Hearties Accuse Hallmark Of Pushing ‘WCTH’ Elizabeth & Nathan Romance Too Hard
This week, Erin Krakow and Kevin McGarry went on an old-fashioned charm offensive, trying to promote WCTH and the Elizabeth and Nathan romance. Although most of the interviewers understandably wanted to know how Mamie Laverock was doing, or if Lori Loughlin was returning as Abigail Stanton, they did manage to get a few words in that the season would end with a promise of an exciting romantic moment for the Mountie and the teacher.
However, this has led to an animated conversation amongst Hearties. A few frustrated viewers have now nicknamed the series “Soap Valley.” Moreover, while some applaud the promo, others have shared some sentiments that insinuate that the promo smacks of “desperation.” That is because When Calls the Heart has never done anything like this before.
Hallmark is promoting this romance hard, but not everyone is excited about Nathan and Elizabeth. Many miss Chris McNally’s intriguing character Lucas Bouchard with Erin Krakow’s Elizabeth Thornton. All season, McNally’s name has been trending hard on social media. Therefore, it is understandable that the network wants to steer fans towards the new romance. But, what do fans think?
WCTH Fans Debate On Erin Krakow & Kevin McGarry’s Recent New York Promotion Tour
On Sunday, Hallmark will air the WCTH Season 11 penultimate episode entitled “Run To You.” For the first time, stars of When Calls The Heart are promoting the final season episodes. Erin Krakow and Kevin McGarry have been hitting the New York City chat circuit, talking to publications about the Nathan and Elizabeth romance.
This is unprecedented for the series. While a few of the bigger Hallmark stars will do some promo, such as Bethany Joy Lenz for her recent Hallmark romcom Savoring Paris, this is the first time that Erin Krakow has been hitting the promo circuit hard to promote a romance for her character Elizabeth Thornton mid-season. Usually When Calls The Heart promotional interviews are before the season starts, or small interviews with Hallmark partners or podcasts.
Many Hearties are very suspicious of this unusual behavior. On Twitter, one fan wrote, “Why do E and K have to promote the S12 so much? I haven’t seen anything like this before S9 when it was Chris’ time. these interviews of theirs (I’ve only seen one) do nothing but distance me further from soap valley and I’m happy about it.”
What did other fans say? May agreed, while a few went as far as to suggest that Jack return from the dead.
- Probably because Lucas fans are getting to them. I’m done with this show. They’ve ruined the character of Lucas Bouchard. Kevin McGarry could never match @ChrisMcNally_’s performance on WCTH
- They are trying to sell the unhealthy pairing of E&N! 😂 Yes, a man who emo abused a woman, interfered wi/her life & work, never respected her enough to be truthful will now be a loving man to her & the child he helped leave fatherless, twice! @erinkrakow, why promote such 🐂 💩?
- I have no desire to watch anymore. I wish I could get a refund for the seasons I bought.
- I wish it didn’t, but it makes me angry to see them and I’m so glad I’m not watching.
- E and K are like best friends in real life, which makes me wonder what some else said online a few months ago..did he become the leading man only because one of the producers is promoting him? If so, that’s Lousy ☹️ Regardless, not interested in soap valley.
- It’s pretty standard for tv shows to do promos tours, Bridgerton just finished a global press tour yesterday.
- We have however never seen this level of promo. It smacks of desperation. Then again who wants the widow maker getting together with the widow? Only crazed Nathan/KM fans. The story simply doesn’t make sense anymore. Now, if only Mountie Jack became undead that would be great!
- That would bet the cliffhanger to end all cliffhangers! 😳
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Erin Krakow And Kevin McGarry Were In New York On Vacation Together
As stated by one Heartie comment, WCTH star and executive producer Erin Krakow, and her boyfriend Ben Rosenbaum often go on vacation with Kevin McGarry and his fiancée Kayla Wallace. On Thursday, after the interviews and an Empire State Building photo shoot with Kevin and Erin, Erin shared on Instagram a selfie from the theater of the four of them. All four were on this trip to the Big Apple.
This is not the first time the quartet have gone on vacation together. This is certainly not the first time that the four actors have gone to New York City. Erin has previously stated that as she used to live there, she loves to take her friends to some of her old haunts.
Therefore, it is not clear whether this charm offensive was because they already had a trip planned, or if the two couples decided to tack on a few vacation days to a work trip. This also offers further speculation that the big romantic change for Elizabeth is because Erin and Kevin are such good friends. While Kevin is a talented Hallmark actor, the sudden dissolution of the Elizabeth and Lucas romance still has Hearties wondering why.
Moreover, it seems that even during this charm offensive, there is just a small group of people who care about Elizabeth and Nathan, no matter how hard Hallmark tries to promote them.
Hearties, what do you think of this recent WCTH promotion tour?
You shouldn’t have to promote something so hard if it’s seen as genuine to majority of viewers 🤷🏻♀️
I love Nathan and Elizabeth’s story!! Season 11 is absolutely awesome!!
Some retcons have worked but most are epic failures… what Hallmark has done with its flagship series is not working! It’s legacy has been tarnished.
I think a majority of viewers are happy with this pairing! how is it pushed? Slow as smoke is more like it. How was this pushed anymore than Lucas? Nathan is a much better fit. I love this show, and might we remember this is just a TV show!
I want the nine years worth of watching this show back, please. I need a refund of my time. They DESTROYED my favorite show, and for no reason. They shouldn’t be surprised that they’re receiving such negative reactions.
I’m glad everyone else is finally seeing what Lucas fans have seen since episode seven of season 10. We believe that Erin Let Lindsay ruin the show because she was jealous of Chris McNally‘s rising popularity. He became the star of when calls the heart and she couldn’t stand it. Because she’s an executive producer it was within her means to stab him in the back. And doing that she showed her true colors and I know that I speak for a lot of Chris McNally fans when I say we will never watch anything with her in it again. She plays dirty!
Chris McNally is a great actor. WCTH is showcasing his acting abilities by giving him the biggest plot this season. Who Shot Lucas? Hardly the actions of a jealous producer.
Absolutely. His storyline is greater than Erin and Kevin.
totally agree. CM has a much more prominent role now. and I have always loved Elizabeth and Nathan Ratings are thru the roof! all this negativity just needs to stop, creates nothing but ridiculous anger. Just enjoy what the writers pen the story, stop analyzing, move on and have fun
Agree
Not a fan of the new romance I can’t see the chemistry . It was very disappointing what the writers did . I feel they rushed this new romance they should of let Elizabeth find herself . Hopefully , season 12 will have some surprises .
Totally agree. They seem to be trying to fix something that was never broken! A total turn off to many fans!!
Most fans are super excited about Nathan and Elizabeth. Chris McNally fans have taken to the internet to spread negativity and even hateful remarks. Even Chris wants this negativity to stop. If these fans would just be patient, they would see WCTH has big plans for the character Lucas. Nathan and Elizabeth were always meant to be. Lucas and Elizabeth were not working. If you want to watch a show that promotes family and Christian values, Team Lucas should stop and evaluate their actions.
A TV show that promotes family and “Christian values” should reevaluate when it has an engagement end and a character makes an insinuation that engagements are meant to be trial periods and spends a good portion of the time needing to convince the audience the main character is “honorable.”
It should perhaps also *not* introduce emotional infidelity.
Mmmmm, delicious Lucas fan tears. All their coping and seething makes it taste so much better. See you all in Season 12!
Umm who are all these so called “Hearties.” Did you actually do some kind of poll? I know many fans of the show who are delighted with an actual genuine romance that is based on mutual respect and admiration rather than a man trying to buy his way into someone’s heart. I applaud WCTH w
For realizing it was on the wrong track and being brave enough to change course.
I will never get over that a faith and family show added infidelity and betrayal to their number one rated series. Nathan never loved Elizabeth. He lived a lie! Elizabeth never broke a promise, until s10. She not only broke a promise to Lucas, but to her son, whom she thanked for helping with a proposal in s9. Writers ruined an engagement, saying it was a trial period! They gave their lead female character a makeover in looks and values to fit deceitful Nathan. How is that a healthy message to women?
No hearties aren’t accusing HM of pushing E&N’s romance too hard, that just the Lucas complaining. If you had done your homework, you would know that the contrary is happening, hearties are tired of the slow burn and want E&N together and married ASAP. I’ve never seen a more unprofessional article written by a Lucas fan.
They made a huge mistake of breaking up Lucas and Elizabeth. I am not sorry for those fans who think that this redirection of the series is working for them. It doesn’t work for many fans especially those who love Lucas. We can see how they are twisting and altering the series just to make it work, but its a retcon and makes no sense. They are leaving out the rebellious action of Nathan where he was punished for not obeying orders and led to Jack Thornton’s death. Why would anyone want to have a romance with a man who led their husband to die? That is worse than what they wrote about Lucas. Elizabeth was put in danger, but that was the limit. Lucas was never shady in season 6-9. He had his reasons and gave his response. It is the writers that are making him shady in s10-11 and 12 just to appease Nathan fans. Elizabeth herself is portraying a various rebellious personality. She rejected her family by not wanting to be associated with a rich life to come to Hope Valley. She keeps saying she wants a simple life, but her background isn’t that. Lucas Buchard was the perfect second match to her as Jack was. Janette Oke even wrote about a saloon character that is a great man and now they have damaged his character and making have a bad past and who knows how far they are going to damage Lucas. Elizabeth and Nathan act like desperate teenagers. Immature and dishonest and cheating. S10 was the worst of Elizabeth and Nathan. There is narcissism and gaslighting and I found it very toxic to watch. Even in s11, Elizabeth is being dishonest and refusing to acknowledge or so called feelings towards this mountie. I see no romance between these two. Fans commented it is not love, but something worse. The calm way of saying its more of a crush. I have nothing positive to say about Elizabeth and Nathan’s relationship. I don’t appreciate the fans speaking against John Tinker as I found his writing to be way better than s10-11. I find these recent seasons are childish writing and repeating s6 and other seasons. There is nothing new about it and it is no longer appropriate to watch. I did not appreciate them showing Nathan partially naked too. I started watching because somebody claimed it is Christian, but it has fallen far from that basic that it had. Elizabeth was a respective, modest, honest, and likeable character prior to s10. Now, I don’t like her and don’t like Nathan either. The other characters are not that great now. Their personalities have changed. Mei and Mike are like teenagers. They seem to like to give more flaws and bad character to these characters. Rosemary is way too nosy now. I feel that I don’t like her again.
Elizabeth easily flipped her feelings claiming that she doesn’t have love for Lucas when in s8-9 she reflects all the actions and words of love. She is so fast to drop her relationship and chase another man whereas she was taking her time in previous seasons. She should have stayed single and sorted through her thoughts and feelings. Little Jack now lost his buddy who could have been a great father image for him. Nathan can’t even get Ally to respect him all the time. She also acted in rebellion to go see her real father without obeying this one who became her adopted father. It made sense with the previous seasons and was in line with Janette Oke’s desire of not having a mountie and teacher relationship again. Why did these people have to go against her wishes and think that she would be okay? They have lots many fans due to breaking up Lucas and Elizabeth. The Christian values that used to be there in Elizabeth are gone. She forgot who she is and became selfish to want only what she wants. She doesn’t want to compromise. Lucas sacrificed to make her happy and then he sacrificed to save the people of Hope Valley and they are not respecting him. Some claim that it was not right for Lucas to not inform the town about Montague helping to fund the resort. They made things worse by announcing it and then getting him injured. It is partially an act of rebellion, but at the same time they should have spoke to Lucas directly how serious it is before releasing it to everyone. They have announced it to just the town and not to the whole public. They are trying to make Nathan into a hero when he isn’t one. Lucas is the real hero of the series in these two seasons, but they still aren’t doing a great job of showing how important he is. The fact that he has less screen time on camera is making fans angry. He deserves more screen time. They weren’t that bad when Lucas and Elizabeth were together. The way they are doing things they are showing nepotism and really favouring Kevin McGary over Chris McNally. This is inappropriate and fans can see everything that they are doing and they don’t like it.
I meant to say that they lost lots of fans. I noticed that I wrote that comment wrong. They are not gaining fans with this new change. I think over 1 million fans stopped watching when they broke Lucas and Elizabeth.
I am one of the many fans who stopped watching the show. Was very disappointed in the way Lucas was chacterized, when he saved the town. He did it for Elizabeth, and now you can’t go back and correct it.
Sorry I like Nathan and Elizabeth together. I’m happy for the change.
Elizabeth is not apologetic for what she did to Lucas. Lucas is a better person than her. He is way better man than Nathan. I didn’t like Nathan since the first time he showed up. I don’t support what N&E fans are saying. I don’t agree with them. It is not only Lucas fans who are upset, but also Elizabeth fans. They now dislike Elizabeth because her character has changed and is no longer stable. She is still living with her heart still thinking of Jack. She never had love for Nathan. Not romance like people are claiming. Even in S6-9, you can see she was avoiding him and was disgusted. Even though people accuse Lucas of chasing and pushing her. He at least was a model of Jack Thornton. He had more in common than what those fans want to admit. Elizabeth is no longer fearless and no longer in her right mind to choose wisely. She is not ready to be married. It is not true that it is written in the stars for her to be with this other man. That is just their excuse to justify putting them together. Other fans refuse to accept this as it is really a poorly written season from s10-s11 has many issues with the storylines. Faith is a better model than her. She is fearless and stable. She never went after other men. She may have started something with Nathan, but did was short lived and didn’t work out. Even though Mei changed, she never had two men at the same time. Fans are mad also that Jeanette’s character. There was an expectation that she wasn’t so self concerned. We expected her to be a likeable character and this is disappointing fans too. We want to see Lucas have a happy life in season 12 even if he isn’t going to have romance. He deserves that. I agree Nathan is deceitful, immature, rebellious, narcissistic, and selfish and with Elizabeth there was gaslighting against Lucas. I agree that Elizabeth has been downgraded to fit Nathan. She is no longer Elizabeth even her cutting her hair makes her no longer Elizabeth. She is more casually dressed too. His style is already low class. Lucas style matched with Elizabeth’s family background. It was beautiful when Lucas and Elizabeth were together and in love. Now, I just get disgusted seeing Elizabeth and Nathan in a so called romance.