Heated Rivalry has had to ask its fervent fans to leave them alone

Being the most talked about series on Earth is not all that it’s cracked up to be.

For a feverish couple of months as the year changed from 2025 to 2026, Heated Rivalry was the only thing on many people’s lips. Either you were watching it, maybe for the third time, and you were obsessed, or you were wondering what all the fuss was about.

The steamy gay hockey romance was the breakout hit few people saw coming, and it really lit a fire under its now very invested fanbase.

The interest in all things Heated Rivalry is so high, its production team has had to make an extraordinary public plea to be left alone ahead of filming for the second season.

In a statement posted to creator Jacob Tierney’s social media, the filmmakers said, “To our incredible fans and everyone who’s been sharing in the excitement for the show: Your support, enthusiasm and kindness have meant the world to us. As we gear up for more Heated Rivalry, please help us in making it the best it can be.

“If you happen to come across one of our filming locations, please give our cast and crew the space they need to do what they do best. We promise it’ll be worth the wait.”

You don’t make an ask like that unless you’ve had problems with parasocial fans and are anticipating that it could escalate to the point of disrupting production.

The intensity of Heated Rivalry’s fandom – because it kind of came out of nowhere (they show was based on books but they weren’t massive in the mainstream), it exploded all at once – has seen it experience more enthusiastic engagement than 95 per cent of TV shows.

The two lead stars in particular, Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams, have been the target of a lot of fan attention, and some of that has been intrusive.

Location filming has meant that many high-profile films and TV shows have had to contend with onlookers in public spaces. Just think of all the scenes that have been set in New York’s Time Square or London’s Piccadilly Circus, iconic locations known for their hustle and bustle.

Sometimes these shoots happen at 5am when there are fewer people around, but it’s not always possible.

A dozen curious onlookers is one thing, but if it’s scores of fans screaming out the names of the actors (or even the characters), it then becomes disruptive – shouts of “quiet on set” is not going to quell that frenzy.

The series is filmed in Canada and the second season is expected to land next year.

Early on during Heated Rivalry’s broadcast, fans would speculate online whether Williams and Storrie were or could potentially be a couple in real life, as if wishing made it so.

That online fever manifested in ugly ways when Storrie was photographed in the wild with another co-star, Francois Arnaud, and some segments of the fandom then trolled Arnaud because he was “in the way” of the true pairing they wanted to see.

Williams, who is half-Korean, has also been the target of racist abuse from people who called themselves Heated Rivalry fans.

Williams and Arnaud in May issued a joint statement in March which said, “Don’t call yourself a fan if you share racist, homophobic, biphobic, misogynist, ageist, ableist, parasocial, bigoted comments of any kind. None of us need your hateful ‘love’.”

Williams last month was followed by a group of “autograph dealers” and ended up in a confrontation when they stalked him to his residence.

Heated Rivalry isn’t the only romance series that has had challenges with incredibly devoted fans. Earlier this year, the producers behind YA show The Summer I Turned Pretty also had to ask fans to stop trying to visit its filming locations for its upcoming TV movie.

“We love the excitement, but sharing locations and visiting set disrupts filming,” it posted on social media. Jenny Han, who wrote the books on which the series was based and is also involved with the show added that having the clear crowds is adding to the burden of the production, and breaks the crew’s focus.

There have always been invested fandoms but social media has made it much easier for fans to directly communicate with the subjects of their obsessions as well as each other, which has led to a more intense and fraught environment for actors, filmmakers and producers to navigate.

They have to walk the fine line of needing to seem appreciative of the love and adulation, and not disrespecting the community while also setting boundaries.