YMMV / Olivia Rodrigo

• Alternative Character Interpretation: In "hope ur okay," the narrator admits she isn't sure if she'll ever see her friend from the first verse again, or if he's "out there." Does she mean they simply might never meet again and he may never hear her saying she still loves him, or is she afraid he might be dead, either due to his parents' abuse crossing the final line, or being Driven to Suicide? (Note the friend in the second verse is explicitly still around, as the narrator simply says they "don't talk much," and that she misses her.)
• Applicability: Due to Rodrigo being mixed-race (of partly Filipino descent on her dad's side), many Asian-Americans have expressed that they relate to her songs. Although they are never explicitly about race, plenty of those songs contrast Rodrigo's brunette hair and racially ambiguous looks to All-American blonde girls'. "all-american bitch," in particular, is pretty clearly a bitter satire of the All-American ideal, something that resonates with these Asian-American fans. It helps that Rodrigo acknowledges and embraces her Filipino side publicly, though she has been mistaken for other ethnicities too (one viral TikTok audio calls her the "crying Mexican girl," which she has herself used in a promo TikTok for her Guts cookie).
• Award Snub:
  • Despite being the female lead of High School Musical: The Musical: The Series, the 2021 Kids' Choice Awards passed her over for Favorite Female TV Star in favor of Sofia Wylie. The 2022 awards corrected this, as not only was she nominated for that category (though Sofia still was nominated as well), but she won (whereas Sofia had lost one year earlier). In fact, HSM:TM:TS lost all of its nominations in 2021, but won them all in 2022 (losing to itself not counting), largely riding the momentum of Olivia's successful music career.
  • In the music category, she was nominated for Favorite Breakout Artist in 2022 and won. Because of that nomination, she was not nominated in the Favorite Female Singer category (it's rare for artists to be in both the new category and a regular category, but there have been exceptions before, like Lil Nas X in 2020, but she wasn't one of them). Furthermore, none of her songs got a nomination for Favorite Song nor was Sour given a nomination for Favorite Album. Billie Eilish took home the blimp for both categories.
• Epileptic Trees: Who were the guy and "that blonde girl" that Olivia Rodrigo sings her heartbreak about in "drivers license"? Fans speculate it's her costar Joshua Bassett after their break-up and Sabrina Carpenter respectively, but that was just a rumor.
• Fandom Rivalry:
  • With Joshua Bassett, her High School Musical: The Musical: The Series co-star. It's widely speculated that most of the songs on SOUR are based on their rumoured Romance on the Set and ensuing break-up. While both of them have remained mum on whose songs are about who and even if they really did date, that hasn't stopped fans from picking sides. This has also extended into a fandom rivalry with Sabrina Carpenter as well, after Bassett began dating Carpenter afterwards, due to fan speculation of her being "that blonde girl" in "drivers license", and Carpenter's single "Skin" coinciding with the timing of "drivers license".
  • In the United Kingdom, she's got a rivalry with Dua Lipa fans, who consider Olivia a wannabe American rival who can't quite get Dua's signature style and have given her an malicious nickname of "Yankee Dua Lipa".
• Friendly Fandoms:
  • With Taylor Swift. Olivia is a huge fan of Taylor's, citing her as one of her biggest inspirations and saying she'd love to collaborate. This reflects in Olivia's personal, intimate songwriting inspired by her real life, a hallmark of Taylor's. Taylor, in turn, has been incredibly supportive of Olivia's career, sending her a gift and handwritten letter of congratulations when "drivers license" was a hit. Olivia even interpolated "New Year's Day" for "1 step forward, 3 steps back." As a result of all this, even Swifties who aren't personally into Olivia's music tend to like her quite a lot, and the two fandoms are generally very amicable towards each other. And by the time of the 2021 BRIT Awards, they have met and taken a picture together! On another note, both women created a song for The Hunger Games films.
  • With Alanis Morissette, due to their respective fanbases comparing their angsty vocals.
  • With Sabrina Carpenter due to fan speculation of her being "that blonde girl" in "drivers license". (At least the section of the fandom that doesn't engage in Fandom Rivalry, that is.)
  • With Paramore due to their similar sounding angsty vocals and pop-punk-rock sound.
  • In a way, her SOUR album is very popular among Amphibia fans, with many animatics, AMVs, and a few fanfics, being made with her songs. The album is usually associated with Anne, Sasha, and Marcy- all three characters from the latter- and is used to detail the trio's deteriorating relationship with each other, all the while adding romance to the mix as well. The most popular songs to use in such fanworks are "brutal", "traitor", "good 4 u", and to a lesser extent "deja vu" and "favorite crime".
• Les Yay: By only taking the music video of "deja vu" into account, one might be forgiven for thinking the song is about the breakup of two female lovers. The way Olivia longingly stars at the new girl while hiding is most telling; the scene of her wrecking the TV screens in rage can be interpreted as the heartbreak for not being able to be with the girl anymore. Furthermore, the other girl wearing the same outfits as Olivia can be seen as missing her ex-girlfriend so much that she can only wear Olivia's clothes and go to the places where they had dates alone to reminisce. It doesn't help that the (male) ex the lyrics refer to doesn't appear anywhere in the video.
• Signature Song: "driver's license" is this, as it has became viral on TikTok, and is considered a "Valentine's Day song". Well, of the break-up kind at least. Also “good 4 u”, which, like the previous song, reached number one in many countries and has over 1 billion plays on Spotify.

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