Wednesday, January 07, 2026
On ‘Heated Rivalry,’ the clothes do more than just fall to the floor
The Washington Post: The chatter around HBO’s hit hockey romance series “Heated Rivalry” has mostly been about the scenes without clothes. And deservedly so; let’s give shapely butts and thoughtful intimacy coordinators the recognition they deserve. At every opportunity, preferably.
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This article does an interesting job of showing how much can go into seemingly simple costume design. Essentially these men are all just wearing simple inoffensive clothing, but even that choice was extremely intentional. The desire for these characters to fit in is shown through those clothing choices, and as their masks break down throughout the show, they are given more liberty to start expressing themselves through their clothing. I also enjoyed how this designer spoke about how she herself was not a very big sports fan, but that does not really matter because most of costume design is about recognizing stereotypes, and then exploiting those stereotypes in order to communicate quickly to an audience what kind of people these characters are. This article, along with every single one of my friends not being able to stop talking about this show, might finally get me to give it a watch.
I had been hearing a lot about this show, and I wasn’t really expecting it to be good, despite the fact that a lot of people really liked it. Then I decided to give it a try, and as it turns out, it exceeded my expectations. While yes, one of the big things that people talk about with the show is the sex scenes, I truly believe that the storyline is an incredible representation of queer relationships, and the way it’s produced tells the story really well. The budget for this show was impressively small, and they were able to accomplish so much with it. This article is specifically about the costumes of the show, reflecting many things I absorbed while watching it. First of all, the fact that they cannot use the actual names of hockey franchises and therefore had to create new uniforms reminiscent, but different than the ones in real life, is done well. I also love how, even in the dialogue of the show, what the characters are wearing represents their journeys and development. There is one scene where the characters talk about how Shane, someone who’s always tried to look as normal and sort of basic as possible, has begun to dress differently and hired a stylist. This comes at a time in his character development when he begins to figure out more about himself and accept his sexuality more. Overall, the show and the costumes are so well done, and prove you don’t need a huge budget to be successful.
As someone who is really interested in costume design, I love these articles on here that are dissecting the way the costumes interact with the characters and their storyline and the plot. I think that especially in Heated Rivalry the clothes that they are wearing really do tell this strong story of conformity for especially Shane and Scott because of the fear that they’re living in. I think it’s really interesting in the scene where Shane talked to Ilya about getting a stylist and how his wardrobe just is evolving at a time where his character is evolving and I think that’s really cool and really clever of the director and of the costume designer. The show really does a lot of things very well in relation to the cinematography and all of these design elements that carry the story and I think the costume is really high like that.
People keep talking about Heated Rivalry as “the gay sex show,” but one thing that SHOULD be talked about is how IMPRESSIVE the production value is, because they had an incredibly small budget. In a show that already has such minimal costumes (because they do spend a decent amount of time either playing hockey or naked), the fact that the costumer was able to land on the dot was really impressive. Each costume shift or outlier matched up with a big turning point or tension within the show (them sharing clothes, Shane hiring a stylist, Kip’s tuxedo, and all of their incognito outfits.) I also think that Shane’s repetition of outfits really helped inform his character–the type of guy who just wears clothes because they’re clothes. This show is also set in a pretty strict time period with people who dress in a very in-the-box style–many of them are straight sports players, or trying to give the impression that they are.
I have seen ALL of Heated Rivalry at least twice and I had no idea they had such little budget until recently, which is insane since their production value is really good despite the lack of budget. The costuming in this show is almost unnoticeable unless you are looking for it because the costumes just fit the characters so well. The only time I really noticed the costuming was when Ilya brought attention to Shane’s clothes when he said that he dresses like shit, which was really funny. It was very interesting to see how Shane really changed his appearance after that comment because he then proceeded to get a stylist of his own that helped him dress to his fully potential. There have only been a few little mishaps with costumes that I've seen people noticing on the internet such as wearing GymShark before it was a brand, but to be honest that is such a little mistake and it makes sense for how little budget there was.
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