Is the Feature Film Still the Brass Ring?

In the past few weeks, we’ve seen a bunch of AI filmmakers announcing feature films.

Amazing.

The big one: Gossip Goblin, the YouTube AI outfit run by Zack London, is putting an AI-generated feature in actual theaters this fall. Not a trailer. Not a proof of concept. A ticket, a seat, a run. And he’s not alone. There’s a whole wave of it right now, from indie creators you’ve never heard of, to Dave Clark’s Promise, to Darren Aronofsky.

This isn’t just momentum. It’s proof of concept.

When I started this Substack, the AI feature film was the brass ring. The moment somebody would reach up, grab it, and prove the whole thing was real. Now, it’s happening.

I’m chasing it a different way.

When I started out making indie films back in the ‘90s, anything less than a full-length feature film felt like a failure. A betrayal, almost. Then television had its renaissance, premium episodic storytelling became the apex predator of the whole business, and the feature quietly stopped being the only mountain worth climbing.

I think we’re at another one of those moments.

My new project, The Kronos Conspiracy, is technically a feature. Or it will be. I’m telling it in two-to-six-minute episodes, one at a time, and when they’re all out I fully intend to assemble them into a feature-length film. I’m sure lots of creatives are approaching projects the same way. That’s not news.

What I find interesting here is that the form of the finished piece has begun to feel secondary. It’s almost beside the point whether it’s a feature, a TV series, or a run of webisodes. There are differences to each form, obviously, but none of them feel invalid to me anymore. None feel better or worse than the other. None of them has a monopoly on art (or on slop).

All of them are valid ways to create and consume high-quality media in 2026. And that’s cool. That’s another roadblock coming down. Another barrier to entry, broken. A step towards a world where the quality of the content is what matters, not where you get it or what shape it takes.

As for me, I’ve got a big story to tell, and I’m telling it scene by scene, moment by moment, and releasing it as I go.

It’s liberating, and feels every bit as valid as making a whole feature and showing nobody a single frame until it’s done.

Nothing against the people doing it the other way. It’s badass. I love that it’s happening. I just find it freeing to not think that way.

Which brings me to episode two, which I just published to YouTube.

Episode one was the prologue. The man, the masks, the setup. Episode two is called The Body, and it’s where the world cracks open.

A scientist is dead at a billionaire’s research facility. They said he fell. Our man doesn’t buy it. And to tell you why, he hides behind AI masks and uses AI “recreations” to tell his story.

Part of the story is how he tells it.

The tools aren’t the subject. They’re just how he, and I, tell the thing.

I’m having fun here… hope you come with me on the journey.

If you missed episode 1, start here:

And if you’re ready for episode 2:

#AI #Filmmaking #Storytelling #GenerativeAI #IndieFilm #YouTube

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