#heated rivalry analysis

[finelytaylored]

[omens-of-what-is-to-cum]

while I 1000% support crackfic writers who write about Ilya spilling about their sex life, in reality I think that shit would be locked DOWN.

like, I think the only details the internet would get would be Ilya liking posts about Shane being a god in bed, into freak sex, that things get real wild after big hockey victories and that the rivalry was foreplay, etc

only stuff that’s funny and wild, but ultimately contains exactly zero details of their actual sex.

like yes, for all the sexy possessive reasons, and all of the privacy and ‘I share the internet with my in-laws’ reasons’, but also because of how Shane would be treated if it was actually known that he was a bottom.

It’s not super explored in canon, but cmon… Shane is a half Japanese gay man in hockey. Those are both two very loaded identities for an incredibly bigoted sport, and they come with a lot of really vicious intersectional ammo.

Shane would already hear so much about how Asian men are submissive and all of the other bullshit I refuse to write out, imagine how much more brutal it would be if there was actual confirmation that the stereotypes are on some level, accurate?

in that same way that homophobia would have hit so much harder for Shane after he was outed and knew that the other player MEANT it, all of that would be even more hurtful and degrading.

And so yeah, I don’t think either Ilya or Shane would EVER reference what positions or anything they prefer in bed anywhere near the public, because the public fucking sucks :((

[gayhockeyshow]

Shane not being able to mask after the draft is so important to me. It’s peak autistic ‘this didnt go exactly how I planned it in my mind so I don’t know how to act’. And this isn’t just a small change of plans to Shane, oh no. This is the day and the moment he’s been dreaming about since he was eight years old. And he gets beaten out by this rude Russian guy. It’s too much all at once. Shane is a fierce competitor and not only did he lose, he lost hard. He came in number two. He was supposed to be alone at the top. He’s “still in shock”. He doesn’t know what to do.

[k-pepp]

Can we talk about this part again? The whole scene is gold, but I keep focusing on the first 40 seconds. Ilya is not usually shown to be an anxious person, but he does have little tells that he repeats throughout the show. And in this scene, he does all of them. His anxiety in the beginning of this scene is palpable. At first you see him nervously scanning the bar, knowing at any second he could see Shane. He's doing his usual self-soothing behaviors like fidgeting with his thumbs (like during the interview with the all star game) and messing with his hair/ear (like on the couch with Shane).

Then the moment happens. He spots Shane. And, fuck, he's coming right for him. He takes a big deep breath, says a quiet little "okay" to get himself ready, and takes a giant chug of his beer that finishes the bottle. As soon as Shane sits down, he starts doing little head bobs to hype himself up for whatever conversation they're about to have. While he's thinking of something to say, his thumbs are rubbing the hell out of the empty beer bottle. Trying to rub that thing back into sand. After Shane orders the same beer that Ilya is having, he does a little nose sniff. The same nose sniff/nose tug move he makes throughout the series to show that he's totally definitely nonchalant about something that's happening with Shane. Ilya asks him about his ginger ale. He can't help it. The last time they spent together is probably all he can think about. So Shane skipping his typical order and getting whatever Ilya has is throwing him off. But then. Shane makes a joke. A silly little 'Shane' joke that temporarily pulls Ilya out of his spiral and gets him to crack a smile. Very similar to the situation in episode 6 when Shane is spiraling and Ilya makes his "maybe he didn't even notice" joke.

After that the scene starts to shift and Ilya becomes visibly less and less anxious and more emboldened to take the lead of the conversation and openly ogle Shane. And Shane immediately ogles Ilya in return. They're BACK

[transshanehollander]

The reason why the criticism of the NHL and its many flaws falls so flat in the game changers series is because Rachel Reid refuses to examine the role that race plays in your experience of hockey and hockey culture in Canada, which is honestly very in line with the Canadian, “well, we barely have racism up here!” even though people of color, especially Black and South Asian immigrants and First Nations people of color will tell you otherwise.

You cannot criticize and examine hockey culture without the foundational understanding of the role that whiteness plays in the toxicity of hockey culture.

When she said that Shane doesn’t carry grief or trauma it becomes glaringly obvious that she is missing one of the core problems of the toxicity of hockey culture in Canada. Whiteness is what enables this toxic and abusive behavior to continue. Yes, the NFL, NBA, and MLB all have them problems and issues and I’m not denying that, but those leagues all have players of color who would never be allowed to get away with what NHL players do.

I mean even when it comes to the rules of their sport, you think a 6’8, 300lb Black linebacker is getting a 5 minute penalty for shoving a ref or for getting in their face and yelling at them? You think a bunch of Black athletes could be living in billet homes in small towns with a reputation of violence against little white teenage girls and it would still be a national problem? Whiteness and racism is core and central to the problems in hockey. Look at Gavin McKenna, an indigenous man, being charged with a felony by State College police because they couldn’t wait to make an example out of him.

“Shane doesn’t carry grief or trauma.”

I’ve been reading hockey player memoirs and one of them is about an “average” player in the NHL. He was by no means a super star or prodigy, just very good at his sport and he talked about how, as a 6 or 7 year old child, he was already facing bullying by adults for how good he was at hockey. Parents of other players resented him so much for scoring they would tell their kids to target him and would scream obscenities. He was even flipped off as a child and humiliated by coaches because he was good at hockey. And this was a white man.

Add in the fact that Shane is Asian Canadian and hockey is a matter of national identity and lm willing to bet that the first time Shane remembers being called a slur, it was while he was playing hockey, and it was by an adult. Because if they already hate that a child is better at hockey than their child to the point of harassing them, how much worse does it get when the parent realizes that it is Asian child who is better at hockey than their kid? Shane would’ve been punished at every level of hockey starting at 5 years old for being good at the sport and being Asian because he would make white teammates, coaches, and fans feels “threatened” because for so long hockey has been centered around their whiteness.

Not only would Shane have been called names, parents would’ve been calling for their kids to “take him out” to take cheap shots and probably screaming slurs at Shane. And I’m willing to bet the coaches and refs did nothing unless the Hollanders threatened to sue, and not Yuna, David had to go down there and flash some legal might around and also the fact that he works for the treasury board and probably knows a thing or two about hockey Canada.

But Shane would’ve been punished for being not white and being good at hockey and it would’ve been severe because whiteness is the cornerstone of this sport.

Laila Edwards has talked about experiencing misogynoir as a hockey player and has, probably in the best interest of her PWHL draft and desire not to be harassed by racist trolls, not been as outspoken on vocal as she could be.

Look at Jason Robertson’s exclusion from the Olympics roster and the handwringing of hockey podcasters who “don’t get why the coaches made the decisions they made.” It’s because the foundation of this sport and its success is whiteness and white people feel threatened when people of color succeed so they have to knock them down a peg even to their own detriment because that’s how much they hate seeing people of color succeed.

Whiteness is the foundation of this sport and racism is so imbedded that parents will scream at their 10 year old to hit a six year old just because they’re brown and good at hockey

Like Hockey Canada is struggling to recruit and retain players of colors even as Canada gets more diverse because of the racism.

Even the big book about toxic hockey culture in Canada brushes over the racism even though whiteness and the excuses we make for white men ar front and center as to why hockey culture in Canada got to be the way it is.

You cannot address the issues in hockey Canada unless you also address the fact that the reason why it was allowed to get this bad is because of a whiteness and racism.

[honeyybrii]

i love how quietly both svetlana and rose figured ilya and shane out, and how softly they both let them know they knew.

svetlana knows ilya is comfortable with his sexuality, but she also knows how he feels about love and his capabilities when it comes to it, she knows what it means to him and also for him. so she pokes delicately, but in a language ilya is used to, letting him know she knows about jane while always mentioning men in tandem - sasha says hi - and then that doesn't work so she starts discussing shane in general and subtly highlighting that ilya's reaction is weird, it's not how he reacts to other players. you know he's good and you know he's handsome has the connotation of you would be able to admit it if there wasn't something more here, and if it wasn't serious you'd tell me

and THEN - it's very clear that ilya imagined his life with svetlana, when he pictured a future and some form of love that would be bearable and safe, it's clear that she is that soft place to land for him and it's clear that he could be in love with her, he just isn't. and when his grief and self loathing is at his highest he looks at her and says "i don't deserve you" and she doesn't only reassure him but she just so kindly says:

i hope jane knows how lucky He is

saying, not only do you deserve me and not only will i always be here, but you deserve the love you won't allow yourself, you deserve to have what you want, in the only way ilya can hear it in that moment

and it means so much that ilya reaches for shane

AND THEN ROSE - she's known shane for a very short period of time and when she figures out he might be gay and very uncomfortable with it she approaches it in the best possible way, in a way that makes him feel so accepted and normal that he can't even deny it and we watch in real time as her acceptance makes him accept it more and more.

and the big moment there honestly isn't her saying it's okay it's:

are there gay hockey players? i mean obviously there are but, are there any that are out?

and we see that register with shane, the thought that other people may be going through what he's gone through just never occurred to him and as soon as it does he opens up just a touch and rose just asks him all the right questions so softly "have you ever been with a man before?" "have you ever told anyone that" "was it different?"

and as soon as shane can conceptualize that this isn't some terrible thing that's just happening to him, it's actually a very normal, common experience - 80% of my boyfriends left me for men, not everyone in hollywood is out - he melts and shifts into something that is more himself and it's so beautiful because there's so much unspoken self acceptance like a dam broke - and as soon as he has that self acceptance he immediately starts joking about it

and then he leaves the conversation and starts showing ilya he loves him and talking about it relentlessly because he knows how to do this now and he wants ilya, even when ilya can't fully tell him he feels the same, he's now accepted that it isn't just men it's ilya and he no longer see's a reason to deprive himself of his instinct to care for him

their interactions with both women really are so incredibly beautiful and in their different ways they both are just continually telling them "you don't just deserve fine, you deserve the love you want, the love that is different"

and it's so moving i get choked up every time i think about it because it's such a big deal - especially when both ilya and shane seemed to be bracing themselves for svetlana and rose to be the most upset by this but instead they just embrace them

[tteukbyeol]

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

[cottage-core-blog]

It's so interesting how the costume design resembles perfectly what is happening in this scene.

Ilya - the nonchalant, I don't give a fuck-guy, showed up to the press conference in a suit and tie, very formal, very approriate. And it unravels during this scene how uncomfortable he is, how much he struggles with the language barrier and even though he tries to play the part, he fails.

Shane on the other hand - the guy who folds his clothes before sex and is always very on guard and socially awkward - rolls up to this press conference without a tie and his shirt unbottoned, not a care in the world, he is in his element. He senses Ilya's discomfort right away and jumps to his aide because he does take control when he is comfortable, when he is sure of himself and we do continue to see this dynamic between them further on.