75bn (ÂŁ1.3bn), tried and failed after an ignominious eight-month run in 2020. Where Americans gave up, Chinese startups persevered. Borrowing from mobile gaming, they sold cheaply made shows by the episode instead of selling monthly subscriptions for premium shows.The US is a key market though, second only to China by some counts. Last year, Vigloo opened an office in LA. The firm wants to target American women who they believe will spend more than their Korean counterparts.Speed and volume are central to this business, explained Vigloo's Choi. It takes only two months for an idea to become a show that is available on their app. The day we visited the set, we watched them film four episodes over four hours. We were told they filmed four more episodes after we left. "We are the fast fashion of movie-making," is how Choi puts it.BBC/Hosu LeeStrong facial expressions are on show on setVigloo has a conveyor belt-like setup where the screenwriter, director and editor focus only on their job before passing it onto the next person. Each of Vigloo's 20 in-house filmmakers are asked to deliver 10 titles a year. What is helping them meet these deadlines is the industry's alacrity in embracing generative AI. We watched two editors at Vigloo's headquarters in Seoul's Gangnam district create a 30-minute film using only generative AI.They used AI to create actors who don't exist based on a screenplay from a writer. They asked it to generate an image of the "actors" – recording their voice and then feeding the image back to the AI tool, asking it to create a fitting voice.To build a background, the editor plugged in a prompt with a reference image and it took AI 10 seconds to spit out a 12 second-long video where the camera tilted to reveal the landscape, almost indistinguishable from real life. In the next room, another editor put together a scene featuring AI-generated video of jet fighters preparing to take off. This helps Vigloo cut production costs down to 10% or less of traditional filmmaking, Choi said.While Vigloo offers only two shows made entirely with AI, the firm says nearly all their titles use generative AI in varying degrees. AI is essential for the popular romantasy genre where fantastical elements, from medieval castles to werewolves and fairies are common. It is useful for the standard romance too, such as when a billionaire love interest is shown driving his luxury car. Renting a real car would cost thousands of dollars, Choi said.BBC/Hosu LeeAI is used to create actors who aren't realJen Cooper, a UK fan who writes reviews and creates contents for other fans, is sceptical of the future of shows made with AI alone.A large part of the appeal of micro-dramas is seeing and interacting with real actors, she said, because the actors are often unknown and, therefore, accessible on social media.And yet, AI will make it easier for the industry to double down on its biggest appeal: volume.Cooper herself appreciates how sequels arrive so quickly. They are ready in a couple of months, and they almost always tie up the story arcs, she said. Netflix shows, on the other hand, could take years between seasons or could be cancelled after two seasons.Of course, micro-dramas, which are scripted, filmed and released in mere months, don't offer the same quality or narrative depth as movies and streamed shows. The sets are not sophisticated, the actors are mostly novices, and the AI-driven scenes can feel uncanny under scrutiny.But that is exactly what many viewers seem to be looking for to fill pockets of time in their lives.Cooper rejects the view that this slot-machine version of entertainment saps our ability to focus.Ironically, because the shows are on her phone, she says there is no other device to distract her. Even if micro-dramas weren't available, she isn't sure viewers will be returning to cinemas in huge numbers: "People are time-poor."As a parent of teenage children, Cooper said she had lost the taste for serious films. "Adolescence and Hamnet are amazing pieces of art, amazing performances but intense and emotionally heavy. I cannot watch stuff about losing a child or teen issues," she said. She finds the unabashed escapism in micro-dramas appealing, especially when so much of the news feels "scary and worrisome".Micro-dramas, she believes, are "the art that the world needs right now".BBC/Hosu LeeActor An – real for now – says she and the rest of the cast have a lot of fun filmingFor now, the top hits on Vigloo are a drama, period action and risquĂ© romance: "Miracle of the dirt-poor single mum," "Red Monster: Revenge against the devil," "The flat where tenants must do each other". Nudity is a no-no in Korean shows but censorship on social media online is far more relaxed compared to TV or well-known streaming platforms.Still, Choi believes that high-octane micro-dramas will mature into a range of content, from acclaimed short films to low-brow entertainment. And one day, a micro-drama may even win an Oscar, he says. "Hollywood looked down on movies using computer graphic-made effects, but now it's handing the Oscar to Avatar."South Korean filmmakers generally accept generative AI as an unstoppable trend, if not a silver bullet that could save an industry beleaguered by rising costs. South Koreans are among the most optimistic towards AI, according to a recent Pew poll.An, who plays the billionaire's fiancĂ©e, is concerned about AI replacing her, but says micro-dramas are also "an opportunity for new actors like us". She herself is a fan: "They are spicy and that's what keeps grabbing our eyeballs."She and the crew are enjoying the exaggerated story. Laughter erupted after each flip of the table and every slap."We had a lot of fun shooting. And we thought it was hilarious while we filmed!"Additional reporting by Hosu Lee and Leehyun Choi in SeoulOnce mocked for being tacky, this Korean music genre is making a comebackSouth Korea's 'movie of the year' is an indie story about a teen's trauma A global craze for Korean culture is making its humblest snacks unaffordableFrom Squid Game to Blackpink, how South Korea became a culture powerhouseSouth Korea
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