TV Watch: Heated Rivalry

Well.  I've now seen all of the 2026 hockey/ romance sensation folks are watching over on HBO, Heated Rivalry.

The six-episode series charts years and years of a pair of hockey players who enter the pros at the same time, one a nice boy from Canada, and one a Russian who is such a bad boy, he smokes.  The two have an immediate attraction, and embark on what is initially a sexual relationship, but eventually becomes romantic.  Both are tortured by the expectations put upon them by their macho sport and all that surrounds that as closeted men.

I'm oversimplifying because, gang, this was 6 episodes, each running 45 minutes.  

I don't know that the show really held a ton of surprises, but it's not that kind of show.  It's more about taking you on the journey as best they can as the two move from casual and sexy secretive hook-ups to developing real feelings.  

You will have heard that there is lots of sex in this show, and you would be right.  The show producers are not shy about the "come for the 0% body-fat athletes going to town, stay for the sweet romance the show really is" value proposition.   What it really made think about is that, online, people are very fond of saying they absolutely cannot abide sex in movies and TV, and I wonder if all those same people are now secretly watching the show.  Because, boy howdy, it does not shy away from the hanky panky.

The only actor in the show I recognized was Dylan Walsh (last seen on Superman & Lois on the CW), and most of the rest of the cast I just didn't know.  Jamie informs me the two leads are mostly unknowns, and one is actually from Odessa, Texas (not Russia).  

There's a whole parallel story about a different player on a different team and his romance that occurs in a bottle episode, and it's almost like seeing a parallel show you could have been watching.  At first I found it a bit odd, but it's an interesting narrative device to color and inform the events of the main storyline. 

I don't know that I have a lot to say about it.  It's reasonably funny, works its way to sweet, and is very well made.  Even with what's obviously a considerably budget behind it, it's hard to ignore all the ways things could have gone wrong in the script, in the casting, or just building general vibes across the series.  But it doesn't go wrong.  The two young leads are stellar and, frankly, brave.  That's a risk to take showing literally your whole ass repeatedly on TV as well as risking type casting.

That said, I think both of these guys will be able to have their pick of projects for a while.  Both are handsome, talented and have that It Factor.  

My only real grip with the show is that there's a lot of modern architecture and interior design, which is a whole other fight and that is not the show's focus.

I also don't know anything about hockey, but did watch both Gold Medal matches in the Olympics, and it really is a great sport that I have a very hard time following.  But it works great here, and it's hard to think how this would work with a different sport.