Peacock Makes Its Move: Licensed ReelShort Titles and Original Verticals With Bravo Talent

Peacock just made its move.

The NBCUniversal streamer has launched microdramas using licensed ReelShort titles, while also developing original vertical series with Bravo talent. It is the first major U.S. streaming service to put the format inside its own app.

Not just a licensing deal

Licensing a few ReelShort series would be a cheap way to test whether Peacock’s audience watches vertical. Developing originals with Bravo personalities is something else. It means NBCUniversal is committing its own talent relationships and its own production resources to the format, and that it sees vertical as a product line rather than an experiment.

Bravo is a smart place to start. Its reality stars already have the on-camera skills and the audience loyalty that vertical leads need, and its storytelling runs on the same escalation the format does.

What it signals

A major platform is testing the format. For the companies that built vertical, Peacock is both validation and competition: validation that the format belongs on a mainstream streamer, competition for the talent and titles that have been theirs alone.

Which streamer do you think will be next? Netflix, Hulu, Prime Video, Max, Apple TV+? Netflix has already tested a twenty-episode microdrama of its own. The association’s expectation is that every service on that list will have a vertical offering within a year, and that the question for the industry is whether the people who make those titles come with the format or get replaced by it.