I’m not going to lie to you: I more or less (more) gave up watching When Calls the Heart after the Lucas and Elizabeth debacle.
But that doesn’t mean I’m fully tapped out, and when I saw people concerned over the dream sequences from When Calls the Heart Season 12 Episode 6, I had to check it out.
And once I did, I wondered: Are Hearties ready for racier material?
Let’s face it: the majority of the When Calls the Heart audience is older. Hallmark skews older, which is why their most successful stars are middle-aged or older.
That’s not a bad thing, either, despite what advertisers will tell you.
The days of brand loyalty are gone. Gen X and Millennials rule middle age now, and we go where the wind takes us.
Someday, advertising will stop trying to get money from kids who still live in their parents’ basement and actually advertise to people with expendable cash, but that time isn’t now.
Therefore, ratings tell us that older people are bad for business. They are not. We are not.
However, that doesn’t mean that the older audience can’t have a thing or two all their own.
Hallmark has long been one such thing, and When Calls the Heart, in particular, has found the warm embrace of middle-aged women.
Now, some middle-aged women really like their content racy. Bring on the affairs, sexual liaisons, cheating, and manipulation!
Hearties generally have not been those women.
So it doesn’t surprise me to see comments about the dream sequences, which began while Elizabeth was ill. We can call them fever dreams.
Those fever dreams were affecting her libido as she began seeing Nathan in a different light than she’d shared with us previously.
It got pretty wild there for a second when she dreamed of a shirtless Nathan chopping wood.
That might not seem like a big deal, but in an era when even holding hands wasn’t the norm in Hope Valley, it stood out like a sore thumb.
Even more interesting, those sentiments carried over into Elizabeth’s waking life when she groggily told Nathan he should take his shirt off when chopping wood.
While she was sick, Elizabeth’s entire nature changed. She even seemed more comfortable in Nathan’s presence.
By the end of the episode, Nathan had caught the illness, and his own fever dreams came to life.
Nathan imagined Elizabeth hanging laundry in the backyard, capturing her in his arms and kissing her amidst the billowing sheets.
On any other show, that would be sweet, but on When Calls the Heart, it’s racy. It’s unheard of, really.
But the truth is that in the 1920s, sexual mores were changing.
It was the decade of the flapper — women who brazenly bobbed their hair (a direction Elizabeth has already taken), wore shorter skirts, and even began smoking and drinking in public.
There was also a growing acceptance of sexuality outside of marriage.
Women gained more control over their lives, paving the way for decades of social change.
So what kind of story is When Calls the Heart telling, and how far is the audience willing to go with it?
If the show remains true to life, the characters will inevitably change, opening themselves to new experiences — including a shift in romantic expectations.
It sure seemed as if the writers were testing the waters with those dream sequences.
So, how far are you willing to go?
Would you be interested in watching Elizabeth change with the times, exploring her relationship with Nathan before tying the knot? Or does that feel like too much for Hope Valley?
What about the other characters? Would it be easier to accept this kind of shift with someone like Fiona, who has already bucked the system and embraced independence?
As Hallmark changes, so does its content.
With 11 seasons behind it, is When Calls the Heart prepared to evolve, or would it make more sense to wrap up its story before Hope Valley looks too different from the world we’ve come to love?
Cast your vote in our poll below and share your thoughts in our comments section. We’re very interested in which direction you think When Calls the Heart should go!
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