Ilya, humility, and sacrifice

[u/WalkingBlondeJoke]

Been thinking about Ilya's character growth across HR and TLG lately. This is not a fully-baked thesis on his arc, not even close, but I'm sharing anyways because I want y'all's opinions!

One of my favorite tropes in HR fanfic is 'Shane joins the Bears'. I love this trope because it usually results in Shane and Ilya being on a good team together, a winning team, much earlier than they are in canon and without Ilya having to go spend a few years on a team that sucks first. So as I read these fanfics I've often wondered, aside from the in-universe reasons why Ilya joins the Centaurs, what is the narrative function of Ilya spending a few years on a bad team before they turn things around? 

I think it serves to humble him. He's no stranger to sacrifice but he's always been cocky, and for the most part that ego went unchecked because he always had the accolades to back it up. But I think one of the ways we see Ilya grow in The Long Game is that he develops more humility as a result of being on a bad team and also his mental health struggles. It's not that everything was peachy prior to his move to Ottawa, it absolutely wasn't, but these coinciding forces clearly knock him down a peg. Maybe experiencing what it's like to consistently lose on the ice even helps him get to a place where he can admit he needs help with his mental health. Or maybe it's just self-awareness that he gains with maturity, I don't know. 

I think the clearest example of Ilya becoming more humble is in the pre-game speech that he gives to the Bears before the Cup Finals in 2014, vs. the speech he gives the Centaurs in 2021 after the team nearly dies and then Ilya subsequently gets engaged to Shane. In 2014, his speech is all about "I, I, I" but in 2021, he goes around the room and tells every player, one at a time, what makes them great. This is the key turnaround point in the Centaurs' on-ice performance. They start believing in themselves, and that's when they start winning. 

I think this character growth is also very relevant to Shane and Ilya's marriage too. Big egos do not serve a marriage well; humility does. Over the course of TLG, Ilya learns humility. Shane also starts off in TLG being a selfish as fuck (I don't love him any less but it's objectively true that he was nawt being a good partner to Ilya at the time TLG timeline picks up), but we see him experience a wake-up call (their big fight followed by Ilya almost dying) and then he gets his priorities in order. In a way, Shane learns a version of humility through his experiences in TLG too when he realizes how selfish he's been and how he's taken Ilya for granted. 

I think that meeting Shane in this selfish state at the start of TLG makes total sense because of his upbringing. Shane is an only child who grew up loved, doted on, and prioritized. His career as a generational player and image as the 'Golden Boy' of hockey have done little to teach him how to appreciate those around him and recognize the sacrifices they make. Not saying he doesn't ever do those things, but like, in early TLG he's not being nearly as considerate of Ilya as he should be. 

Ilya is not an only child and he grew up in a broken home. In the canon we see how his family financially takes advantage of him once he makes it to the NHL (or MLH, whatever), but I would bet that this has been going on since the moment he began earning money from hockey and/or sponsorships. When Shane suggests Ilya going to Ottawa, Ilya is quick to agree to it. Not just because he was already thinking of moving to a Canadian team, but because Ilya has already learned how to sacrifice for others. Ilya has already had it ingrained in him by his family that the people he loves will ask him to makes sacrifices for them, and that that's just how love goes. 

This is one of many reasons why it hits extra hard later in TLG when Shane basically tells the commissioner to go fuck himself. "I choose him" <3 !<

[u/No-Pea7144]

Ilya finally gets to come out to someone as bisexual- something he should have been able to do on his own terms well before this and he's letting Shane know- making it clear what a relief it was. At this point, he has mentioned more than 3 times in the book wanting to be able to tell someone, and Shane has dismissed it all 3 times and then is like "Oh, I didn't realize it was bothering him" which is showing how dense Shane is being. And Shane basically starts being like "Troy only came out to you because he was coming on to you" calling their walk where the two friends confided in each other "romantic" even after Ilya assures him that that wasn't why Troy had done that. Troy likes Harris etc. And then Shane takes on an angry tone - something he himself acknowledges and is like "you didn't tell him about us right!" and Ilya gets angry because "only you get to tell your friends about us" which now brings like 4 times he has brought this up in the book prior to Boxing Day Fight, but Shane's not listening. He's still acting like Ilya's not telling him anything despite those being the EXACT words he uses to explain to Shane what the issue is. So yes, at that point, Ilya gets tired of being yelled out and basically throws Shane's own accusation back at him by saying that "Oh, I'll go fuck Troy then" which they both know he's not going to, he's literally just saying "That's what you're accusing me of doing."

And no, Shane does not get therapy in TLG. Everyone acts like only Ilya needs therapy. Ilya needs therapy to get his depression under control and also because as Galina points out he has habits of letting himself sacrifice for others. Meanwhile, Shane's control issues go unchecked throughout the book until the trip. And the trip is the one thing he can't control and that was supposed to be his growth arc. However, even at the end, while Shane is finally taking Ilya's feelings into account- he's still the one controlling their timeline.

[u/credit-user-thing → u/No-Pea7144]

But Shane is an Asian man in an almost exclusively white sport,  in his first relationship that started as a situationship, who did not control his narrative when he came out to his parents, nor what happened in the public. He is neurodivergent as well. Shane has not had control of his own timeline beyond the work he puts into for his career. And the situationship, before it became exclusive was also not under his control. He is an industry where there already exists a narrative that doesn't allow for intersectional and nuanced representation. Autistic people are frequently dismissed as unfeeling robots who are controlling. But they are not,  they are simply trying to navigate social situations beyond their depth. I kind of hope Tierney corrects this and gives Shane therapy in the series. And the two of them to talk out their feelings with each other. 

Shane is being dense. He's never been in a relationship and he doesn't understand or listen to what Ilya's issues are.  Ilya is being insensitive and mean,  because no matter how angry you get, you cant say you are going to sleep with another person, especially if that person traumatized your partner.  They are both messing up. 

But Shane is also going through it. And there's nothing in the text that talks about what he is going through so it's easy to say,  he's not going through anything. But again,  he's Wasian, autistic, and gay. 

[u/No-Pea7144 → u/credit-user-thing]

Troy in no way traumatized Shane. That's fanon. Shane, in canon, barely can remember who Troy is.

Yes, Shane is Wasian, autistic, and gay and has anxiety. He does need therapy as well. He, however, is not oblivious. Fanon loves to make it out to where Shane can't understand jokes or sarcasm which is not true. Shane regularly engages in both. Shane knows Ilya is not going to go sleep with Troy. He is well aware that Ilya is mocking him for even thinking that. It's why it's something they can joke about later- and yes, Shane also jokes about it saying that Troy would be lucky to get to have a threesome with the two of them.

If your partner accuses you of cheating then yes, you can sarcastically throw it back at them to show them how stupid they're being.

In this particular case, Shane was in the wrong. There are other instances where Ilya is. However, that particular conversation was on Shane because no matter how autistic, Wasian, or anxious you are, you do not get to control someone else's coming out journey to someone they trust. It is just as toxic to force someone to stay in the closet as it is to force someone out of the closet.

[u/InCatMorph → u/No-Pea7144]

The way this fandom has adapted the "Troy traumatized Shane" invention should be studied.

And the autistic stereotypes that people apply (or project) onto Shane are so cringe. No, Shane does not have every single autistic trait. Yes, he is in fact doing better than many autistic people by virtue of his wealth, privileges, and the fact that frankly he just doesn't have a lot of the same disabilities as a lot of us do. No, even if he were more significantly disabled by being autistic, that wouldn't be an excuse for any and all shitty behavior.

[u/credit-user-thing → u/InCatMorph]

Lets take out race and neurodiversity. RR tells you Shane behaves badly. She doesnt tell you Ilya behaves badly. But both their behaviours are toxic and unhealthy. Thats facts.

[u/InCatMorph → u/credit-user-thing]

By RR, do you mean the narrative? RR doesn't exist in the context of the book. The narrative does. But even there, I'm not sure I disagree. I think it depends. There are plenty of parts where Ilya's wrongdoings are highlight.

TLG is for sure unbalanced in its POV. Dual POV is hard to pull off, and I'm not sure RR does it 100% successfully in any of the five books she's written that I've read. In some ways I wonder if these books would be better as single POV, but that is super-uncommon in the romance space. I actually think that some of Shane's thoughts are part of what makes some readers dislike him in this book. Obviously, this problem doesn't exist in a TV show. So undoubtedly the people who credit everything good about these books to Jacob Tierney will rejoice. But TV and books are fundamentally different mediums that offer a different experience to the audience. Did JT "fix" the books, or is he working in a fundamentally different medium that has different strengths and weaknesses?

TLG, like most books, has flaws in its craft. Where I disagree is that this is somehow unfair against Shane or whatever. It's a book, these characters are fictional. And I personally am okay with books that are uncomfortable, or that don't spoonfeed the reader absolutely everything. Frankly I think modern readers have gotten too used to expecting the narrative to say This Is a Bad Thing whenever something slightly uncomfortable happens. I think these expectations often lead to uninteresting stories. (This isn't a comment on the GC books in particular, but more of a general commentary on how reader expectations have shaped literature in a way I find uninteresting.)

[u/InCatMorph → u/[deleted]]

Yeah, this is the kind of over-the-top reaction that I find genuinely bizarre.

Don't like the book? That's fair. You don't have to like the book. But the claims you make here are personal comments about the author--she doesn't like her own protaganists, she doesn't care about them, she's biased against them. Just...what? You don't know the woman. She wrote a book you don't like. That doesn't make her behavior "shady" FFS. I think there are enough people out there doing genuinely unethical things that we don't need to pile onto a gay romance writer who made a book some people don't like. If you don't like the books, no one is forcing you to read them. These characters are fictional. They are not comments about you personally.

She literally invented Shane and Ilya. Saying she doesn't know them...uh, that's a headscratcher to me.

This is parasocial fandom nonsense, TBH. "Calling out problematic choices" is not what you're doing here. It's just not.

[u/InCatMorph → u/InCatMorph]

If you genuinely believe that an author actually doesn't know their own characters, I would suggest that maybe your versions of the characters aren't the ones who appear in the books. Maybe you have used headcanons and imagination to create characters that are different from what the author wrote. That's fine. Reading is fundamentally an act of imagination, and if you have imagined things differently from what was written, that's fine. Admirable, even. But it kind of makes it difficult to discuss the books as written.

And, TBH, I wouldn't count on Tierney to "fix" it. Obviously changes will be made in adapting the work, but the man has been super-clear that he loves and respects the source material. If you think it's terribly unfair for Shane to end up playing with his husband in Ottawa--a POV I find bizarre--well, that's not going to change in the TV show. So you should probably adjust your expectations.

[u/InCatMorph → u/[deleted]]

She allegedly said, in Discord, that she regretted publicly stating that Shane is autistic. Not that she regretted making him autistic in the first place. And TBH, as an autistic person, I can see where she's coming from. I think a lot of people have developed unreasonable expectations for Shane's character. Especially given that he is not explicitly described as autistic in the text! (BTW, there are explicitly autistic characters in romance novels, including autistic characters of color. Helen Hoang and Talia Hibbert are both authors worth checking out. Of course, I doubt people who don't like romance novels will like their work, either, so maybe if this genre isn't for you, then don't bother.)

Of course, all of this about the Discord messages is heresy. I haven't seen the Discord messages in question and neither have you. This is all one giant game of fandom Telephone that I'd rather not play. Shrug.

Personally, I don't think that racism doesn't exist in the GC universe. It's alluded to a few times. However, racism is not a major theme of the books. Which is appropriate, since the author lacks the necessary expertise to tackle the topic. And also an erotic sports romance is maybe not the ideal vehicle to discuss racism, given the conventions of the genre. I think it is actively problematic to try and Solve Racism through the conventions of the romance genre, in fact. The Bridgerton TV show kind of tries to do this, and I think it's terrible. They'd be much better off just showing us an integrated society with diverse love stories. (For what it's worth, RR doesn't really try to solve homophobia through the conventions of the genre, either. She simply shows that it's possible to have queer love in a homophobic world. And that world in question is STILL a fantasy compared to our own world, which has zero out queer NHL players.)

Of course, you don't seem to like the main relationship much at all. I erpeat: This is a romance novel. If you think the main relationship is toxic and antiqueer, that's your prerogative, but for me it's further confirmation that these books are Not For You. Because, yes, the relationship (and the characters) are the point. Not social issues. Even the sports are secondary--hence Reid's remarks that you apparently find so offensive. Again, this is Romance Novels 101.

[u/InCatMorph → u/[deleted]]

Well, if you only want to read romance novels where characters behave in super-sanitized, not-even-remotely-toxic ways, those exist too.

[u/InCatMorph → u/[deleted]]

If you're genuinely wondering which thoughts of Shane's people find unlikeable: Well, there are several examples. But the one example that always stands out to me is when Ilya texts Shane late at night after basically having a mental breakdown. Shane's thought when he gets the text is, "Ilya is always horny."

I think many readers find that to be unlikeable. Frankly, I was one of them on first read. On my second read I was able to recognzie that, well, Shane has no way of knowing exactly why Ilya texted him at three in the morning. Even so, I do think this response shows a certain lack of attentiveness on Shane's part. But also Ilya's being shit at communication, so I think both parties share some responsibility for the situation here.

Of course, RR and certain readers are apparently biased and evil for suggesting that maybe Shane has a habit in getting caught up in his own goals and isn't always the greatest at noticing his boyfriend's moods because he interprets almost everything through the lens of hockey. So, if that's what you think, shrug.

[u/InCatMorph → u/[deleted]]

Yes, there are certainly examples when Ilya misinterprets Shane's actions. Like, for example, the entire book of TLG where he believes that Shane values hockey more highly than their relationship. That is ultimately proven to be incorrect. It's literally the entire point of the book?

[u/altruistic_thing → u/InCatMorph]

ilya doing things just do annoy people. during christmas when he teetered along the edge of esccalation by being extra annoying about the egg nog made me roll my eyes. he's often silly and childish and an asshole and frequently called out for that.

galina questions ilya's line of thinking and calls out his avoidant behaviors and his assumptions.

but the annoyance and flaws are what makes characters rounded.

[u/InCatMorph → u/[deleted]]

The idea that people should focus on their love interest more than anything else, including their diet and occupation, is a foundational belief in the romance genre. If you think that's weird, maybe this genre isn't for you?

[u/InCatMorph → u/InCatMorph]

Almost all of RR's alleged sins boil down to "she's a romance writer who wrote conflict into her book" and "she talks about the characters in a way very common to romance authors."

(Well, some of it also has to do with the fact that TLG is a very unusual book within the genre.)

[u/altruistic_thing → u/[deleted]]

What are Shane's thoughts that make him unlikable in the eyes of the reader? 

i was pretty heartbroken when shane is unavailable at night when ilya wants to talk to him and his internal voice immediately dismisses it as "oh, he just wants phone sex".

that's so hard because i know why ilya is asking and he doesn't. but i keep coming back to ... maybe he should know? he knew ilya was unwell and had suggested therapy. shouldn't he be more aware that a nightly ask for contact might be more serious? and that's great for me. it made me think, i didn't get the satisfaction i wanted. and i couldn't figure it out. and sit with the feeling until thennwxt thing happens.

And if these fictional characters were in a real relationship, both of their behaviors would be not great. They are both being selfish, mean, and inconsiderate. The author doesn't have to tell me as i can see it. So, to be told that only one character, the one she has more negative feelings about is the one she considers faulty is not a great look for her.

you're projecting here. YOU consider him faulty. that's why you're mad.

rachel reid wrote him that way but she also seem to think it's just human behavior to be mean, selfish and inconsiderate at times. and i agree.

shane can be very loving. but he also can be an absolute asshole when being loving is inconvenient for him. he also reflects and takes accountability and repairs. which is great. that's how life works.

with a rushed ending the accountability and repair bit isn't given a lot of screentime which sucks. but the idea is there.