nerding over stuff

Nerdy girl watches TV! And movies. And reads. And writes. Also, cats.

[crisshex88]

Buffy The Vampire Slayer

by Kevin Wada

[lavenderprose]

To be clear. Shane's whole thing about Ilya being a Sex God is because of the limerence. Ilya is nineteen and he can get a rhythm going and that's about it. He was throwing shit at the wall when he hit that 'Get on your knees' in Nashville but only he knows that because Shane's brain turned OFF. Ilya said "Let's do a little experiment here" and the results were "Oh my god oh my god oh my god." Shane came hands free because he was that obsessed with the idea of Ilya Rozanov being inside him. Ilya said "Do you like that do you like that" because he's nineteen and he needs the validation and Shane was like "YES YES YES I LIKE IT OH MY GOD YOU'RE SO DEEP YOU'RE SO GOOD" and objectively. It was okay. Ilya fully did not know where to put his hands a couple of times. He forgot about Shane's dick. Luckily, Shane is God's special angel who can come from the idea of Ilya's cockhead being in proximity to his prostate a few times. Mind over matter, says Shane Hollander's dick. And then Ilya said "Oh God Hollander" because it was also, objectively, one of the hottest things that had ever happened to HIM, Ilya Rozanov. Shane sits on that step afterwards plotting about how he's gonna get this over and over and over again for the rest of his life and he has no idea that there are women in Boston who have Ilya listed in their contacts as "Hockey Guy 6/10". Shane Hollander cannot fathom a world in which Ilya Rozanov doesn't lay the maddest pipe this side of Lake Michigan. "Ilya Rozanov is a some kind of nineteen year old sex God" No Shane honey he was just designed in a lab to score goals and make you cum and he's done scoring goals for the night.

[blacksheepcolorfulskin]

[mechinaries]

whatever you say bucky

[drawballa]

Sleepy boys 💤

[yuqis-ifty]

Shane's struggle with his sexuality being so wildly misunderstood in fandom spaces among people who haven't really struggled with their sexuality makes me so mad. Yes, it does take years even while you have sexual and sometimes even romantic feelings indicating very clearly that you are queer. Yes, you can have feelings for people and have no idea or chalk it up to some other type of attraction. Yes, you can have a good or decent enough support system that wouldn't give you up just for who you are and still be deeply terrified of them ever finding out. This happens to so many people, and it doesn't get easier. Even if Shane Hollander didn't have nearly as much to lose with confronting his sexuality or coming out as he does in canon, even if he team would've been supportive and the man he was in love with wasn't also very much at risk, it would still be very hard, and you should be able to sympathise with something so common among queer people.

[laurenbknewyouweretrouble]

One day post TLG, Harris has the Cens doing a video for social media, it’s a competition for who can keep a straight face while the others try to make them break with a smile or a laugh.

Towards the end, only Ilya remains. No one can break him, so they go get Shane. He’s got a little smile while they explain and he starts thinking of what to say. Of what he can say for a video going on the internet.

He hesitates, because he knows what he wants to tell Ilya, but keep it their secret. No one else needs to know what this was about, but he’s saved this tidbit, waiting to play it at the right time. Ilya’s steeling himself. He loves Shane and usually would smile with him just in the room, trying do be earnest about anything, but he won’t let his husband break him for this. Finally Shane makes direct eye contact with Ilya -

‘The first time, after the commercial,’

Ilya tenses, eyes light up but he’s keeping his face neutral. He isn’t sure what he thought Shane would say but it wasn’t this.

‘ while I was waiting for you -‘

‘I put on a suit and tie.’

Ilya has never been so happy to lose at something

[katzynia]

Chapters: 1/? Fandom: Heated Rivalry (TV) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Alexei Rozanov | Andrei Rozanov & Ilya Rozanov Characters: Alexei Rozanov | Andrei Rozanov, Ilya Rozanov Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Pre-Canon, Family Dynamics, Growing Up, Brotherhood, Depression, Suicidal Thoughts, in a way: canonical suicide is very much a starting point for this story, Alternate take on how Ilya grew up: what if Alexei stepped up and started caring?, Grigory very much continues to be a shit dad Summary:

The most important realizations of Alexei Rozanov's life came to him in brilliant flashes of insight.

Look. He was not the smartest guy, or particularly (or maybe 'in any way' was more honest) prone to introspection. He partied, he drank, he had sex, he bore the weight of the expectations of being the oldest son of Grigory Rozanov and being an absolute failure at it. What did introspection give him? It didn't lessen the sting of Father's words to ponder his feelings and biases while the belt whipped through the air. Too late to cry when the milk was on the ground, Mother always said— Used to say. Yes. Used to.

*** Or, a story about how Alexei Rozanov started caring. Because somebody had to.

[gaynehollander]

The general public starts infantalising Shane so hard after the relationship reveal, acting like Ilya used his wicked sex magic to seduce this poor innocent baby boy and Ilya’s just there like:

[fractally]

So when I say Shane isn't a good person really I don't mean that he's like. Bad. Or malicious or evil. I just see so many fics that write him as this weird paragon of perpetual virtue, almost saintlike, where he's impossibly kind and an activist and sweet to Ilya like a little kitten and caring of his friends and I'm just sitting here thining....no??

Shane's canonically kind of a selfish guy! Not in a terrible way, he just doesn't really care about stuff outside of his direct sphere. He only gets into philanthropy when there's a direct benefit to him (laundering his relationship). He loves his friends but he's not super caring of them or all that invested in their lives (forgetting Hayden's baby's name is peak). Some of that is he's too wrapped up in his own shit and his secrets but I think a lot of it is just his personality. Shane's not selfish to the degree of it being a personality flaw (see: Shane giving up a day with Ilya to babysit Hayden's kids. I wouldn't have) but he's more selfish than selfless.

We don't hear about him sending signed pucks to sick kids or doing charity with the Voyageurs or that sort of thing. Maybe he's doing it in the background idk. Most likely he's got some assistant in charge of it. But that's not something he spends a lot of mental energy on.

He's not rude or cruel to people, but internally he's a bit judgemental. He sells himself pretty ruthlessly. He’s wealthier than anyone on this website can even comprehend. He’s a landlord.

To get to three cups in a decade Shane’s also got to be very locked in as captain. Like Theriault is this fandom villain (fair) but it just doesn’t make sense to have Shane constantly clashing with him and the Voyageurs and still winning over and over. We see Shane let homophobic comments slide in the locker room and I have to assume that’s his general approach to dealing with things in Montreal. Winning comes first.

I’ve said a million times I love Shane. I’m obviously obsessed with him, look at my many posts. But I just think he’s a grittier and more interesting than the fandom gives him credit for, they just turn him into like the anxious nagging wife who tells Ilya to pick up his socks and is Team Mom.

[ebulliscent]

This!!

Hudson imbued Shane with a lot of gentleness, and the series centring the romance means we see a lot less of Shane when he isn't Ilyamaxxing but book!Shane is incredibly cutthroat. He's impatient, he might not ~showboat~ as much as Ilya does (and he judges him for it constantly) but he's just as much of an attention whore. He isn't just admired because he's Shane Motherfucking Hollander; he's genuinely a bro, he's inaccessible because of his routine and his diet (which gives him major 'you can't sit with us' vibes that he does precious little to counteract, both because he's too wrapped up in his Everything to notice, and he wouldn't care enough if he did).

He's the ice queen, not Ilya. As far as the league, and even his team, is concerned, all routes to Shane Hollander are through excellence, proximity, or work. Ilya and Scott Hunter get the time of day because they're good. Hayden is his friend and Assistant Captain. JJ is a teammate and is sort of the glue of the Voyagers. Rookies get Captain Hollander because he's responsible for them. That's all.

There is no 'Holzy'. His team feels a proximity to him because he's an indelible part of their careers. They're barely a footnote in his, and they know it. Shane does too; he does try to make their success about the team but even when he's thinking of his dynasty and the camaraderie of the locker room in TLG he's thinking of it as a transaction, as loyalty that is owed to him rather than relationships he can trust. Things imploding the way they do in TLG is predicated upon this power imbalance, and that's why the Centaurs are such a good foil.

[fractally]

Yes!! Yes you get it.

I really like you pointing out how distant and inaccessible Shane is. He lives alone immediately, which is very unusual in hockey, being housed by older players during your rookie contract is almost seen as a guardianship or part of your training. The older players teach the younger guys how to sleep properly and cook good meals and such. Shane doesn't need any of that, he's already locked in. And he's very aware of the distance his talent and routines and diets creates between him and his teammates:

"all routes to Shane Hollander are through excellence, proximity, or work"

Yeah, exactly. Shane is so transactional---he thinks about his diet and routines as input / output. He doesn't eat red meat so that he skates better. He doesn't drink so that his muscle control is tighter. He's obviously an endorsement whore---and in the book it's HIM doing this, not his mom. He wants to be THE Shane Hollander, hockey phenom, and he sees this as a thing he can buy with his effort, his restriction, his repression, and his body. He didn't trip his way into being the greatest of all time, he planned it, piece by piece, and worked his ass off:

And yeah as to the friendships with Hayden and JJ, man. I don't know. I really feel like Ilya is the only person on the planet who gets Shane's platonic intimacy until very late into TLG, when Shane has a sweet moment with JJ. But like even his TLG convos with Hayden are very stilted. Shane makes a super rare vulnerability bid by admitting how he's thought about how tough it would be for him and Ilya to have kids and it flies right over Hayden's head.

These guys are friends because Hayden's his winger and because Hayden doesn't have much of a hockey ego and doesn't get insecure around Shane. That's what's happening there.

People adding in nicknames for Hollander is always funny to me because it feels very deliberate that they don't exist in the book. I think the fans call him all sorts of things, but I don't think a single person in that locker room is calling Shane Hollander by a nickname.

Honestly I think this is a hard thing for people to think about with a character which is why depictions of Shane file it away. Most of us have never had the experience of being the most important person in the room, the once without whom the room would not even exist. But that's Shane's day to day. Ilya (and Hunter, on the outside) are pretty much the only equals he ever interacts with. Everyone else is buying his time in various ways.

[sometiktoksarevalid]

[batsandbirdsandothers]

Inspired by “A Sea Dwelling Robin” by Oddball03 on ao3!

[i-fear-gritty]

its fun or whatever when fic writers make luca haas both an ilya and shane fanboy, but has anyone dabbled with the concept that he was solely team ilya for the rivalry. he’ll put up with ilya’s boyfriend because that’s his captain’s boyfriend and he makes his captain very happy, but he does not fucking like ex-captain shane hollander of the montreal voyageurs. just absolutely snubs him at every turn. ‘ooh i won three stanley cups yeah well he single handedly revived two dead fucking franchises and won the hart and the conn smythe #teamroz #mycaptain’

[the-depressed-comedic-relief]

So since the fandom has come the the (correct) conclusion that Samwise Gamgee is the absolute height of hobbit attractiveness standards, it only follows logically that hobbits see Sam working for Frodo as the middle earth equivalent of your weird eccentric rich neighbor having a hot pool boy. Thank you for coming to my Ted talk.

[fractally]

Commentators on my activity page: yes sorry people WOULD actually be wondering if Ilya Rozanov, scorer of 67 goals in his rookie season, Hart winner, Cup winner, etc was having a mental breakdown if he walked away from Boston and signed with Ottawa during the first year of his free agency.

Ilya's not just good he's generational. Both he and Shane are supposed to be SO absurdly good compared to the rest of the league that they can drag their teams to cups with ~3-4 years after signing. They're not fucking Tavares man they're like Crosby and Ovechkin but better because fiction.

Anyway a guy like that, moving to a team he has no connection to, in a city that's not appealing for any obvious reason, that he seemingly has never even visited other than for game nights? And he's not explaining why? It's not TJ going back home, it's Rozanov going to a random fuck off city in Canada.

So yeah, no, I legitimately think people would actually wonder if it's some kind of mental break. Like he just couldn't handle the pressure in Boston and picked the worst team in the league deliberately to take himself out of contention for future cups.

I don't even think people would assume he had a partner in Ottawa because literally unless he was dating fucking Justin Trudeau or some other high ranking Canadian government official why wouldn't they just move to Boston, or why wouldn't he just split his time, he has the money to charter flights, like it makes no sense.

Actually I wonder if that would end up being the most popular conspiracy. Ilya Rozanov is dating a high ranking Canadian governmental official and that's why he won't talk about it and also why he has to live in Ottawa. Rozanov x Trudeau fanfiction starts soaring on AO3. Rozaneau. Truzanov

[gonzocoded]

bitch, i’m a big deal

nails, hair, hips, heels - todrick hall

[themoonandmyman]

I think the reason some people struggle with analysing HR is that they cannot help but equate sex (especially good sex) with concepts like ‘true love.’

Shane’s face on the stairwell after their first time isn’t ‘oh I’m so in love with this guy’ it’s ’this guy just fucked me so good and so hard that every single braincell melted into a soup and fell out of my ass and I’m super thrilled about that’

I know it’s nice to argue they were in love from the very beginning, and to a degree I think there was always deep affection there, but the love absolutely came later.

I don’t know, maybe I just have a different perspective on (healthy) hookup culture and I’m missing something, but is it not enough for two people to just… really like fucking each other? Isn’t that the whole point of the first half of their story?