From broken contracts and ghosted producers to abusive communication and shockingly unprofessional editorial oversight, a growing number of creators are sounding the alarm about Chinese-based vertical content company DramaWave — with claims that paint a disturbing picture of how some companies are abusing the global gold rush of short-form drama.
Dozens of anonymous accounts, now corroborated by former collaborators and internal team members, suggest a clear and repeated pattern: start production prep, overwork creators for free, then ghost them — or worse, demand unpaid revisions and withhold final payments.
“You’re their slaves during pre-production,” one producer told us. “They call you at 11pm for script notes. Then once they cancel, they pretend they never approved anything.”
💸 Contracts? Ignored. Payments? Delayed. Apologies? Never.
Multiple sources say DramaWave initiated full pre-production on projects — complete with casting, location scouting, and scripting — only to cancel last-minute and refuse compensation for the prep work already done. In some cases, signed contracts were allegedly torn up unilaterally, without apology or explanation.
“Not only did they ghost us after we cast and budgeted the project,” another producer shared, “but when we followed up, they casually said they’d already moved on to another company — while still negotiating with us.”
A disturbing theme? Classic bait-and-switch. Teams say they were given approvals, then suddenly accused of making unauthorized decisions. Approved actors, outlines, and scripts were later “denied” by the company — as if the greenlights never happened.
🧨 Editorial Whiplash: Conflicting Notes, Ever-Changing Editors
One of the biggest pain points reported? Absolute chaos on the script side.
Sources claim internal editors at DramaWave often contradict each other, creating impossible revision cycles. Approved outlines were thrown out, revised per one editor’s direction, then scrapped again when a new editor took over.
“It’s like trying to write for three bosses who all hate each other,” one writer said. “There’s no editorial leadership — just confusion, ego, and blame-shifting.”
Even worse, one account says a non-English-speaking editor was providing notes on English scripts — by running them through AI back-translation tools and grading them based on how well they aligned with the original Chinese draft.
“You can’t localize or rewrite when your notes are being generated by ChatGPT reverse translations,” the writer explained. “It’s insulting and dangerous.”
🔒 Withholding Pay. Slashing Budgets. Ghosting Writers.
It doesn’t stop with ghosting. One filmmaker says they only received their first payment on Day 3 of production — meaning they had to front 40% of the budget out-of-pocket.
Another claims they were promised a final payout of $90K — but were paid only $60K, with no reason given. The missing $30K? Gone.
“I had to get loans from my family just to keep the production going,” they said. “Then they blamed me for problems they created. It was humiliating.”
Several writers claim they delivered full outlines and scripts — in some cases 30+ episodes — without ever receiving a dime.
“It’s the first time in my life I’ve written entire seasons of television and gotten zero pay,” one screenwriter said. “They just said, ‘We’re not moving forward,’ and vanished.”
📣 Platforms, Take Note — This Cannot Stand
DramaWave isn’t the only platform being called out — but it’s fast becoming one of the most infamous. Several of the platforms DramaWave claims to work with (Vigloo, ReelShorts, Kalos, Candy Jar, Gatorade) are being urged to reconsider their partnerships.
Why? Because vertical platforms cannot scale on exploitation.
This new frontier of storytelling deserves better — and the people actually making the content deserve to be paid, respected, and protected.
Platforms: vet your partners. Producers: protect your teams. Writers: demand contracts and fair terms.
