I have a lot of thoughts about all of this like everyone else but this is the bit that made me have to barrel into the fandom like that weird sentient jug the Americans have - the way Ilya comes in and stands almost like he's in a military hearing or something.
You just KNOW Ilya stood like that in front of his father the horrendous abusive police guy. And you know he only heard awful awful things when he was there. So he defaults to 'this is how you stand in front of parents' and that's how he first enters the Hollander family. He lays his hand on Shane's shoulder and tries to help (is he trying to be funny with 'lovers'? Or does he not fully get the way the English word comes across?). He is willing to do whatever would help Shane in this moment. For some reason watching him stand there like a statue made me tear up.
Apparently the word “lovers” in Russian doesn’t have the negative connotations of the word in English. It just means two people who are in love, and also have sex.
On Connor Storrie’s excellent Russian in HR (from a linguist)
Ok it’s time to put my Russian and linguistics (and Slavic linguistics) degrees to work and tell you why Connor Storrie’s Russian and accent work in this show is so freaking good. (Links added for those who want more info about stuff.) Hey other linguists — I’m playing fast and loose with notation here, ok, we’re not doing phonemes and IPA.
We’re going to go over overall mouth shape, palatalization, lack of aspiration, vowel reduction, and intonation with examples from Ilya’s dialogue! I’m going to talk about this from the perspective of an English speaker learning Russian since that’s what Connor (and I) did. Here we go.
1. Overall mouth shape
Every language has what you could think of as its own neutral or resting mouth position (aka, basis of articulation). One way to think of this is what the “I’m thinking” noise is — in English it’s uhh, in Spanish it’s often ehh. In Russian it’s mmm or ehhh or ahhh. The other thing is that the mouth typically does not open as much vertically when speaking Russian as when speaking English, but rather wider (horizontally).
Connor is doing a good job of maintaining a more Russian resting position (and I have a theory that this is one of the reasons his face looks so different as Ilya).
You can see Connor doing this when he says “ehh no” to Shane about whether this is his first time with a man in episode 1.
Also when he’s yelling at Alexei during the funeral in episode 5, we get to see him head on speaking Russian for an extended time, and you can see he is opening his mouth wider but not taller.
2. Palatalization
Every consonant has a place of articulation in your mouth, aka a place where your tongue touches the inside of your mouth or is positioned so that the air flows or is stopped in such a way as to make the sound. Making sounds is all about changing how air flows through our vocal tracts (throat, mouth, nose).
For example, in English ‘t’ and ‘d’ are both alveolar sounds made by touching the tip of your tongue to the hard palate behind your teeth. In Spanish those same sounds are dental, so you touch the tongue to the teeth to make the sound. In Russian you touch the hard palate and the teeth at once - the sounds are dental and alveolar.
In Russian consonants are sometimes palatalized. This means that there is a regular version — for ‘t’, touching the tip of the tongue to the teeth and hard palate. For regular “l”, touching the tip of the tongue to the hard palate or right behind your teeth and resting the body of the tongue along the bottom of the mouth, etc.
Then some consonants have a palatalized version, which happens before certain vowels. You lift the middle of your tongue and use it as the point of contact with the roof of your mouth instead of the tip. So for palatalized ‘t’, the middle of your tongue touches the ridge of the hard palate, and the tip of your tongue moves down to rest behind your bottom teeth. For ‘l’, the same.
In Russian the distinction is meaning bearing. So mat (regular t) and mat’ (palatalized t)’ are different words (cursing and mother, respectively). Another explanation here. Here’s an IPA chart with animation and videos of sounds being articulated. Try clicking on the ‘t’.
Connor is doing this. He doesn’t hit every single palatalized consonant but I’d say he’s hitting 85-90% of them. It’s wild! He was clearly taught by sound/phonetically which is great. But Americans often have trouble learning palatalization as a meaning bearing sound difference (I know this because I’ve taught Russian many times and there are studies) and he’s knocking it out of the park for someone who doesn’t speak the language.
You can hear it in his very careful pronunciation of I love you to Shane in ep6 - palatalized consonants in this phrase are the t, b, l, and b and l together: я тебя люблю/ ya tebya lyublyu.
Also every time he says the word хрень/ khren’ (shit/fuck) - he says this in episode 1 on the phone with Alexei twice and in the monologue to Shane in episode 5. The kh, r, and n are all palatalized, he nails it.
He even gets it in some tricky spots:
In episode 1 on the phone with Alexei with the baby crying in the background, he says the words для/ dlya (for) and блядь/ blyad’ (fuck). These are both notoriously tricky for English speakers learning Russian because every single consonant is palatalized. He gets both right.
He says the word больше/ bol’she (more) a lot during his monologue to Shane in episode 5 and nails the tricky palatalized ‘l’ in the middle every time.
3. Lack of aspiration
In English we have some aspirated consonants. The means that when we say them we sometimes produce a little puff of air with them: p, t, k. The aren’t aspirated 100% of the time but we don’t use aspiration for meaning like some languages do (ex. In Hindi kal (no aspiration) and khal (aspirated k) are two different words (time, skin)).
In Russian these sounds (p, t, k) are not aspirated. It’s difficult for English speakers to pick up this difference a lot of the time because it’s so subtle and hard to self monitor when you’ve never had to do it before.
You can feel it by putting your hand or a piece of paper in front of your mouth and saying “tik tok” or “cat”, you’ll probably notice the little air puffs.
In Russian similar words have no aspiration-так/ tak (‘so’) and кот/ kot (‘cat’)
Connor is doing this pretty well. He struggles with non-aspirated ‘t’, which is pretty normal. He’s better with p and k.
The times his “okay” sounds really Russian? Not aspirating the k is part of that.
He does a good job not aspirating the k sound in fuck in English, which adds to his accent.
In episode 1 he asks Alexei on the phone (when the baby is crying) как папа/ kak papa (how is dad), and overall does a good job with not aspirating any of those k’s or p’s.
His non-aspiration is pretty good overall in the long monologue with Shane in episode 5.
In my experience as someone who learned Russian as a second language and then has taught it to others, it feels a little bit like swallowing back or speaking from the back of your mouth to avoid aspirating. Or try putting another sound in front of the aspirated letter. (ex. In English, peak vs speak - the p in speak is not aspirated)
4. Correct vowel reduction, mostly
In Russian, word stress affects vowel sounds. In the syllable that is stressed (emphasized), the vowel has its most typical sound. In all of the unstressed syllables around it, the vowel sounds “reduce.”
Ex. the word for milk is молоко/ ‘moloko’ and the last syllable “ko” is stressed/where you will put the emphasis. The other two o’s don’t sound like o’s as a result. Correct pronunciation of this word is more like muh-lah-koh. As you get farther from the stressed syllable in either direction, the vowels get more reduced (o reduces to “ah” and then ə (“uh”) when fully reduced). (Tricky note: in this word the first syllable, muh, isn’t as reduced as it could be because it’s first, so it gets a little boost from that.)
Connor is doing this pretty beautifully throughout. Even when the consonant palatalization or the vowel quality is a little off, he’s knocking vowel reduction out of the park, for the most part. I imagine this is because he learned it phonetically.
Every time he says отец/ otets (father), he correctly pronounces the ‘o’ as ‘ah’.
There are many good examples in episode 1, but here’s a couple that stood out to me — when he’s watching Shane speak French, he says просто отлично/ prosto otlichno (just perfect/excellent) and correctly pronounces it “prostuh ahtlichnuh”.
He says the word теперь/ teper’ (now) a couple of times, and correctly pronounces the first e more like i (и).
When he and Sveta are talking about the ASG and votes in episode 4 on the bed, he says голосовали/ golosovali (they voted) and correctly reduces all 3 o’s, since the syllable ‘va’ has the stress: “guhluhsahvali”
5. Intonation of questions, sentences
Something you might know about English is that yes/no questions have rising intonation, aka we contour our pitch/voices up at the end. Like if I asked you “do you know the way to the store?” I would raise my intonation/pitch at the end to indicate it is a question. We also use falling intonation but often differently from Russian.
In many of the situations where we use rising intonation in English (including yes/no questions), Russian uses falling intonation. So the question goes down at the end instead of up.
There’s more to it than this but you can hear Connor do this very clearly when he asks Svetlana questions.
In episode 5, he asks her if Shane is also mediocre when they’re talking about other players on the bed before the ASG. And he uses falling intonation perfectly.
In episode 2 he says “this year?” When Sveta is telling him he could win the cup that year. His intonation falls perfectly again - а этом году? / v etom godu?
He also says a word in ep1 that I don’t think gets translated (the subtitles say “speaking Russian”) and his intonation is just so good - Неужели/ neuzheli (really). (His palatalization here is also great!) He says it to Shane when Shane asked him not to tell anyone in the first hotel room together.
Anyway. Connor, as we know, is hitting it out of the park with his Russian, and here are some of the reasons why. He picked up palatalization, mouth position, non-aspiration, intonation, and vowel reduction!! Like, damn.
Hi! Sorry to bother you, but I’m writing a fic that has a fair bit of focus on language + identity and the (often incredibly humiliating) process of learning a language, and I have some questions about Russian, if you’re happy to answer!
Firstly, about the connotations / vibes of Я тебя люблю, because the internet is being very unhelpful. I’m mostly wondering about how much emotional weight it has, and what context it’s typically used. Can it be said fairly casually between family/friends etc, or only between couples? Also, is it said commonly between an established couple (like after we reach the “I love you” stage in English speaking cultures and start saying it casually at the end of phone calls and such) or is it a bigger deal and reserved for more serious/sincere moments? Google is just giving me the literal translation 😭😭😭
Also, if it isn’t too much to ask, I’d love some suggestions for some realistic mistakes that that Shane would probably make if he was learning Russian, both in terms of grammar and pronunciation.
In my fic he’s been learning for like 2 ish, and I’m writing him as decently experienced with studying languages — and as a neurotic perfectionist — so he’s been focusing on listening practice/comprehensible input and memorising vocab. He hasn’t been taking classes and he isn’t practicing speaking with native speakers (including Ilya, because he’s unwilling to subject himself to the mortifying ordeal of being bad at something in front of people). So he wouldn’t be making beginner beginner mistakes, but he’s far from good at it, and he definitely has a noticeable accent, albeit not an abysmal one. I’m mostly just looking for realistic ways I could describe his speech and skills.
Aaaa this turned into an incredibly long ask, apologies! And thank you for all the generous work you do helping us fic writers, I appreciate it so much 🩵
hello! no worries at all, i'm happy to help (anything to avoid my own scary wips oops)
(long ask warning, i am sorry people i genuinely cannot write anything under 1k)
i always get a little queasy when i get broad cultural/linguistic questions. at the end of the day, i am only one person who cannot represent the entirety of the post-soviet diaspora. i make sure to ask for my friends' (who are from the culture) input before replying to reduce the risk of personal bias as much as possible, but do keep in mind, this is informed by my own experiences.
generally speaking, 'я тебя люблю' (ya tebya lyublyu) is not something that is said very often. when it comes to home life and familial relationships, it is barely said at all. i can count on one hand the number of times my parents have said that they loved me, and i am certainly not alone in this. many of the friends i asked shared similar experiences, even those who have a good relationship with their parents. it's just not culturally appropriate. i have talked about this in my ilya rozanov analysis longpost, but to reiterate: people who grew up in the soviet union are very emotionally reserved and repressed. there is no talk of feelings or emotions, vulnerability is looked down upon, if not actively punished. it is not considered valuable. people were taught to move through life in this manner and then taught their children, who taught their children, etc. unfortunately, this can also apply to romantic and platonic relationships. younger generations can definitely be a lot more emotionally open, but it is still a skill you have to learn and develop on your own, so it's all a bit rocky.
so, as a rule of thumb: the full phrase 'я тебя люблю' is reserved for first confessions, serious/life-threatening situations, and instances that require intense vulnerability for successful communication. it holds A LOT of emotional weight; it cannot be used casually, like in english. to illustrate this idea better, i will give an example. when i read fic or romance novels in russian, i consider the love confession between the romantic interests as the most heightened point of catharsis in the entire story. not just because it is narratively cathartic, but because even simply reading the words 'я тебя люблю' on the page feels like a gut punch. your insides drop. i experienced something similar during my watch of ep6 of heated rivalry - not only did ilya say it, he said it multiple times. i thought i was going to die from how hard it hit me, most genuinely.
however, this does not mean that we never say 'i love you'. casual expressions of love do exist between friends and committed partners, but typically, people favor the shortened form: 'люблю тебя' (lyublyu tebya) or simply 'люблю' (lyublyu). this translates to 'love you' and 'love' respectively. these phrases are used a lot more casually; in text, at the end of a phone call, simply throughout the day. i find their use even more frequent in my platonic relationships than in romantic ones.
unfortunately, i've noticed that this cultural difference can sometimes create conflict in multicultural relationships. i'm not sure if this is generally the case, but i get the impression that in english-speaking countries and cultures, people aren't really keen on the 'love you'. i've witnessed multiple scenarios in which an english-speaking partner would get upset at the russian-speaking partner because they wouldn't say 'i love you' often enough. this typically confused the russian-speaking partner immensely. not simply because it doesn't come naturally. multiple of my friends have shared that saying 'i love you' too often is suspicious, and makes them doubt their partner - they perceive it to be performative, therefore treating it as manipulative or untrustworthy. they prefer their partner to express their affection through tangible actions, such as acts of service or gift-giving.
obviously, this doesn't apply to everyone, but i've seen this sentiment expressed fairly often. some people have more ease adapting, but still prefer saying 'i love you' only in english, or saying it casually only in english. this is the case in my relationship, and since ilya and i seem to have had a very similar upbringing, i like to think it would be easier for him to say 'i love you' consistently only in english. 'love' or 'love you' can make an appearance, for sure, but that's the extent of it. it would be interesting to have shane and ilya communicate about this and express their needs/cultural differences.
now, onto linguistics. i have to say what you're going for in your story is very ambitious if you don't speak the language, i'm afraid you will have to seriously familiarize yourself with russian grammar/phonetics to write speech mistakes accurately. i'm not going to give you specific examples of 'mistakes', because that's impossible; every speaker is different. but here are some tips that could help you construct realistic speech for shane (both phonetic and grammatical).
declensions. english-speakers learning russian struggle with them immensely, because the system of declension in russian is a lot more elaborate and complex than in english. almost every part of speech is declined: nouns, pronouns, adjectives, demonstratives, numerals, etc. if that wasn't hard enough, there are six grammatical cases, three grammatical genders and two grammatical numbers. english-speakers constantly forget or mix up their declensions, even if their general sentence structure is correct. study russian declensions, and have shane confuse them, forget about them, get them wrong.
intonation and word order. russian word order is a lot less rigid than in english. words can move around freely in a sentence (obv, there are exceptions), and nothing needs to move to form a question, you simply raise your intonation slightly. certain syntactic forms are more common than others, despite generally free word order. study word order variations in common russian phrases and have shane get them slightly wrong. not grammatically incorrect, but unnatural for a native. listen to the phrases and have him misplace intonation, raise his voice too much to form a question.
sounds. palatalized (or soft) consonants, which are extremely common in russian, are very difficult sounds for english-speakers to produce, because their place of articulation never occurs naturally in english phonetics. the alveolar trill /r/ might be a little bit difficult, but it's not uncommon in variations of english, so i don't think there's need to worry about it too much. other consonant sounds that english-speakers struggle with include voiceless and voiced retroflex fricatives (/ʂ/ and /ʐ/), as well as voiceless velar fricatives (/x/). certain vowels are also hard to produce, especially /ɨ/, /æ/ and /ɵ/. if you are a native english-speaker, look up the pronunciation of certain russian words and phrases and try to replicate them. note the sounds that you're struggling to produce and try your best to describe the sounds that do come out. then, incorporate your data into shane's speech. additionally, you could look up videos of english-speakers with russian as their L2, analyse their speech and sound production and comapre to a russian native.
i know this all sounds like a lotttt of work, but as a linguist, i cannot recommend anything less.
if you have any more questions, leave them in the comments!
Ilya Rozanov’s Impact As Representation of Queer Russians
alright here we go
this isn’t really structured as an essay, but is a detailed analysis
first of all, i need to establish that a lot of my points come directly from personal experience — i am a mixed race kid born in kazakhstan, half-russian and half-kazakh, raised primarily in russia. i am also queer myself, although i was raised as a woman (i am now agender). this analysis will heavily focus on cultural elements, because they are crucial for understanding the depth of ilya’s character and why he acts the way he does.
i was quite apprehensive about ilya initially — western film loves to portray russian people as a caricature and use them for tasteless gags without really examining anything in depth (I’m looking at you stranger things, yes, you). i was concerned heated rivalry would remain surface-level about ilya’s background and portray him as a stereotypical, cold-hearted russian dude. i was also concerned about his accent being too caricatural, concerned about the potential dialogue in russian (as a linguist, russian dialogue in western film is infamously stiff and unnatural. looking at you again, stranger things), so you can imagine my surprise and delight when all of those concerns ended up being unfounded.
to be completely fair here, ilya does sport some stereotypical character traits — he’s brash, confident, distant and unafraid to offend others. but in contrast to other russian characters in western film, ilya has a warm flirtatiousness that i haven’t really seen before. and most importantly, his characterisation doesn’t end there.
at first glance, it seems that ilya doesn’t face any struggles with his sexuality at all. he is experienced, confident, the leading man to shane’s anxious discovery of himself. in reality, ilya’s understanding of his sexuality is directly tied to his personal conflict with his family and his culture.
said conflict is introduced in the very first episode of the show. during the scene where he is being drafted as the new all-star player for the boston raiders, he is being watched over by his father, grigori rozanov. grigori is portrayed by an older actor, and sports a number of medals attached to his suit, which likely implies that he is a war veteran. it is also established later on that he is ‘police’, which, culturally, means that he’s very friendly with some big heads in the government, not that he is literally a police officer. it is a man with trauma, powerful and influential. even without external cultural context, you can already see the toxic and abusive power dynamic this creates between him and ilya.
in the scene, ilya’s facial expression is one of discomfort — he’s smiling very awkwardly, chewing at his lip, his eyes are darting around. this immediately stops as soon as his father speaks; he puts on a cold, serious mask. grigori dismisses his son’s achievements and insists that he needs a lot of discipline, otherwise he will become ‘lazy’ (he means this in a ‘he’ll start slacking off’ kind of way). afterwards, he addresses ilya directly, in russian, using a very condescending tone of voice, and instructs him to listen closely to what he’s being told. the exact phrasing he uses is best translated as ‘understood?’, which might sound more neutral in english but in russian has a slightly aggressive connotation. i’ve seen quite a few people expressing surprise when reacting to this scene and being confused as to why ilya’s father isn’t showing any pride. i regret to inform you that this dynamic is, unfortunately, very common for the culture, especially between a father and a son.
to explain it further, i’ll have to talk about the way i was raised a little bit. russian (or post-USSR region) parents are typically very strict, demanding and authoritative. they are often emotionally distant, neglectful or even outright abusive. i will require you to put your nuance caps on here, because this behaviour is not necessarily a product of malice, and more a product of cultural norms. showing emotion, whether positive or negative, is seen as a weakness. more so for men, but for women as well. you are taught very young that you have to keep your emotions to yourself — nobody wants to see it. i was scolded and punished very frequently for intense emotional displays as a child. Mother and Father would scold me for crying. Grandmother would scold me for laughing too loudly. looking too happy. your parents are your caretakers, perhaps, providing food and shelter, but you definitely aren’t expected to lean on them for more than that. in my experience, it wasn’t very common. what you are expected to do, however, is be productive. be successful. provide. this is your duty as a son or a daughter, and if you fail, you are no longer of any worth to these people. it is your duty to take care of your parents and siblings, not the other way around. because of that expectation, whether you are achieving something grand or not doesn’t matter — after all, you’re just fulfilling your duty as a human being. no matter how hard i worked, i don’t think my parents ever genuinely said they were proud of me. because there is nothing to be proud of, really. it’s what you have to do.
with this cultural context, grigori rozanov’s characterisation immediately lands as extremely accurate. all of those norms and expectations are expressed in a few sentences and we are immediately shown the way they impact ilya.
ilya is desperate for his father’s love and acceptance, but he knows he will never get it. because they do not exist.
i have more to say about grigori, but now, let’s focus a bit on ilya’s queerness.
ilya is initially portrayed to be very at ease with his sexuality — he leads shane during their encounters, he’s not afraid to flirt and come on strong. but there’s a lot of pain and repression lurking underneath, only it’s not as obvious to the naked eye.
despite what the russian government will have you believe, there are, of course, plenty of queer people in russia. how dangerous it is to be queer there has fluctuated over the years, but it has never been truly safe. it’s a part of yourself you’re forced to hide for years, if not forever. the physical aspects of queer sexuality are often discovered early on — boys fooling around with boys and girls fooling around with girls — (ik this is a little contrived but just for the sake of the point) but later on dismissed as one grows up. even if there is no shame, there’s an unspoken understanding that it can never become something more. you’d never be able to emotionally commit to each other, because it’s not simply dangerous, it’s life-threatening. it can only be this — heat and bodies and mouths clashing.
we learn in the first episode, first hand from ilya, that back in russia, he was regularly sleeping with his hockey coach’s son. he brushes it off as nothing serious when explaining to shane, but most likely, he treats most of his sexual encounters with other men as such. because how is he supposed to know that it could be something more? i find it really intriguing that he establishes this to shane, because it implies ilya is so drawn to him he almost unconsciously considers pursuing him more seriously. otherwise, he wouldn’t have said anything and proceeded with the hook-up regularly. there’s nothing to explain, because it can never be real, can it?
a lot of ilya’s emotional avoidance later on in the series is rooted in this unspoken belief. he runs from shane not because he doesn’t love him, but because he believes it can never be real. that they can never be a couple. this is something people do behind closed doors, in secluded corners, in secret. it’s not something to commit to, not a real, tangible possibility.
ilya is in the closet not because he’s necessarily afraid, but because he doesn’t expect to have other options. in russia, there weren’t any other options.
in addition to this, ilya is also emotionally repressed because of the way he was raised. there are many things on the table that he cannot knowingly treat as real possibilities, including expressing his true emotions, which makes it very difficult for him to be vulnerable with shane. the intimate and genuine side of him comes out mostly during sex, especially at the beginning, because it is the only time that it can.
this is why ilya only accepts shane’s invitation to the cottage after witnessing scott hunter kiss kip on national television — he is actively being shown that there are other options.
all of these feelings are incredibly familiar to me, as a queer person who grew up in russia. a lot of my own repression wasn’t always rooted in shame, but hopelessness. the knowledge that this was something you could never really have. it took years to deconstruct, the same way it took ilya years to be brave enough to chase after something he really wanted.
now, I’d like to talk about the concept of ‘duty’ that i introduced earlier some more. for this section, queerness and ilya’s personal trauma will overlap.
in russian culture, the concept of ‘duty’ doesn’t simply involve your family. it involves your entire being — your duty as a citizen of russia, your devotion to the country, to the collective entity. an example of it is the scene at the end of episode 1, where grigori tells ilya to ‘apologise to russia’ after losing his game. i’ve seen quite a lot of people say that this moment was exaggerated, but once again, i regret to inform you it is a very common phrase. because of the concept of duty that overlaps our entire lives, our personal failures are deemed as overarching disappointments to the country. we are not good enough to serve it, therefore we should apologise to it.
this abstract concept of duty affects multiple areas of ilya’s life. he feels obligated to keep giving money to alexei, because it is his duty to provide for his family. i’ve seen many reactors be confused as to why ilya was even entertaining him, but this is the piece of context they were missing. it is unthinkable to cut him off. you’d be betraying yourself, more than anything. ilya unquestioningly obeys his father (at least in his presence) because of the same sense of duty. he avoids his feelings for shane out of the same sense of duty — he couldn’t possibly leave russia to be with shane. he’d be betraying himself and his duty.
in episode 5, when shane attempts to have an open discussion about their feelings for each other, ilya is dismissive. he doesn’t want to be, but he sees no other way to go about it — duty, hopelessness and fear are all crushing him. shane, however, is able to reach through to him and ilya allows himself to be vulnerable. this marks the definite shift in their relationship, because shane’s love and gentleness overpower, if temporarily, every cultural bias poisoning ilya’s life and preventing him from reaching for his own happiness.
the scene of grigori’s funeral that comes later in the same episode cements that shift and is absolutely masterful. there is a lingering shot of grigori’s numerous medals, from ilya’s POV. the medals are a very clear representation of duty, and now, with the man supposed to be wearing them gone, the duty is as well. this allows ilya to consider never coming back to russia, because there is no longer any duty to uphold. alexei’s behaviour later on only drives him further to cut ties — the abstract duty has lost its meaning and no longer holds weight for ilya. he can pursue something he really wants, even if he’s terrified. svetlana’s reassurance also helps this a lot.
i don’t think ilya was genuinely considering committing to shane then and there. after all, you can’t just shed years of your upbringing in one day. but the seeds are all planted in that scene, and masterfully so.
ilya’s russian monologue to shane is my favourite scene in the whole show. I’ve written about it before on this blog, saying how the composition of the shot reminded me a lot of the subway station tunnels near my home in moscow. he’s encased by walls covered in graffiti, laying his heart out in what is essentially a box made of concrete. the overhead lights are reddish in tint (they’re usually bright clinical white), painting the scene with a sense of danger and tension. ilya can only confess his feelings to shane in a language he doesn’t understand because he is still scared and has little hope. he looks out at the scrap of city in the distance before gathering his courage to even say it in russian and we see a brief flare of a police car’s siren — doing this is still incredibly dangerous. but he goes through with it. other things ilya says in this monologue also directly correlate with my previous points — he talks about his duty for his family choking him, draining him. he gave them everything, like he was supposed to, but there was never any gratitude, never any warmth. because there wasn’t supposed to be. he feels guilt for betraying his duty by not being able to take care of his father on his deathbed. and it kills him. he wishes things were different. he wishes for genuine connection. but it was never going to be found there. that feeling, i know all too well…an incredible, character-defining scene for ilya. I cry every time I see it.
in the finale, ilya’s character development is incredibly cathartic and powerful. I cried (again) when I heard him confess first, whispering ‘ya tebya lyublyu’ into shane’s skin. for context, ‘i love you’ is not something we say very often. i don’t remember my parents saying it to me much, if at all. ‘i love you’ is reserved for extreme situations. it must have taken such strength of character for ilya to say it then and it hit me really hard. ultimately, what made him be able to express his genuine feelings was shane talking about plans for the future — together — something ilya previously thought impossible. hearing and seeing shane be willing to commit to him must have been so grand. did I already say i sobbed my eyes out for this?
in conclusion, i absolutely adore the way ilya’s character was portrayed in the show. his cultural background was respected and directly influenced his character’s choices. his conflict with his family was layered, complex and realistic. i really saw myself in him. he wasn’t at all a caricature. he had tangible growth and was able to leave behind the harmful biases of post-soviet culture. i’ve already seen a couple of people in the russian fandom express gratitude and satisfaction with ilya’s portrayal, and i couldn’t agree more. i didn’t expect it at all, but it was masterfully done.
if anyone has further questions, please leave them in the comments, i will gladly answer.
tagging you bc u said u wanted to read about it @torntrianglesleeves @two4dashow @voidcrumbs
You’ve heard of “making writing a habit,” and you’ve tried, but the pressure to write fills you with horrible pain and dread. You spend all your time wishing you could write but somehow never writing. The “make it a habit” approach doesn’t work for you. But you still want to write, maybe even regularly. Is there nothing you can do?
Here is an alternative approach to try. A rehab program, as it were, for writers with a psychological “writing injury” that has destroyed their desire to write and replaced it with shame, anxiety and dread.
If you have a writing injury, you probably acquired it by being cruel to yourself, by internalizing some intensely critical voice or set of rules that crushes your will to write under the boot-heel of “you should.” “You should be writing better after all the years of experience you’ve had.” “You should be writing more hours a day, you’ll never get published at this rate.” “You should write more like [Hilton Als/Jeffrey Eugenides/Octavia Butler/Terry Pratchett/etc.].” “You should write faster/more/better/etc./etc.”
You know what, though? Fuck all that. Self-abuse may have featured heavily in the cool twentieth-century writer’s lifestyle, but we are going to treat ourselves differently. Because 1) it’s nicer, and 2) frankly, it gets better results. My plan here is to help you take the radical step of caring for yourself.
1) First of all: ask yourself why you aren’t writing.
Not with the goal of fixing the problem, but…just to understand. For a moment, dial down all of the “goddammit, why can’t I just write?” blaring in your head and be curious about yourself. Clearly, you have a reason for not writing. Humans don’t do anything for no reason. Try to discover what it is. And be compassionate; don’t reject anything you discover as “not a good enough excuse.” Your reasons are your reasons.
For me, writing was painful because I wanted it to solve all my problems. I wanted it to make me happy and whole. I hated myself and hoped writing would transform me into a totally different person. When it failed to do that, as it always did, I felt like shit.
Maybe writing hurts because you’ve loaded it with similarly unfair expectations. Or maybe you’re a victim of low expectations. Maybe people have told you you’re stupid or untalented or not fluent enough in the language you write in. Maybe writing has become associated with painful events in your life. Maybe you’ve just been forced to write so many times that you can no longer write without feeling like someone’s making you do it. Writing-related pain and anxiety can come from so many different places.
2) Once you have some idea of why you’re not writing…just sit with that.
Don’t go into problem-solving mode. Just nod to yourself and say, “yes, that’s a good reason. If I were me, I wouldn’t want to write either.” Have some sympathy for yourself and the pain you’re in.
3) Now…keep sitting with it. That’s it, for the moment. No clever solutions. Just sympathize. And, most importantly, grant yourself permission to not write, for a while.
It’s okay. You are good and valuable and worthy of love, even when you aren’t writing. There are still beautiful, true things inside of you.
Here’s the thing: it’s very hard for humans to do things if they don’t have permission not to do them. It’s especially hard if those things are also painful. We hate feeling trapped or compelled, and we hate having our feelings disregarded. It shuts us down in every possible way. You will feel more desire to write, therefore, if you believe you are free not to write, and if you believe it’s okay not to do what causes you pain.
(By the way: not having permission isn’t the same as knowing there will be negative consequences. “If I don’t write, I won’t make my deadline” is different from “I’m not allowed not to write, even if it hurts.” One is just awareness of cause and effect; the other is a kind of slavery.)
4) For at least a week, take an enforced vacation from writing, and from any demands that you write. During this time, you are not permitted to write or give yourself grief for not writing.
This may or may not be reverse psychology. But it’s more than that.
Think of it as a period of convalescence. You’re keeping your weight off an injury so it can heal, and what’s broken is your desire to write. Pitilessly forcing yourself to write when it’s painful, plus the shame you feel when you don’t write, is what broke that desire. So, for a week (or a month, or a year, or however long you need) tell yourself you are taking a doctor-prescribed break from writing.
This will feel scary for some folks. You might feel like you’re giving up. You might worry that this break from writing feels too good, that your desire to write might never return. All I can say is, I’ve been there. I’ve had all those fears and feelings. And the desire to write did return. But you gotta treat it like a tiny crocus shoot and not stomp on it the second it pokes its little head up. Like so:
5) Once you feel an itch to write again—once you start to chafe against the doctor’s orders—you can write a tiny bit. Only five or ten minutes a day.
That’s it. I’m serious: set a timer, and stop writing when the time’s up. No cheating. (Well…maybe you can take an extra minute to finish your thought, if necessary.)
Remember: these rules are not like the old rules, the ones that said, “you must write or you suck.” These rules are a form of self-care. You are not imposing a cruel, arbitrary law, you are being gentle with yourself. Not “easy” or “soft”—any Olympic athlete will tell you that hard exercise when you’ve got an injury is stupid and pointless, not tough or virtuous. If you need an excuse to take care of yourself, that’s it: if you’re injured, you can’t perform well, and aggravating the injury could take you out of the competition permanently.
For the first few days, all of the writing you do should be freewriting. Later, you can do some tiny writing exercises. Don’t jump into an old project you stalled out on. Think small and exploratory, not big and goal-oriented. And whatever you do, don’t judge the output. If you have to, don’t even read what you write. This is exercise, not performance; this is you stretching your atrophied writing muscles, not you trying to write something good. At this stage, it literally doesn’t matter what you write, as long as you generate words. (Frankly, it would be kind of weird and unfair if your writing at this point was good.)
6) After a week, you can increase your time limit if you want. But only a little!
Spend a week limiting yourself to, say, twenty minutes a day instead of ten. When in doubt, set your limit for less than you think you’ll need. You want to end each writing session feeling like you could keep going, not like you’re crawling across the finish line.
Should you write every day? That’s up to you. Some people will find it helpful to put writing on their calendar at the same time each day. Others will be horribly stifled by that. You get to decide when and how often you write, but two things: 1) think about what you, personally, need when you make that decision, and 2) allow that decision to be flexible.
Remember, the only rule is, don’t go over your daily limit. You always have permission to write less.
And keep checking in with yourself. Remember how this program began? If something hurts, if your brain is sending you “I don’t wanna” signals, respect them. Investigate them, find out what their deal is. You might decide to (gently) encourage yourself to write in spite of them, but don’t ignore your pain. You are an athlete, and athletes listen to their bodies, especially when they’re recovering from an injury. If writing feels shitty one day, give yourself a reward for doing it. If working on a particular project ties your brain in knots, do a little freewriting to loosen up. And always be willing to take a break. You always have permission not to write.
7) Slowly increase your limit over time, but always have a limit.
And when you’re not writing, you’re not writing. You don’t get to berate yourself for not writing. If you find yourself regularly blazing past your limit, then increase your limit, but don’t set large aspirational limits in an effort to make yourself write more. In fact, be ready to adjust your limit lower.
When it comes to mental labor, after all, more is not always better. Apparently, the average human brain can only concentrate for about 45 minutes at a time, and it only has about four or so high-quality 45-minute sessions a day in it. That’s three hours. So if you set your daily limit for more than three hours, you may be working at reduced efficiency, when you’d be better off saving up your ideas and motivation for the next day. (Plus, health and other factors may in fact give you less than 3 good hours a day. That’s okay!)
Of course, if you’re a professional writer or a student, external pressures may force you to write when your brain is tired, but my point is more about attitude: constant work is not necessarily better work. So don’t make it into a moral ideal. We tend to think that working less is morally weak or wrong, and that’s bullshit. Taking care of yourself is practical. Pushing yourself too hard will just hurt you and your writing. Also, your feelings are real and they matter. If you ignore or abuse them, you’ll be like a runner trying to run on a broken ankle.
I know I’m going to get someone who says, “if you’re a pro, sometimes you gotta ignore your feelings and just get the work done!”
NO.
You can, of course, choose to work in spite of any pain you’re feeling. But ignore that pain at your peril. Instead, acknowledge the pain and be compassionate. Forgive yourself if pain slows you down. You are human, so don’t hold your feet to the fire for having human limitations. Maybe a deadline is forcing you to work anyway. But make yourself a cup of hot chocolate to get you through it, literally or metaphorically. Help yourself, don’t force yourself. If you’ve had a serious writing injury, that shift in attitude will make all the difference.
In short: treat yourself as someone whose feelings matter.
Inspired by @monkeysnplaybills, my logic puzzle of characters from @exactphoify's "The chips are set to fall." Do not ask how long I spent on this (but it was fun!). Spoilers ahead, of course!
A few disclaimers:
The Status variable isn't entirely accurate since we know that unnamed players from the list have retired, but I kept it anyway (in future I'll probably just record known retirements and leave the others ambiguous instead of marked "Active").
When years are marked, 2017- means the event happened in 2017 of the 2017-2018 season. If the event happened in 2018 of the 2017-2018 season, it's marked -2018.
I did this via one (1) re-read of the fic, and when I started I wasn't entirely sure what I was tracking and what I wasn't, so I'm sure there are inconsistencies and things I'm missing. If you want to catch any of them, I guess you'll just have to read the fic...
One of the things about Heated Rivalry that always struck me a little bit odd is that Shane is by far the more terrified of the two about their relationship becoming public. Ilya would lose his ability to ever return to Russia. That seemed much more significant.
Last week, Jason Robertson, the Dallas Stars’ half-Filipino left winger, who leads American players in the NHL in points this season, got left off the USA’s roster for the Milan Olympics.
And this, finally, has helped me understand Shane’s fear. Let me explain. (also look at both these cuties).
By all accounts and statistical measures, Jason Robertson is an attacking powerhouse. He’s tied for 9th in total points (goals + assists) this season, but is the top American, and he’s 4th overall in goals scored. He’s a damn good hockey player and seems like he could be a helpful guy to have on your team if the goal is to win six straight hockey games by as large a margin as possible.
US Olympic GM Bill Guerin spoke about wanting to build a roster that's a “true team” and not just an “All-Star” team. He’s talked about prioritizing physicality, which tbh is an unhinged choice, considering referees in international hockey permit way less physical contact than the NHL.
This Guerin character seems like an ass, and, oh, his implicit racial biases are showing.
Indeed, the Hockey Graphs blog did an in-depth analysis of racial bias in hockey scouting, called “Racial Bias in Drafting and Development: The NHL’s Black Quarterback Problem”. Though, as the title suggests, this report is largely focused on bias against Black hockey players, the analysis compares scouting report language used to describe white, Black, and Asian players.
“Asian players were much more likely to be cited than Black players for their hockey IQ, while Black players were significantly more likely to be cited for their athleticism (particularly size and strength).
If we drill down by comparing players of Asian and Black descent to White peers of similar rankings at the same position on [Central Scouting lists, we find a similar bucketing of skills sets.”
Even though Jason Robertson is 6’3”, even though his defensive statistics are somewhere between average and excellent, Guerin clearly perceives him as not being “physical” enough.
So, in short, racism is why Jason Robertson is not going to the Olympics with Team USA.
And this racism is exactly why Shane and his mom work so hard to associate Shane with old-school luxury, and its incumbent whiteness, in his endorsements.
It’s why Shane pushes himself to be perfect. Because he has to be the best, at everything in hockey, or the doors won’t even open for him.
It’s also probably why Shane is drafted second. Why Shane wins rookie of the year, but Ilya wins MVP.
If this blatant racism is still happening in hockey in 2026, I can only imagine how much worse it was in the 2000s and 2010s timeline of the show. Shane’s professional life, his professional success, in a racist hockey landscape relies upon his difference, his Asian identity, fading out of focus for the white men in power.
Jason Robertson’s Olympic snub illustrates that being “too Asian” might’ve been enough to harm Shane’s career. Shane must then have viewed being both Asian and gay as an absolute death knell to his involvement in hockey.
Obsessed with how Shane only ever acts grumpy and spoiled with Ilya and his parents. He's brattier and singularly foul mouthed with Ilya, of course, they're peers and Ilya is an asshole. But he literally never calls anyone else insults throughout the books or the show. He's like, oh look at me, I'm Mr. Hockey, Mr. Canada, I'm the best sportsman you will find on this planet :) and he sees Ilya and he's like "fuck you, you asshole!!!" While turned on to a 100. I also love that he gets so snappy with Ilya. He's like, well why aren't you doing exactly what I would have done in your place?! And Ilya's like :/ omg you needed to undress YESTERDAY. Shane's so nice to Rose, so gentlemanly. He looks at Ilya and goes ":) well I'm gonna fucking kill you! :))" like he's SUCH a little brat and he doesn't have to hide it with Ilya because Ilya loves it. Ilya wants him like that. And how dare Ilya complain anyway? He should be doing whatever Shane wants him to do.
currently obsessed w the idea of hollanov rough housing and wrestling like ALL THE TIME
bc while yes they r sweet and soft and tender w one another they are also boys at heart and incredibly jock4jock
they’re running down the hallway with each other in a headlock after dinner w yuna and david laughing and pushing at each other until they accidentally knock a picture off the wall and yuna has to put them in a time out
two grown 6” tall , 200 lb professional athletes sitting in a corner pointing fingers at each other and blaming the other for getting them in trouble
When Ilya moves to the Centaurs he doesn’t get to keep his number. Some old fuck on the team already has it and refuses to trade, no matter how much Ilya bribes him.
so, in true Ilya Rozanov fashion, he picks the number 24. People think he did it to be an asshole, which is true, but he also did it to have Shane with him all the time. Shane was both infuriated and touched by it.
but then of course, years later, SHANE transfers to Ottawa. And lo and behold, the old fuck who had number 81 retired, so when Shane has to choose a number?
81 is available.
so the first day of training, Shane walks into practice in a jersey that says Hollander, 81, with an absolutely shit-eating grin on his face.
You know, as much as I'm a fan of horror and time loops, the absolute funniest interpretation I've seen of Dracula Daily is the one that goes that Jonathan Harker is fine and healthy and happy, he's just telling this story to his grandkids. Again. Because they love hearing the Vampire Story.
there are many reasons why bruise kink is a big fat win for hollanov. but v important is that, though leaving identifiable sex marks is expressly forbidden by the Homophobic Powers That Oversee Shane's Anxiety, if shane shows up to metros optional morning skate with the same bruise on his obliques that everyone saw yesterday after the game, but today its aggravated, pulsing purple and red and maybe abraded in spots, that's literally fine. they're just gonna think he slept on it wrong or the bruise got worse over night. classic. normal. happens every day to every man in homoerotic ice life.
they will NOT ☝ think that the bruise is aggravated because ilya put his mouth on it and sucked at it for an hour (until shane sobbed like a hurt lil coyote and came so hard he sorta blacked out), to complete the check ilya began during the game by putting shane into the boards in the first place and causing this beautiful bruise (foreplay)! but that is what happened (what they planned) 😌 and this IS how we get all of the benefits without any of the worries. soothing possessive pain kink for hungry coyote and his tundra predator. in public and private. so considerate. so mindful. so hockey. so eviscerating.
turnnoffyourmind
prguitarman
theartofmadeline
izzy806
gummygunk
baratheonpilled
