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In case you were wondering, it’s been almost three months since the final episode of Heated Rivalry aired on Crave and I am still in the throes of a feverish mania.
I’m aware that this can partly be attributed to the stranglehold grip of my social media algorithm and my cohort of fellow HR devotees, both of which feed me endless reels and memes and edits that only fuel the fire of my obsession. Some days it’s as if the only content that exists is Heated Rivalry content. (To quote the show’s Ilya Rozanov: “I don’t ever want that problem to ever go away.”)
As I frequently point out, I am not alone here in this glorious fan prison; the Canadian queer hockey romance is holding lots of people captive. That means money — it’s the No. 2 driver of new users to U.S. streamer HBO Max since the platform launched — and Hollywood is well aware of this.
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Of course, that means suits in boardrooms all over the world are scrambling to create new shows or movies that will capitalize on this moment, trying desperately to parse out just what exactly went into this series that made it resonate. Was it the hockey? The sex? The queer representation? The way it treats the romance genre seriously?
You can just imagine the pitch decks: What if you had more hockey, but less horniness — or vice versa? What if it’s sports-rivals romance, but not gay? What percentage of butts is the perfect number of butts?
Hear me out: What if it’s the same guys, but joined by a cartoon newspaper mascot?? (Free Press reporter JS Rutgers kindly combined my two passions in this image featuring our mascot Scoop.)
If this kind of mercenary approach to art results in more queer stories that centre love and happiness and acceptance, I am here for it.
But I also want new stories, not lukewarm rehashes or pale imitations.
Not only does lightning not strike twice, you also can’t expect to catch it in the same bottle. Heated Rivalry works for a lot of reasons (would you like tickets to my TED Talk?), but a huge part of it is the chemistry between lead actors Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams. That’s not something you can strategize in a boardroom or map out with AI. It’s alchemy, not marketing.
Another reason is that Storrie and Williams were essentially unknown before they took on these roles. There is something about experiencing a story through unfamiliar actors that lets them inhabit these characters entirely. They just ARE Ilya Rozanov and Shane Hollander; when the show debuted, no one watching was thinking about their previous roles or past scandals or who they were dating.
Don’t get me wrong — I want nothing more than for these two guys to have long and fruitful careers (it’s pretty much my entire personality at this point). But it would be nice if the success of a show featuring fresh faces inspired casting directors to take chances on new talent.
As a manager for writers and directors told Nicole Fell of Hollywood Reporter: “Heated Rivalry is something that all the algorithms say would never work — and it does.”
She agrees: “The most philosophical lesson Hollywood can learn is ignoring what everyone’s been told is a safe bet.”
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