Heated Rivalry: Goons Gone Wild [Rant]

(Preface: I am writing this mildly inebriated on Christmas Eve, there may in fact be misspellings or word misusage. Apologies friends, and welcome to Goons Galore.)

Heated Rivalry is the new hit series starring Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie, along with many attractive supporting cast members. The show is based on the Game Changers book series by Rachel Reid, a queer hockey romance anthology (i guess?) about two men who are simply star crossed lovers and can't come out because they can't fuck up the bag (..and could get deported).

The show itself has two separate fandoms. Both are crazy large, insanely passionate, and quite horny. I am biased, I fall into the first camp (not the horny part please). I enjoy romance stories with a passion, I think every gen z child at some point has read from AO3, Webtoons, Episode, or my personal fave..Wattpad (it went downhill when they added ads tho). I've always loved love, especially queer romance and the ability to see myself in queer love stories as a possibility at happiness instead of a far distant anomaly.

The second group however is simply horny.

goon: Well-known slang term in sexual subculture of chronic and compulsive masturbators, used both as a verb and a noun. Means achieving the trance-like blissful state reached when riding the edge of cumming for as long as possible, perhaps many minutes or even hours at a time. Also denoting the absence of control, compulsively pursuing that feeling as a avid masturbator. (Urban Dictionary)

SO with this added context, the second half of the fandom are simply gooners (noun); more sex obsessed than a Spencer's store. Not horrible people, but unlike Connor, (recently interviewed on the shut up Alex podcast.. i think) I don't necessarily fully like that side of the fandom. I just can't get down with them. I'll list 3 reasons why and you tell me AITA style, if I'm crazy.

1. They are more obsessed with individuals sleeping with one another than the heart of the story. Gooners are gonna goon..and instead of a porn site they are dedicated to the story of two closeted queer men. Online, especially during the first two episodes of the show, many members of the goondom made claims that they fast forwarded and only watched the sex scenes in the show. They're literally masturbating to fictitious sex scenes. Is that not insane?

2. They hate Scott and Kip's love story. Across all social platforms there was a majority and minority sentiment around episode 3..Gooners were the majority. They complained about Scott and Kip's episode heavily only desiring more scenes of the main characters and more frames of naked bodies but only specific naked bodies. That episode specifically centered not around the main characters, Ilya and Shane, but instead the ones who eventually break the queer barrier, Scott and Kip. The Goondom just want to see people fuck and I actually quite hate that. They completely shit on such a gut wenching episode of desire, longing and emptiness (WHERE NO ONE ENDS THE EPISODE HAPPY), because they want to see two specific men have sex like I'm irritated.

3. They refuse to read the books, or even the important books. Non issue yes, however, at the end of the day this is a love series. All of the stories connect in some way, even if somewhat loosely.  Ilya's personality having a soft thoughtful side and desire to be apart of the community is showcased deeply during his interactions with Troy, Harris, and the Ottawa team, a perspective we truly don't get in the books that are specifically dedicated to Shane and Ilya's personal lives.

Bonus reason:

People in the fandom, although I'm assuming it's more of the unhinged gooners (however, I don't put it past my fellow bookopolis residents) are trying to out Connor Storrie's sexuality?? Just weird shit bro like these are actors, the story isn't real, the sex isn't real, the love is platonic at best. It's this really strange dynamic where people feel so strongly attracted to you, that they want to know everything about your sexual life, and they assume they know everything about you outside of that intimate aspect. That phenomenon in itself could be researched to death with stalkers, Marilyn Monroe's body disappearing, and the entitlement people feel to shame/approve their love choices.

Overall the internet while having emotion evoking edits, is lowkey a hellscape for this show. This rant is also borderline parasocial because it's not an autobiography based show (aka it's not real), but seeing the overwhelming negative reactions to this other queer story makes me a wee bit sad. I just hope that when the actors who play Troy and Harris, or Eric and Kyle, or Ryan and Fabian are apart of season two, the reaction towards them sharing the spotlight isn't the same..

Thank you for reading my Ted Talk and Happy Holidays LMAO.