Why aren't there many jdramas on Netflix?

Literally having this discussion in my kpop/ jpop culture class and Japan is really doing itself a disservice by being so stringent with their copyright laws. Yea you're making money but imagine how much more you could make with international fans. That whole aspect of it being "too Japanese" is just a cop-out.

 Takkatan:

Well, I don't agree with the perception that there aren't many Japanese flms and drama's to watch. It all depends of where you live and which platforms do you use to watch your drama's/films.

I use Netflix and the Dutch version of it does offer me an abundant choice of Japanese films, J-drama's and even Anime to watch.  Some J-drama's are really great!

There is some choice, yes but it's not as significant compared to Korean stuff and most of the Japanese stuff was offered on various other websites before (like Viki or DramaFever) and it's likely Netflix and Amazon scooped up the international streaming rights for cheap.

And like you say - a lot of it is anime which isn't my cup of tea.

I don't know how well The Naked Director is doing but that's the only recently created high profile Japanese show I can think of to come out on a streaming service with English subtitles.

 ShotaSidePart:

Literally having this discussion in my kpop/ jpop culture class and Japan is really doing itself a disservice by being so stringent with their copyright laws. Yea you're making money but imagine how much more you could make with international fans. That whole aspect of it being "too Japanese" is just a cop-out.

I do feel like Japanese TV is too Japanese for me. Or at least the Japanese TV that gets subtitles is too Japanese. There are of course exceptions and I don't mind things in small doses but Japanese TV feels 'extra'.  A lot of stuff that gets subtitled seems to be "based on this popular manga(? graphic novel)" and the characters seem more like caricatures than characters I would get invested in. I can definitely watch a movie because it's short enough but a TV show? Those are hit or miss because the first few episodes rarely get me invested in the characters and their stories.

I'm not saying you can't enjoy Japanese TV and people outside of Japan can't enjoy it... just that there's not enough interest or wider audience for it to gain wider traction to the point where we get 10-20 Japanese dramas brought into the streaming catalogue of Netflix US each year.

There is a reason Korean dramas are far and away the most popular. A reason Netflix has an entire production team and headquarters in Korea to sign Korean dramas and bring them international. Disney Plus is expanding to Korea in the next year or two and I would imagine given the "safe" and "family" nature of most Korean dramas they might try to sign or produce Korean dramas as well.

Outside of The Naked Director I can't really think of a major project from a non-Japanese streaming company despite many of them having a presence in Japan. There's just very little interest in bringing live action Japanese TV to an international audience and it's not all on Japan being inward looking and not caring about an international audience.

The Naked Director it's already available on the Dutch Netflix. Didn't start to watch it yet (only watch the trailer).

Thank you Momochan for the VPN tip.

 Knavery:

there's not enough interest or wider audience for it

I would love to see a source for this because it sounds like straight up bs to me. Just because you find their tv "too Japanese" doesn't mean international fans won't gravitate towards it. I'm not Japanese but I love their content. Yes sometimes their content goes over my head, but it's happening less and less because I watch more and in doing so I'm educating myself in the process. Ingesting Japanese content just takes more "work" but is still enjoyable. 

 ShotaSidePart:

I would love to see a source for this because it sounds like straight up bs to me. Just because you find their tv "too Japanese" doesn't mean international fans won't gravitate towards it. I'm not Japanese but I love their content. Yes sometimes their content goes over my head, but it's happening less and less because I watch more and in doing so I'm educating myself in the process. Ingesting Japanese content just takes more "work" but is still enjoyable. 

Fair enough but Viki, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and others have voted with their budgets for licensing international content and Japan live action ranks at the bottom.

From my view there's a clear hierarchy of popularity in terms of Western audiences (Eastern audiences KDramas dominate) and it plays out on the content offered on various streaming platforms:

1. Japanese anime

2. Korean dramas

3. Chinese dramas

4. Thai dramas

...

X. Japanese live action dramas

You could argue another reason Japanese live action gets so little traction is because unlike Korea and China... there's no concerted effort to push Japanese TV shows abroad. Korean 'culture' didn't just happen to explode internationally. It took a decade of work by the Korean government, Korean movie & TV producers making a concerted effort to make their dramas approachable to international audiences and pushing content out there while supporting subtitling efforts. You could say the same about China aggressively pushing their culture abroad from those Confucius Institutes to TV shows to "travel to China" vacation seminars. 

Japan by extension has never aggressively marketed itself, the government & TV/movie producers haven't worked together for decades to push their culture abroad. If you read some of the literature from Japan it's actually really interesting and arrogant. There's this "ha, we don't have to do what the Koreans do and export our TV shows!" attitude especially from NHK.