2025 Female Director’s Grant: Ellen Su
Ellen Su
Congrats to the next recipient of the Female Director’s Grant!
The grant aims to support and elevate the voices of female filmmakers who are committed to telling diverse and underrepresented stories through animation. Learn more about it here.
Ellen is a Chinese American artist that has held a variety of roles in the animation industry, including animated commercial director, adjunct professor at the School of Visual Arts, and the Head of Recruiting at Titmouse.
Check out her work here: https://www.ellensu.tv/
Ellen shares with us a little about her journey into pursuing her dreams: creating an anime.
Can you tell us a little bit about the project?
The logline goes: A Chinese American teenager, who feels abandoned by her divorced parents, is willing to face the wrath of Heaven, Hell and everything in between in order to save her best friend: a magic dog.
The magic dog is inspired by my favorite Chinese mythical creature called the Pi Yao (or Pixiu in Mandarin) which is known for fending off evil spirits and bringing their master great fortunes. And so, we have this super powerful creature that everyone wants, but what if its master is a lonely teenage girl instead of the Emperor of Heaven? The tone is action comedy in a monster mystery of the week format, a bit like Supernatural x Mob Psycho 100 and I’m having a lot of fun boarding all the ridiculous dog antics that will occur.
Also I’m hiring (thanks to this grant)! So if you’re interested in working with me, please submit an application here.
A picture of a young Ellen holding a beloved Scooby Doo plushie, posing with her dad.
What inspired you and why did you want to tell this story?
Firstly, I wanted to put all the things I deeply love into the show, which are action-comedy anime, kung fu films, supernatural mysteries and DOGS (as you can see from this embarrassing photo of me with my dad from the 90s). And then the other thing I’ve made my lifelong journey is researching and improving upon my communication skills in order to deepen my relationships with the people in my life, whether it be with family, friends, co-workers or doggos.
As a first-generation immigrant from a broken household where healthy communication wasn’t an acquired skill and everyone was always busy working, I was raised by TV and books. It was there that I could escape my reality for a little while and it was there I found my mentors, learned about things like true friendship, found families and never giving up. I know the power that media has to teach viewers important life lessons, so I wanted to put what I’ve learned into this.
My relationship with my parents hasn’t always been the best, but by putting in the work, not giving up and being willing to take feedback, we’ve all grown tremendously over the years. A social worker from Hong Kong once told me, in Chinese culture, teaching someone is to yell at them. They might want you to do well in school, but what comes out of their mouth is, “Why are you so lazy?” or “Why are you so stupid?”
It’s not a healthy way to create meaningful bonds between people, and I hear the regret in older Asian people I’ve interviewed. They want to be closer to their kids, but they have no idea how to approach it because no one taught them.
I realized with my own mother, the way she was talking to me was directly passed down to her by her mother. But once she was exposed to other ways of communicating, through my American friends or my husband’s family, when she had the exact language modeled for her consistently, she started adjusting her communication style.
These days I finally feel close to my parents, and they’ve shown me old dogs can learn new tricks (heh), so if I could put these examples into a show, maybe I can help other people adjust their own communication styles and connect better with the people they care about.
What does receiving this grant mean to you?
Receiving the grant really took me by surprise, and I am eternally grateful to Shannon and Chris Prynoski for their support.
Prior to this, I had made the difficult decision to leave a safe and secure position at Titmouse as their Head of Artistic Recruiting in order to pursue this project and solidify myself as a narrative director. The hardest part of being an independent creator is to maintain confidence that what you are doing is good and worthy.
The grant is a sign that I’m on the right path and a huge boost in confidence. I’ve spent a lot of years volunteering my time for nonprofits, and I love mentoring and lifting others up, but it’s just really nice to be the one lifted up for once. I can’t wait to spend all the money on hiring the amazing talent that is available right now in the industry to bring this vision to life! Let’s get to work!
The shorts Ellen are producing are set to release later this year in Fall 2025 and just a reminder, she is currently hiring! You can follow her journey on her social media: Instagram | Twitter | LinkedIn
