Heated Rivalry is, almost exclusively, the story of Shane Hollander (Hudson Williams) and Ilya Rozanov (Connor Storrie), two high-level professional hockey prospects who fall in love. It doesn’t https://www.boombetonline.nl/ feel like hockey, and it doesn’t feel like anything else on TV right now; it feels a little bit like falling in love. While it isn’t ascending to Bluey levels of global streaming dominance, what’s unique about the show has been its growth. To really appreciate what’s going on on the ice, you have to be in that big refrigerator, shoulder to shoulder with the raucous crowd, bodies flying at you left and right.
When Do New Episodes of ‘Heated Rivalry’ Come Out? What to Know About the Steamy Hockey Drama
Streams is a new feature that carefully curates content from within the Disney+ app or provides access to live linear streams, such as ABC News, to give you a continuous streaming experience. “Heated Rivalry,” a romantic drama inspired by Rachel Reid’s book series “Game Changers,” dropped its first two episodes on the streaming service on Nov. 28 and left viewers wanting more. All six episodes of the romance series’ first season are available to stream on HBO Max. Canadian actor, director and screenwriter, Jacob Tierney wrote and directed all six episodes of the series’ first season.
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- The series has been described as a slow-burn story that’s emotional and filled with sexual tension.
- The series is also streaming on Sky-owned Neon in New Zealand and Movistar Plus+ in Spain.
- HBO Max’s acquisition of the series, which was spearheaded by the company’s content chairman and CEO Casey Bloys and the SVP content planning and programming Jason Butler, was attributed in part to online social media buzz generated by the Game Changers fanbase who campaigned for global distribution.
- The series had its preview screening at the Image+Nation LGBTQ+ Film Festival in Montreal, Canada on November 23, 2025.
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The series became a significant word-of-mouth success, characterized by an “unusual” growth pattern in its viewership. HBO Max also revealed the show is the No. 2 driver of first-time viewers on the platform since its release. The series also debuted at number two in Australia, and consistently ranks as the number one show each week. In addition to its critical reception, the episode achieved notable audience recognition. BJ Colangelo of /Film also praised the performances, specifically Williams, Storrie, and Sophie Nélisse, and remarked that the series and Storrie are deserving of Emmy recognitions. Whitney Evans of TV Fanatic praised the episode’s structure and pacing, as well as Storrie’s performance, highlighting his Russian accent work and screen presence.
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- Miley Cyrus also expressed interest in contributing music for the second season, as did rapper Bbno$.better source needed
- The series debuted on Crave with a two-episode premiere on November 28, 2025, followed by weekly episodes, with the finale airing on December 26.
- This is, I might guess, what good hockey is like.
- When hockey rivals Shane and Ilya meet each other as rookies, sparks fly.
- For their performances in the first season finale, TVLine named both Williams and Storrie as “Performers of the Week”, while /Film described them as the strongest break-out performances of the year.
Download limits apply to certain content categories on HBO Max. The Pitt trains its focus on this one place and this one time (per season), but it cares about everyone who passes through. While the narrative eye returns to our titular heated rivalry, and things begin to loosen up with their own communication, it eventually becomes clear that the Scott Hunter episode is mostly there to set up later plot developments between Ilya and Shane. One of the most jarring features of the show, which becomes apparent quickly into the first episode, is its skimming-for-the-good-parts storytelling style.
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In the terms of film theorist Linda Williams, they are both series within the realm of “body genres”—dramas built around showing the body in moments of distress and/or elation. The Pitt has nearly a dozen series regulars in the main cast, another dozen recurring characters, and many dozens more who filter in and out of the E.R. This is, I might guess, what good hockey is like. Though, for what it’s worth, the moment when that happens, when these two plotlines converge, is one of the most electrifying sequences I’ve seen on TV in the past couple of months. This episode is counterprogramming to the Ilya-Shane romance. In this stand-alone episode, we watch Scott come to terms with his own sexuality, begin secretly dating a barista named Kip, and see that relationship run up against the wall of Scott’s inability to come out.
In its brisk, bustling six episodes, the outlines of a wider world beyond Shane and Ilya are blurry. Between the week of its debut and the week of its season finale, on December 27, viewership grew tenfold—from 30 million to 324 million streaming minutes logged—with a growing and notable majority of viewers being women. This November, though, a little Canadian series called Heated Rivalry figured out how to make hockey work on television.
It is set to adapt The Long Game (2022), the sixth book of the Game Changers series, which serves as a sequel to Heated Rivalry. The agreement also includes expanded distribution deals, with rights for season two secured across multiple international markets via Warner Bros. In June 2025, it was officially announced at the Bell Media Upfront that the series would be streamed on Crave. Tierney initially had doubts about whether the story could be adapted while retaining the books’ sexually explicit content.
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Shortly after its release, it entered IMDb’s rankings of highest-rated television episodes, attaining a rare perfect 10 out of 10 rating. Vogue Adria and InsideHook highlighted the Empty Netters podcast, hosted by former ice hockey players, for its enthusiastic coverage of the series which they cited as an example of “non-toxic masculinity” within the sport. The series is also streaming on Sky-owned Neon in New Zealand and Movistar Plus+ in Spain.
Each new episode drops on HBO Max at 12 a.m. Here’s everything you need to know about “Heated Rivalry” and how to watch the rest of the season. HBO Max’s newest series has viewers buzzing. Learn more about what content you can watch with Streams at the Disney+ Help Center.