‘Heated Rivalry’ and the increase in homosexual romance tales

When the vacation season rolled round final 12 months, Margaret Hecox knew precisely what her grandmother would love.

The 23-year-old wrote in a card about “Heated Rivalry,” the breakout Canadian TV sequence following a clandestine love story between two male hockey gamers. Hecox watched a number of episodes together with her grandmother and likewise inspired associates and different members of the family to tune in.

“I knew she would love the present,” Hecox mentioned. “Clearly, she did.”

The grandmother-granddaughter duo is a part of a large fan base of girls for books, exhibits and flicks centered on love tales between two males.

This kind of romance content material — lengthy referred to in some Asian cultures as “yaoi” or “boy love” — has been produced for many years. However shoppers and specialists advised CNBC that the thrill round “Heated Rivalry” pushed this nook of LGBTQ+ media additional into the mainstream, notably amongst straight American ladies.

On TikTok, greater than 900,000 movies have been posted utilizing the hashtag “fujoshi,” a slang time period in Japanese for the feminine followers of those tales. Google searches for phrases associated to the yaoi fandom surged to never-seen-before ranges late final 12 months within the U.S., underscoring the subgenre’s rising home consciousness.

“That is all, pun meant, ladies popping out of the closet with a style that they’ve been invested in,” mentioned Shampaigne Graves, who consults on and hosts a podcast about ladies shoppers. “It is not a brand new phenomena. It is simply one thing that girls really feel snug speaking about and sharing with each other.”

All of the issues she mentioned

HBO, the U.S. streaming platform for “Heated Rivalry,” mentioned about two-thirds of the sequence’ viewership was ladies. Throughout the present’s press tour, the inventive group and lead actors repeatedly fielded questions on why they believed it struck a chord with ladies particularly.

“‘Heated Rivalry’ sparked straight girl being like ‘OK, we wish extra of this,'” mentioned Emily Sarre, a social media content material creator who made a number of posts declaring her affinity for the present.

Demand for one of these content material has ballooned past the six-episode “Heated Rivalry” sequence.

“Name Me By Your Title,” a coming-of-age drama from Sony, had the ninth most followers of any narrative function movie who establish as ladies on film evaluation platform Letterboxd. That is 46 slots greater than the place it sits on the equal checklist for males.

Practically seven out of 10 viewers of the Timothée Chalamet-led movie within the first three months of 2026 have been ladies, in keeping with Nielsen.

“Crimson, White & Royal Blue,” a 2023 political romcom on Amazon, had 61% feminine viewers, Nielsen discovered.

Lionsgate shared Nielsen information with CNBC exhibiting that girls accounted for 60% of viewers for the reason that begin of final 12 months for “The Perks of Being A Wallflower,” a chronicle of same-sex romance involving a soccer participant.

The subsequent ‘Twilight’?

Ladies readers have additionally targeted their consideration this 12 months on “Heated Rivalry” and different male-to-male romance books by writer Rachel Reid on Fable, a Scribd-owned ebook dialogue platform. After working by Reid’s catalogue, they look like choosing up different titles within the subgenre, like “The Tune of Achilles,” a reimagining of Greek mythology printed in 2011.

“This isn’t only one extra in an extended string of little tendencies,” mentioned Kim Allee, Fable’s advertising and marketing director. “This looks like one thing far more vital than that.”

Actual ebook sale statistics by gender might be tough to trace. However anecdotally, the lion’s share of male-to-male romance readers look like straight ladies, in keeping with Jennifer Bokal, president-elect of the Romance Writers of America commerce group.

Bokal mentioned she noticed ladies donning “Heated Rivalry” merchandise “in all places” on the BookCon conference in April. With the joy for the present and ebook, Bokal mentioned it is catapulted right into a league with the “Fifty Shades of Gray” and “Twilight” franchises.

On the floor, “Heated Rivalry” and different male-to-male love tales might be surprising picks for ladies, provided that they aren’t represented because the protagonist or love curiosity. However Allee mentioned Fable’s ladies customers are struck by the depth of emotion within the subgenre, a lot in order that “craving” has grow to be a buzzword to explain what attracts them to those books.

“It is exhibiting folks the kinds of love and romance that they should have, no matter gender,” mentioned Gianna Saad, a 30-year-old whose bookshelf is lined with novels on this subgenre by authors together with Scarlett Drake and TJ Klune. “There’s this deeper stage to the whole lot that is taking place in these sorts of books.”

Showcasing numerous tales

A few of these titles have grow to be mainstream hits partially by word-of-mouth endorsements by female-centric fan bases.

Reid’s novels have been among the many top-read e-books on Scribd’s Everand subscription service this 12 months, in keeping with information from the corporate launched this week. Extra broadly, Fable’s Allee mentioned male-to-male love tales have unseated “romantasy” as the preferred sort of romance books.

Amazon mentioned “Crimson, White & Royal Blue” drove new subscriptions and rapidly turned one of many highest-watched romcoms on its Prime Video platform. Each the “Crimson, White & Royal Blue” film and the “Heated Rivalry” TV sequence have second installments within the works.

Viewers might see extra on-screen homosexual love tales amongst athletes as producers look to duplicate the “Heated Rivalry” playbook, mentioned Tom Nunan, a producer and former community and studio govt, who now lectures on the UCLA College of Theater, Movie and Tv.

However Nunan mentioned the larger lesson for Hollywood ought to be that producing authentic and real tales will probably be rewarded by audiences. The trade has lengthy sought to win the eye of girls — who sometimes account for almost all of audiences for scripted leisure — by numerous and thought-provoking plots, he mentioned.

“When exhibits like ‘Heated Rivalry’ take off, it reminds us: What a wealthy a part of life that is to discover,” Nunan mentioned. It is also a reminder to “be sure we populate our exhibits as precisely and authentically as attainable, as a result of everyone wins in that state of affairs.”

Whereas these releases have garnered fanfare and acclaim, LGBTQ+ advocates additionally warn that the group’s total illustration on display screen is shrinking.

GLAAD, a non-profit LGBTQ+ advocacy and media monitoring group, mentioned that the share of LGBTQ+ inclusive scripted movies from prime film distributors dropped by roughly 14% from 2023 to 2024. The variety of LGBTQ+ characters in TV exhibits tumbled about 23% within the 2024-2025 season in contrast with three years prior, the group reported.

“On one hand, I believe it is encouraging,” mentioned Katherine Sender, a Cornell professor who researches LGBTQ+ media, of the joy over “Heated Rivalry.” “However alternatively, I do not suppose we ought to be too optimistic.”

‘All I can take into consideration’

To make sure, not all male-to-male love tales have majority-women audiences. The “Heartstopper” sequence on Netflix, and the “Love, Simon” romcom from Disney‘s twentieth Century Fox each skewed barely towards male viewers within the first quarter, in keeping with Nielsen.

There’s additionally proof that the fan base for this style extends past ladies who establish as heterosexual. Throughout CNN’s New 12 months’s Eve particular, co-host Andy Cohen requested the musician Brandi Carlile if lesbians have been equally obsessive about “Heated Rivalry.”

“It is all I can take into consideration,” Carlile responded.