Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest one of Heated Rivalry
Dear Heated Rivalry fans,
oh yes, this post will be about this trending TV show, sorry…
I still have at least 3 topics/theories I want to discuss about Stranger Things. The first should explain why it was Holly who was abducted, another can partially explain why volume 2 felt so off and the third can give you hope that somewhere in the future Will and Mike will be together, it’s dark but the signs are there. Unfortunately I don’t have time ATM for those deep dives. Moreover, I’m not sure if anyone still wants to read anything like that after the final episode fiasco…
I was mourning the ending of ST for several weeks trying to make sense of it, but I started to be bombarded from several sides to watch Heated Rivalry. I had a plan to watch it but wasn’t really in the mood for any romance of any kind and went back to my standard comfort TV media - true crime documentaries. But if you receive tons of HR reels day after day staying spoiler free is almost impossible. So I gave in and finally watched it 4 days ago. Well… this post here is proof that it was indeed an extremely good decision. It had a healing effect on my soul and somehow I regained the trust for humanity (at least for a little while).
OK, enough of the intro, the reason why I decided to write this post is this:
Oh, I don’t mean the scene. I actually meant this:
Yep, that ginormous mirror Shane and Ilya sit in front of.
Although I didn't know exactly what it meant at the beginning I immediately had a feeling that that mirror is very, very important, that there was a reason they positioned the main characters sitting in front of that mirror. Then after watching the season finale I understood. That big mirror there is an intentional choice and is actually a message to us, the viewers. Yes, really! The thing is that the director (or whoever decided on it) could have let them stay sitting on those stationary exercise bikes or sit in front of them or wherever in that gym and it could be equally tense and hot. But they sit in front of a mirror. Not to mention, with this choice they had extra work with erasing the camera reflection from the mirror.
I noticed one thing, in general a lot of fans when analyzing any TV show or movie, when they find 2 scenes which are in a way similar to each other, these fans usually call them ‘parallels’. And even in the case of Heated Rivalry I already saw this happening. Fans could find a pair of scenes which they marked as ‘parallels’. However, in this case they actually are not parallels but mirrors! By positioning the 2 boys in front of that mirror the audience is specifically challenged to look for mirror scenes.
No wonder this scene takes place quite early in episode one. The main characters are already introduced to us, we have already understood that they will be rivals (if you didn’t get it before, then that cycling tournament of theirs definitely set their positions as professional athletes) and the scene where they sit sweating and heavily breathing should tell us about the nature of their personal lives. And at this moment the mirror was put in the scene.
A lot of times the term ‘parallel’ and ‘mirror’ for 2 connected scenes can be used interchangeably. But in the case of Heated Rivalry we work with two scenes which reflect on each other. Or rather the later scene reflects back on the earlier scene and it shows progress. And this can be applied to all the mirror scenes in this show. The first sets the time point in their relationship and the later scene shows how Shane’s and Ilya’s lives moved forward, how they grew as characters and what changed in their relationship. That’s why the mirror is there in that gym scene and why is so huge
Also, no wonder that all the ‘later’ scenes which reflect back are in the last episode!
Here is the scene that mirrors (reflects on) the gym scene:
They are lazily sitting on a couch in the cabin, their toes are causally touching, no tension between them anymore.
These are another two scenes mirroring each other:
Feet touching under the table - one during the press conference where Shane helps Ilya who is overwhelmed by the difficult question due to his language barrier and the second at Shane’s parents house where Ilya helps Shane overwhelmed due to his coming out to his parents.
But the 2 mirror scenes I want to write about in more detail are the ones introducing one of my favourite compositional tools, the ‘Rückenfigur’. A device used to invite the viewer to identify with the figure we only see from behind and experience what he ponders about and how he feels.
This is the first of the pair:
The first scene happens in episode 5 on the beach. At this point in the story none of them can deny what they feel for each other. They are sitting on the sand watching the waves of the sea and we see a space between them. They are in a public place and are known to be rivals so obviously they can’t sit close to each other, but the cinematography of this shot wants us to understand the distance that is between them in terms of their relationship. They still have a lot of things to figure out and they don’t know how it ends. Moreover, up until now they had to deal with everything by themselves. We are meant to ponder together with them about what will happen next, what they should do, what to do with their ‘situationship’. We also see that the pace between them is not empty, there’s a sun between them like a burning mass of millions of questions they still don’t know the answers to.
Another important detail is that the sun is setting as if it was marking an end of an era, as something new will come. And really, after this the hotel room scene happens where Shane comes out to Ilya as gay and Ilya opens up about his father, this is followed by the postfuneral scene with Ilya’s Russian monologue, Shane’s injury and the hospital scene, Scott’s public coming out and we finally end up in the cottage. But when they are in the cottage they still have a lot of things they need to talk about. Only after they put their hearts on the table and talked about everything thoroughly, even making a plan for the future, the mirror scene is shown to us.
BTW, notice also how it is Ilya whose fingers reach Shane’s and he accepts. This little detail is actually very important as well. It is a signal that Ilya is on his way to open up and seek help from Shane. That he will not run away from his feelings anymore.
So, in this mirror scene, when we compare it to the earlier one, we see that there’s no distance between them anymore as they sit on the rock watching the water. They are covered with a blanket as if merging into one entity. This empathises that they are a couple now (boyfriends). From now on whatever life brings them they will manage it together, figuring things out together. This doesn't mean that they are at the end of their journey, far from that (we still see them looking to the distance pondering and the sun is still there too) but now they are there for each other, helping each other.
Also, in contrast with the first scene, in this scene the sun is rising, a new day is starting, a new chapter in their lives.
I would say that these two mirror scenes cut the story into 3 parts: ‘we are dealing with everything ourselves’, ‘the avalanche and talking’ and ‘we are officially a couple now’.
Interestingly, the second scene starts with only Ilya sitting on the rock. Maybe this scene can be partially read as Ilya's POV. He was alone for a long time. Then Shane comes into the picture offering him a drink and a shoulder to lean on. He’s not alone anymore.
(BTW… drink, water… I have a hunch that there's something going on here in the subtext as well, but I have to do my second re-watch to be more sure, so maybe another post?)
Sometimes you don’t need any words to tell a story, just an amazing cinematography with two boys sitting next to each other in silence, their backs facing the audience, pondering about their lives…
Now, you tell me, did you catch the meaning of the mirror? How many mirror scenes have you found? What do they reflect on and what is the progress there? There are definitely more.
theartofmadeline
kaledo-art
tangentwithtanner
janainaart
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