Memory Acquirer is... weird. But it shouldn’t be ignored. This vertically-shot drama by Starto Entertainment, one of the biggest talent agencies in Japan rising from the ashes of the former Johnny and Associates and starring one of its biggest talents, Koichi Domoto, is a big-budget push into Japan’s growing intrusion into the globally-booming micro drama market. Just like many countries around the world, this new medium is already beginning to reshape the Japanese entertainment industry, as a profitable storytelling medium, a marketing medium, and a new storytelling frontier.

And it’s only getting started.

The growing popularity of short dramas has quickly become one of the most intriguing topics in the global entertainment industry over the last five years. In 2018, former Disney chair Jeffrey Katzenberg founded Quibi, a vertical-format short drama streaming service that quickly shut down after failing to find an audience. Today, especially in China but also in the same United States that rejected the idea, alongside a number of other countries, micro dramas are one of the fastest-growing forms of entertainment, created for the scrolling social media algorithms that have reshaped audience viewing habits.

These micro dramas are typically episodic in nature, anywhere between 1-3 minutes in length and vertically-distributed to fit the phone screens they’re often viewed upon. In episodic stories, these need a quick hook, a stream of stimulation, and a cliffhanger to keep someone watching, typically with stories about romance, cathartic revenge stories from stresses like work, or comedy. They’re shot on ultra-low budgets in many cases, reliant on online ads or converting audiences to later episodes on paid services, though some shows can have budgets that compete with traditional TV dramas on the larger scale. All are structured and tailored for the high-stimulation social media environment of today.

This new form of entertainment makes sense as an attempt to reach audiences where they are, as opposed to expecting audiences to come to them. Viewing figures nowadays for social video apps now overtake watchtime for linear TV and traditional streaming sites, with even light users of services like TikTok on average using it for roughly 45 minutes per day, many using such services for hours per day. Specifically in Japan, commutes on public transit can average over an hour per day, much of it occupied by these apps. Over 39 million people in Japan have TikTok, while over 63 million use Instagram as of 2026, creating a large captive audience for vertical dramas to thrive.

It’s far from a small industry. While over 80% of revenue is earned in China, Japan is one of the fastest-growing markets for it, catering to the captive audiences and time available to them during commutes as a way to find audiences. On the one side, you have creator-driven independent short dramas, which tend to shy away from major storylines for self-contained comedic gags featuring a shared cast and theme, but digestible, with a story of some form. Channels like Koneko Film and Shimauma Gekijo have amassed hundreds of millions of views this way.

Where things become arguably most interesting in how it indicates the subtle shifts the industry is undertaking is in the major studio investment going into these shows. While companies such as Nippon TV and Yoshimoto Kogyo are known more for their traditional TV and movie productions, in recent years both companies are just some of the many to have invested heavily into the short drama space in recent years.

The latter launched FANY, each micro drama streaming services replicating the Chinese model: release limited episodes through websites like TikTok and make some episodes available for free through their app, with the rest available through paid subscriptions. The former launched Viral Pocket, an all-new division that alongside social media vertical marketing was made to create a slew of short drama replicating the success of their biggest hit, We are Coy Every Day. The show is a daily-life school-setting drama series featuring a number of easy-to-read high-drama scenarios like a girl dealing with her mother’s loss as her dad gets a new partner, or bullying in school. It boasts over 4.5 billion views and over 850,000 followers on TikTok alone, with the company stating 1/3 of all Gen Z Japanese youth have encountered the series.

Despite these viewing figures making it the most-watched drama in Japan in terms of sheer numbers, the series has almost zero cultural reach beyond immediate in-the-moment passive viewing, which especially stands out in a country where merchandising is typically such a large pillar of any TV drama or streaming success story. It’s less surprising when watching an episode itself: stories are relatable by using easy-to-recognize scenarios, but the need to capture attention in an instant and prevent scrolling from boredom creates a story that can’t differentiate itself in favor of placating its audience’s emotions. It’s algorithmically-designed for success, down to the lack of a soundtrack replaced by an at-times ill-fitting trending sound that can be attached and played over the top in order to favor it in feeds alongside a range of other content.

Even comments from fans left on these episodes are more approving it in terms of their own ability to relate to the story, or at best asking for a longer, traditionally-produced drama with these characters that can explore its story further and make it more worthwhile. They’re disposable, but they’re profitable. Episodes are produced quickly and cheaply, often producing an entire series of 50+ episodes for less than the cost of a single episode of a normal drama. Further, the format’s growth on social media allows it to overcome language barriers, making it easier for these shows to break beyond the domestic audience.

Despite attempts by the likes of Fuji TV to make their drama available globally via Netflix and a growing number of streaming originals being produced and released worldwide, only a few have broken into the global consciousness. Even the most successful Japanese TV dramas, despite far surpassing the viewership of anime domestically, barely registers in other countries. Meanwhile, many Japanese micro dramas have made their way internationally thanks to their bite-sized nature. Drama Box, one of the biggest global short-form apps, boasts shows from all over the world, including a number of Japanese shows translated for multilingual audiences. For Their Final Journey boasts an experienced cast led by Hayato Ichihara, includes idols like Takagi Reni in the supporting cast, and is available worldwide with hundreds of thousands of views.

Even these shows, dedicated to their own app and at least telling more continuous stories across many episodes that bring with them a narrative arc, can feel disposable. Their success is merely in viewing time with adverts, or the high-spending minority paying for dedicated apps not disimilar to high-spenders in mobile gacha games. This model makes it impossible to resonate the way traditional media can. It’s certainly not helped by the way this format is being further co-opted by companies as a form of advertising. Dartslive produce their own gyaru-themed darts short drama able to attract millions of viewers per episode, set inside one of their darts stores for the purpose of promoting the retail chain.

Sponsorships for dramas are nothing new, but the nature of these collaborations purely as promotional content undermines the medium when no clear serious alternative yet exists. When Viral Pocket was announced, their initial press release noted their core aims, though the intent of their productions was clear. The goal with this initiative was stated not to be about creating deep, resonant drama in this new medium, but about metrics. While they celebrated an award earned at the 1st Asia Short-Form Drama Awards, cultural success is not a goal for these works. It’s KPI-driven storytelling.

It’s an investment in trends. Their proudest achievement, in their own words, isn’t this award, but a drama produced in partnership with food company Nissui to weave its egg-free products into a story about allergies which successfully turned viewership into sales.

Creating TV and movies is a form of art, but it’s also a business. There’s no denying that, nor would I think any creative would attempt to do so. But to earn money, creating great media that people can invest in beyond a superfluous, immediate but shallow emotional connection matters. There’s a reason the Japanese media industry is build upon multimedia productions and merchandising - by creating a story in one medium that people resonate with and that can endure beyond a first experience, it can be adapted to a new medium, you can create merchandise, you can earn money from its continued expansion and cultural capital.

That’s unnecessary in a format where money is earned not by the work itself but its existence on a platform, and one rewarding engagement over the traditional barometers of success.

If you create enough episodes and get people to stare at a screen for long enough, you make a profit. The medium and often location and method in which these works are being viewed, creating a captive audience where these works are placed alongside vlogs and dances and content that is designed to be social and unprofessional. The nature of this disinsentivizes the need for these works to provide the expected level of professional color grading, set design and production of full movies an TV shows, making them cheaper and quicker to produce. It limits their cultural impact, but it makes money. A lot of money.

Revenge! Cleaning Lady CEO Saki earned over 450 million yen globally for Shortbox. Every major TV company is producing short dramas alongside their traditional work. In 2025, the market was worth $160million yen: less than the domestic box office for the latest Demon Slayer movie in Japan alone, but far from an insignificant number when this also ignores the money earned from advertising on non-dedicated app platforms for these dramas like TikTok and Instagram.

Which is where Memory Acquirer becomes a fascinating outlier and an insight into the potential future of the industry. While not free from the pacing and other flaws inherent to many of the shows discussed, the intent of this production from its very origin feels distinct from those. Starto Entertainment since their rebuilding under this new name have only dabbled with the online streaming ecosystem of modern entertainment, but those experiments have earned results.

Beyond making the music of their talents available on streaming services the company has notably expanded their efforts on YouTube and vertical video sites in a stark contrast to the traditional video offline approach of the former Johnny’s. Embracing this world is a major factor in the growth of Snow Man and supporting its star member, Meguro Ren, in becoming an international actor and celebrity.

One key consideration, however, is how to avoid devaluing the brand of Starto in this rebuilding project, which a vertical micro drama risks doing. Thus, a slightly different approach has been taken by Memory Buyer compared to its contemporaries. For all the show is available for free on YouTube and other vertical video sites, selectively clipped into micro drama-length shorts for these services also, it’s vertical format may be the only thing this series otherwise shares with its contemporaries.

Each episode released so far is over 30 minutes in length, released at a slower pace with clips breaching the wait between episodes rather than relying on a continuous glut of episodes on a regular cadence. These episodes are not free of the pacing concerns mentioned previously, but they are far more carefully constructed to build tension using their extended runtime.

Production levels feel on par with more typical TV dramas when compared to other shows too, even if the vertical format can feel quite restricting in terms of framing in many scenes. That said, even this feels like an improvement, with a number of cleverly-produced sequences using the taller aspect ratio for dramatic effect in ways impossible in traditional formats. During a job interview early in the first episode, we see the character’s full body and not their head to focus on their tense body language before messing up their answer. It helps that performances are decent across the board - having watched many less-than-stellar short dramas, this felt like a notable improvement in concept and approach in almost every sense of the matter.

In many ways, this is a vertically-shot traditional drama more than a typical micro drama, but aware of the conceits of the industry in order to spread awareness. The clips the company has released feel more in line with how a typical micro drama promotes itself, with punchy subtitles and contained storylines that align with what succeeds on these platforms. They work standalone, even if they can feel out-of-place and not best suited to the broader show, included or paced certain ways as a necessary evil rather than the benefit of the story.

The intent, however, is to get its audience willing to engage in something more methodical, using celebrity and concept as a draw. As younger audiences slowly abandon traditional linear TV at slower rates than those seen in other countries, this is an attempt to merge the mediums by meeting audiences where they are without abandoning what stories people continue to engage with from the biggest J-Drama of the moment. This approach feels far less disposable as a result, and coupled with the company behind its production feels tailored to the sort of cross-market merchandising and expansion these shows are typically unable to earn themselves.

The current micro drama trend has exploded in large part thanks to the explosion in popularity for the platforms that fit this work since 2020. The rise of generative AI is increasingly putting these platforms at risk, especially as the approval of generative AI amongst younger people has dramatically fallen in recent months. Even if Japanese youth use it for school work, this is not translating to a consumption of AI art, something creatives overwhelmingly oppose. Yet Chinese services offering micro drama are embracing the tech, and even Japanese initiatives have noted curiosity to their use. This puts at risk the meteoric growth of the industry as both a domestic boon and international export, at a time Japan is seeking to move beyond anime in what it can culturally export to the world.

There are many better traditionally-produced TV drama than Memory Acquirer. The show’s writing is decent but simplistic, the main thing holding back its sci-fi story from its full potential. In a space that risks devaluing the very thing it wishes to sell, the show offers an alternative created as a hybrid between old and new, taking advantage of this alternative format while retaining the format’s discoverability and global accessibility. This show is available with subtitles in multiple languages on YouTube worldwide, featuring idols and talent that have a degree of international recognition. While it’s not had the biggest debut, failing to reach the virality of other shows, its performance is far from disappointing.

More, I see Memory Acquirer as a show created from a moment with the potential to offer a glimpse into a more sustainable, co-existent future for the new medium. The show is tailored to Japanese audiences by feeling almost exactly like a traditional TV drama cropped for the format in every sense. Ironically this can sometimes clash with the inevitably more stop-start nature a person viewing this show on their phone will experience, but it’s a marked improvement, and it gives these shows a legitimacy that’s a window into the broader acceptance to turn a trend into something long-lasting. This is a booming industry with a potentially-influential future, and Japan is not immune to its effects or potential at home and abroad. The question is, what will that future look like?