Admiring The Ship - OctaScratch · 11:02am Aug 22nd, 2023
So what is this about? Well, essentially I wanted something else to write about about it between working on fics and lately, I've been reading a lot of romance stuff. In response to that, I have decided to try to give my thoughts on certain ships that I particularly like, why I like them, and some common writing tropes to avoid when writing them and we're starting out with probably one of the most well known ships when it comes to background ponies, Octascratch.
OctaScatch is easily one of my favorite ships when it comes to background ponies getting together. There is always such nice chemistry for this ship when written right. For those who have been living under a rock for the last... like 11 years (at least as of writing this), OctaScratch is a ship between Octavia Melody and DJ Pon-3. For stories prior them getting official names, you'll see them under the names of Octavia Philharmonica and Vinyl Scratch. Well... Pon-3 still get called Vinyl Scratch probably because that's just an easier name to use in conversation. I mean can you imagine constantly using "Pon-3" in conversation for stories? ESPECIALLY confessions? Fucking,
"I love you, Tavi."
"I love you too, Pon-3."
ITS TOO GOOFY!!! Anyways, this is a fun ship because these two are musical based ponies from different backgrounds, Octavia is more classical and Vinyl is more modern and its always fun to have these two interact the way they do. Most of the older stories involve them not liking the other's choice in music and hating each other for a bit and then eventually seeing what behind the pony who does the music and they actually ended up liking the pony behind the music they play and end up falling in love that way. Either that or angry sex stuff.
However that way of telling the story is VERY overdone honestly. Usually the same song and dance; Octavia is a classical purist unable to change, and Vinyl, while not a purist like Octavia, gets annoyed for at how stuffy Octavia is and her unwillingness to venture out musically. Them hating each other for their choice in music is a bit dated at this point, especially with "Slice of Life" making them roommates who seem like they're best friends. I do favor stories that just nip that in the bud quickly, or its an add on to a bunch of reason they don't get along at first. Looking back at two of the first OctaScratch fics I've read, which were University Days and Allegrezza respectively (like pretty much everyone else), they had different reason to not like the other character, but they've usually ended up realizing the other pony is not so bad.
Anyways moving away from that, there are some stories that I like to talk about that brought a very interesting take on the OctaScratch formula, but moreso end up in the same situation.
GTVS: The Great Teacher Vinyl Scratch
Usually I don't read the humanized stories too much, but this one was one I was actually quite fond of reading through. In "The Great Teacher Vinyl Scratch," Vinyl, who is called Vincenza Scatch here, is at a down point in her career, pretty much later on to be assumed to be the fault of Neon Lights... at least in the fan comic that was being made alongside this. So, in response, Vinyl's mother in this fic, Photo Finish (I'll talk about this later, don't worry), calls in a favor to a Vito Philharmonica about a job, while Vinyl takes a break from being a DJ. The job ends up being a music teacher for the seniors at a private high school. Just so happens, Vito's daughter, Octavia, is also going. The biggest issue is how is she gonna teach a bunch of teenagers, when she is BARELY older than them.
So, now that that's done, let's get the messy part out of the way. Vinyl is 22 and Octavia is 17, turning 18 during the school year. Vinyl is Octavia's teacher, this is an OctaScratch story, and they are temporarily living under the same roof. I know a lot of people are going to be VERY concerned mainly about the fact that Octavia isn't a legal adult here and a romantic situation between a student and teacher generally gets frowned upon because one party is using the other party and power dynamics. I guess we can be glad this is fiction right? But to be real for a moment, the second someone turns 18 and graduates, its fair game no matter how slimy it may be (and its EXTREMELY weird. I couldn't imagine dating ANY of my teachers, past, present, or future). I don't think this is AS bad though because Vinyl is not planning on staying a teacher. This is only a year long thing until she can get back on her feet and start DJing again.
What's more unusual here is that Vinyl is the more experienced one here with just life in general. Usually in most OctaScratch stories, they're both equally as inexperienced in certain areas, especially when it comes to being romantic. In here, Vinyl is a high school dropout, but she has been in a relationship before and then was (assumedly) betrayed by that person, been at the top of the musical world after starting from scratch, has multiple years of being a musician under her belt, and she's done all of this BEFORE she turned 22. At one point in the fic, its mentioned that she has 5 years of being a musician under her belt, but she's only be active in the professional world for 3 years due to spending the first 2 years studying different musical styles. It gives the feeling the Vinyl had to grow up quickly (in certain areas) and had to take her job seriously.
Even when it comes to the whole romance portion, Vinyl is the first one that mentions having a talk about how this is going to work and the such with Octavia. Even checks to see if its actual love or a crush that Octavia is feeling. Having an Vinyl that is actually responsible from the start of a fic is actually a pretty nice change of pace. Vinyl herself is also pretty impressionable, as those who are close to her start doing the things she does. The most noticeable is they copy what Vinyl does and will swap between English and another language. Vinyl in this fic is fluent in Italian, French, and English. She has a habit of swapping back and forth between English and Italian, usually swapping to Italian either in her head or out loud if she doesn't want certain things to be understood. Octavia slowly starts learning Italian, just by listening to her and starts falling into the same habit as Vinyl. Later on in the fic, it is mentioned that in this continuity, Vinyl and Rarity are both ex-classmates that hung out a lot. They both took the same French class, so what happens when Rarity appears? She does the same thing that Vinyl does and starts swapping in and out of a different language, just that its English and French instead of Italian.
Unfortunately this fic ended up being cancelled at around 130k words, so until someone decided to adopt it or something, we're kinda out of luck for a continuation.
"Off Rhythm" is a fic that offers a nice change of pace for the normal OctaScratch formula AND they did it before "Slice of Life" aired. Vinyl and Octavia here are still in the same music profession they always are, however, the personalities a changed a bit. Vinyl is more of a meek, nerdy character that turns into the ridiculously confident DJ Pon-3 when behind the turntables. Octavia, however, is the biggest change here. She usually gets the reserved quiet treatment, but she is the more outgoing one here. Heck the first time you see her in the fic, she dancing to music that Vinyl is playing during her show at a club. To just throw out how much different Octavia is here, within the first chapter, she sneaks backstage to compliment Vinyl on her music then gives her a kiss as she leaves, something that isn't normal for how people write Octavia.
The rest of the fic is mostly Octavia wooing Vinyl and getting her to be at least a little bit more confident in herself. There are constant reference that the reason why Octavia was so different was because Discord did something to her at the start of season 2. I won't go into it, but its very much hinted to throughout the entire fic and its very much the reason why she isn't as posh as she usually is. Not a whole lot for me to say about this fic due to the short nature of it (5 chapters and totaling about 27.5k words) as a lot of it is just Octavia and Vinyl meeting the other's friends, talking to each other, and just cute fluff.
Minus some pacing issues in the last chapter, this story is a pretty cure story. It DOES beg for a sequel detailing their relationship after they together, however.
(EDIT HERE)
I forgot to talk about the common tropes to avoid here. Well let me go through them really quick.
1.) "I hate you." "I hate you." Angry Sex.
Yeah, I'm going to be blunt about this, I think this is boring if you just make their entire relationship THIS. This is not how a relationship works. This is a one-night stand of mistakes, alcohol, and anger usually. Now if you're doing it as how the relationship starts and then turn it into a normal relationship later on, then you can do that... just don't make this constant angry sexual relationship.
2.) Only having them hate each other due to their choice of music/Over doing the hatred of the other's choice of musical genre
This one is one I'm copying from an older episode of "Oh Babble Scribbler," a podcast made by ObabScribbler. This is a fairly easy plot to fall into to get them to interact usually. They meet each other in a bar or a place of some sort, get introduced to each other, they tell each other the musical profession they're in, get in a fight over what is considered music, and etc. Its over done at this point and partially due to "Slice of Life" this is very outdated. Make it a part of the reason they don't like each other, but not the MAIN reason they don't like each other.
(EDIT END)
That's all I really wanted to talk about. Maybe I'll come back to this pairing again if I want to talk about University Day or Allegrezza, in addition to another fic I was planning on talking about here called "Syncopation". I ended up skipping it mainly due to the fact that I need to reread it to form actual opinions on this fic, but its a good one, trust me. A shame the sequel is I think in complete limbo atm. But for those who did read this, thank you! You have fantastic day or night and be looking forward to a new story coming out sometime soon!!!!
