In the ever-changing entertainment content market, the tastes and needs of female audiences are undergoing rapid evolution. From the pursuit of romantic love in traditional idol dramas to the complex emotions of “male virtue” and “immorality” plots, the preferences of female audiences are diversified and stratified. This article will explore the unique aesthetic trends that female audiences will show in short dramas in 2025 and how these trends reflect their new expectations for love, marriage, and personal growth.
Before May Day, iQIYI CEO Gong Yu’s speech at the TV series directors’ conference once again sparked heated discussions: the aesthetics of male audiences have basically not changed, and they will always like 18-year-old girls. But the female audience has been changing, first loving the brother, then loving the younger brother, and then the uncle, before they have time to create, and they like men and women.
Although the audience laughs when the platform thinks, Hard Candy has no intention of joining the ranks of the Great Trial. And in fact, this is also consistent with our observations: with the awakening of women’s consciousness, the concepts and tastes of female audiences are indeed in a fierce dynamic iteration, and the reputation of many people, things, and things has changed again and again. This has also turned into a market hammer, intentionally or unintentionally hitting the weakness of long dramas with long cycles and weak timeliness, and idol dramas are especially in a dilemma.
But while the audience of long dramas watched idol dramas and anti-love brains, the hot love made the short dramas talk. Taking the red fruit short drama as an example, 6 1 billion broadcast works have been born this year, of which 5 are female frequency and 4 are puppets.
This also confirms our daily physical feelings: the awakening of female audiences is not a collective step forward, but an internal layer. The most radical and the most conservative coexist in one sea. Long dramas cannot ignore the value trial, but short dramas can meet real needs.
So, in 2025, what kind of aesthetics will the real idol drama consumers, or women who still have a real yearning for love and marriage, uphold? I’m afraid it’s not something that can be summed up by older brothers and uncles of the same sex.
Hard Candy Jun studied the “multi-beat script” and popular characters and routines of the short drama in the past year, and summarized them as follows: feudal and progressive, male virtue and immorality; Fighting and grabbing, the generation is getting longer.
The male virtue is upgraded, and he is a dog for love
For various reasons, there is a unique “one book and multiple shots” operation in the field of short dramas, that is, multiple live-action versions of the same IP may emerge in a short period of time. If there are real hits, it will also give birth to a number of “variants” that follow the trend and imitate. Based on this, in addition to the results of a single drama, the number of remakes can also be used as a popular pointer for routines or characters.
To achieve these three challenges, product managers will only continue to appreciate
Good product managers are very scarce, and product managers who understand users, business, and data are still in demand when they go out of the Internet. On the contrary, if you only do simple communication, inefficient execution, and shallow thinking, I am afraid that you will not be able to go through the torrent of the next 3-5 years.
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Looking at the topic of “more copies” in the past year, we can first take out a line of male virtue evolution of the male protagonists of short dramas: from forcibly robbing to kneeling and fighting and grabbing.
The 8th version of “Crossing the Boundary” (He Tingzhou X Song Shuangxu) and the 11th version of “Drunken Kiss Night” (Lou Yanjing X Li Zhi) both focus on the realization of secret love. However, the two male protagonists are not good at stubble, more active than Zhang Wansen, and more bluffing than Sang Yan.
According to the copywriting of the original novel, the former male protagonist is a “black-bellied and cold prince”, who uses a transaction to “win love” with his brother and pull the heroine out of the pseudo-orthopedic bitter love that has been in love for many years; The male protagonist of the latter is an “unruly and affectionate thug in a suit”, who lends a helping hand when the female protagonist is divorced and helps the female protagonist turn her life around.
To put it simply, they combine the power and action of the traditional overlord male protagonist with the affection and loyalty of the traditional warm male lead. This is also the basic formula of “upside-down overlord”. On this basis, the degree of competition and grabbing has continued to escalate, and it has come to the stage of “being three for love”.
The representative of the “multi-copy” in 2024, there are no less than 20 versions of “It’s Over! The little white face I raised is the prince of the Beijing circle” (Bo Jinxiu X Jiang Ciyou), and the six or seven versions of “Overfire” (Xiao Chenyan X Shi Yan) have been filmed this year, all of which are the “male junior literature” that has not faded – the male protagonists are in high positions, redeemed by the heroine when they are young, and meet the heroine who is unhappy in marriage when they become adults, and are willing to accompany her in a foster relationship, and finally take the heroine out of the sea of suffering.
But similar ideas, from 2024 to 2025, have different presentation focuses. The most well-known Zeng Hui version of “Finished” begins with the male protagonist being broken up by a cliff, a few episodes of Xiao Fu and then revealing his identity, and the two sides start a new pull. In the more recent Wang Daotie version of “Overfire”, the male protagonist is already taking the initiative to hide his identity, serving and talking nonsense, giving people a feeling that he himself is also cool to play a male model.
What does this mean? Before the appearance of short dramas, a third for love could make He Yichen proud of the general world for many years (“Why Sheng Xiaomo”); After the appearance of the short drama, it was not enough to watch it for love, and the times fast-forwarded to “being a dog for love”.
In the first half of this year, the representative of “multi-copy”, in just two months, broadcast 10 versions of “Absolute Surrender” (Ximen Lichen X Jiang Wanzhi), the most magical memory point is in addition to the name of the male protagonist, that is, the male protagonist is a dog for love.
The male protagonist reversed the convention of reuniting with the mirror, investigated the truth on his own, cleared the family obstacles, and replaced the traditional cold-faced pressure and quarrel in front of the female protagonist with intimate flattery and commotion.
On the track of being a dog for love, Ximen Lichen is not alone. In April’s male competition drama “Fishing Delicate Beauty Survives in Shura Field”, one of the male protagonists, Lu Siyan, is the popular “damp green tea puppy”, who was slapped by the heroine and chased after the self-recommended pillow.
Several other male protagonists also did not hesitate to use hooking methods to compete for jealousy, rather than representing the “Sauvignon Blanc” style of self-reliance, which made everyone uncomfortable. “Fishing System” is not more correct, but at least it gives enough fun. Unfortunately, the large-scale stills appeared on Weibo’s hot search, and the drama was taken off the shelves at a glance, failing to effectively drive the 1VN craze.
In short, in terms of core setting, the short drama is “the superior bows his head for love”. In terms of presentation details, this batch of inverted stickers also reflects a certain iteration. They are often emotionally stable and not dadly, and they respect the wishes and experiences of the heroine more, and do not ruin people’s physical and mental careers. The male protagonist of “Over-the-Fire” took the initiative to ligate the female protagonist after giving birth, and Ximen Lichen chose himself instead of letting the female protagonist take contraceptives, which are all more “progressive” pluses.
CP betrays morality and hits a new high
A healthy love is important, but a deformed love is really wonderful. CP playing style is proliferating all year round, the audience threshold is constantly increasing, and the taboo of immorality has gradually become the primary productive force. “Provoke” hyped up “little mother literature”, “Fireworks in My World” made “pseudo-orthopedics” enter the public eye, and the male protagonist of “Ink Rain Clouds” is worried about his wife, not to mention the two male protagonists.
Short country stabbed the uncle’s nest this year, and “uncle literature” became popular. This uncle is not the uncle who scolded Jiao Da drunkenly for “raising the uncle”, but the uncle of the “little uncle”, which can be divided into the heroine’s own bloodless caregiver, the uncle of the girlfriend, and the uncle of the scumbag.
Needless to say, the latter two categories are more popular. “Green Mountains Like Jade” (Shengting X Chushuang), which was married to his best friend’s cold uncle, was filmed in 4 versions, and was filmed in 3 versions by his best friend’s uncle Xu Xu’s “Meet the Soft-hearted God” (Qin Mo X Jiang Wansheng), and “He Wants to Grab” (Cheng Jialuo X Jiang Fu), which inadvertently provoked his fiancé’s uncle, was filmed in 6 versions, and one of the versions also entered the 1 billion club.
Like the boss who sticks upside down, “uncle literature” is also on fire.
First of all, this is a more flexible security betrayal. If the object is a girlfriend’s uncle or a scumbag’s uncle, the two parties do not even have a parenting relationship, and the relationship may not have arisen since childhood, but it is just a generation difference formed in the circle of acquaintances. This can not only create excitement and stealing, but also be psychologically easier to accept when you kick at the door.
Secondly, the uncle is an improvement on the middle-aged overlord. In Uncle literature, the younger generation of men are always portrayed as scumbags and mothers who can’t stand things. Uncle is a more calm and high-quality man, with real power and ability, and can provide female audiences with fantasies similar to the traditional uncle’s love for father’s boyfriend and the protection of the strong.
However, the uncle becomes a younger uncle, which is visually safer and more eye-catching, and to a certain extent, it can avoid the question of “trying to get him old and not taking a bath”. Many uncle male protagonists are actually less than 30 years old in the setting, and the actors may be younger.
Thirdly, from the perspective of making the superior bow his head for love, uncles often eat and see each other, and maintain their single records longer, and of course winning the uncle is more fulfilling than taking the nephew. First of all, the girlfriend complained about how serious and harsh the uncle was, so as to contrast the deep affection and exception of the male protagonist to the female protagonist in the future, which is a kind of hidden female competition.
And the male protagonists of the uncle are often the real power, so they bow their heads more arbitrarily, and they can easily get rid of the family’s resistance and avoid the old-fashioned abusive scenes. The male protagonist of “He Wants to Grab” is a crazy boss who eats all black and white, and the relatives and friends of the male protagonist of “Meet the Soft-hearted God” are relieved to see him blooming, and they don’t care about the identity of the heroine at all.
Ximen Lichen also stacked a layer of little uncle buff, and when he appeared, he had already worked hard from a “wealthy prince” to a “North American god of heaven” (novel copywriting), and he was not threatened by the so-called reclaim of inheritance, and he could also give the elders a sentence of “the Qing Dynasty is dead” with his backhand, which is really unobstructed.
Another hidden cool point of “Uncle Literature” is the promotion of seniority. After being let down by the scumbag, he turned into the elder of the other party, and his wealth and power were all crushed and he lived a better life.
Similar is the recent popular non-multi-film “Wife with ulterior motives”. Among them, the heroine and the second female lead are a pair of sisters, and the second female lead snatched the heroine’s boyfriend and angry adoptive mother, so the heroine backhanded the scumbag’s richest father, the 45-year-old boss, and used her mother-in-law and daughter-in-law to rectify the second woman’s life, and also took away everything from the scumbag.
Desire for the heroine, fight and grab
Every time he studies a short drama, in addition to lamenting the sensitivity of the creator, he is often amazed that people can face their desires so calmly.
Based on the advantages of communication and timeliness, short dramas are more deeply cultivated in the sinking market than long dramas, and can follow the trend and iterate in a timely manner. Female frequency short dramas are closer to the drama market 10 years ago, mainly iron-blooded BG, and at the same time, the format is relatively healthy, and doing idol dramas will not be reversed.
Of course, with the awakening of women’s consciousness, even for romance novels and idol dramas, the audience’s needs are no longer limited to perfect boyfriends and CPs, but begin to care about the shaping of the heroine. The short drama is short in length and has few interfering factors, which can better fulfill the female-based narrative and the audience’s imagination of the heroine.
If the heroine’s setting is sharp and sharp, the male protagonist often does not intervene too much, and let her fight with her own hands and let her take revenge with her own hands. For another example, the male protagonist is willing to share resources and become an assistant to the female protagonist’s growth and career, and lines such as “support her to do what she wants to do” frequently appear in the mouths of different bosses.
Like in “The Wife with ulterior motives”, what makes the heroine, including the audience, fall in love with the boss is not that he maintains good physical strength and can spend 2 billion yuan to send an island, but that he recognizes the heroine’s ability and vitality and is willing to support her to climb up.
The short drama is more serious and infinitely caters to women’s desires. Whether it is studying the female condensation in erotic scenes, or making it the charm point of the heroine who fights and grabs.
This year’s 8th edition of “The Real Daughter in the Countryside is actually the Ancestor” (He Siyu X Xie Sanning) is an alternative story of the past and the present. The heroine is a noble daughter of a noble family, trained by the head of the family since she was a child, and did not panic after wearing it to modern times, the first reaction was “I am still the eldest daughter of the eldest daughter in my life”, and the second reaction was “According to the laws of this world, I can also fight for this property”.
After that, she used her house fighting accumulation and ancient knowledge to gain the appreciation of her grandparents, while actively learning modern knowledge and perfecting her skills to kill the Quartet.
Among them, the adaptation of Anne the Bear’s version is particularly sublimated. The heroine makes good use of the rules to bombard people, but she is also aware of the discipline of the old era, and at the end of the story, she did not accept the male protagonist’s marriage proposal, but recalled the suppressed ideal of “being a champion and a high official” when she was young, and was determined to show her ambitions in the new era.
It is worth noting that there is a big heroine without CP in this year’s short drama, that is, the 4th version of “Yun Miao” (the heroine has the same name) was filmed. The play is a supernatural suspense unit drama similar to “Soul Ferry”, and the protagonist constantly helps the souls solve their wishes. In terms of character, the heroine is similar to the enhanced version of Sito and Feng Baobao, but she looks like a young woman but is the ceiling of the whole play, and she is definitely not deflated.
Any middle-aged and elderly male and female partners who underestimate her because of the heroine’s appearance will eventually have to be torn into a ball of ugliness, kneeling down and crying for her help. The second is that the heroine is completely transcendent, and there is no need to fight and grab the sexual relationship, it is all others who rush to serve her.
At the beginning of the story, the noble old man rolled down from the hospital bed and called her Miss, and passed on his identity as “Miss’s Slave” to future generations. In the middle of the story, the old man’s grandson gradually becomes a slave. At the end of the story, as the heroine’s life experience unveils the tip of the iceberg, the eight people in the setting kneel on the ground to “welcome the return of the young lady”, and the descendants follow her.
All in all, the dream created by the short drama for female audiences in 2025 can be described as both male virtue and immorality, feudalism and progress. As an audience, Hard Candy Jun privately hopes that the “Cloud Miao” faction will develop and grow, and it is best to give a little confidence to the long drama industry. The left and right are dreaming, being blindly in love with a man who can’t be provoked, how can it compare to being a person who can’t be provoked!
