‘Heated Rivalry’ Showrunner Teases ‘Much More Serious’ Season 2 Plot, Including ‘Role Model’ Book Storyline: ‘This Hotel-Room-Adolescent-Sex Stuff Is Largely Gone’

Home TV News Apr 18, 2026 1:34pm PT ‘Heated Rivalry’ Showrunner Teases ‘Much More Serious’ Season 2 Plot, Including ‘Role Model’ Book Storyline: ‘This Hotel-Room-Adolescent-Sex Stuff Is Largely Gone’ By Jennifer Maas Plus Icon Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer @jmaasaronson Latest BookCon Returns After Six-Year Break: Event Organizer on Reservation Rush, Boycott Response and Romantasy Reader Demand 1 day ago ‘The Phantom’ Live-Action TV Series in the Works From Filmmaker Reginald Hudlin, King Features (EXCLUSIVE) 1 day ago ‘Mouse: PI for Hire’ Star Troy Baker on Jack Pepper’s Narration Quirk, Why He Keeps Taking on New Video Game Roles Amid Potential for More ‘Indiana Jones,’ ‘Last of Us’ 2 days ago See All HBO Max/Crave “Heated Rivalry” showrunner Jacob Tierney is in the midst of writing Season 2 of the hockey romance series, which he says will find Shane Hollander (Hudson Williams) and Ilya Rozanov (Connor Storrie) “in much more serious territory” than the lovers were in the first installment. “It’s different. It really is different,” Tierney said during a panel alongside “Heated Rivalry” book author Rachel Reid Saturday at BookCon at the Javits Center in New York. “And the challenge of it is, from an adaptation point of view, is that you’re in much more serious territory. A lot of the initial — there’s still lots of flirting and lots of sex — but this kind of danger, this kind of hotel-room-adolescent-sex stuff is largely gone. And so it presents really new challenges.” Related Stories 'The Super Mario Galaxy Movie' Review: Frenetic and Disappointing Sequel Is a Threadbare Adventure That's All Video-Game Easter Eggs