What is the relationship between the male and female character?

Question

In the short Me Me Me, the male character seems to be mentally tormented by a female character. There are various hints in the short about the relationship of the two. Is there anything official describing the relationship between the two characters?

Answer 1

In the western side of the web, probably not. The only official description is

“You are attacked and ravished by many girls”

That really does not answer the question. But looking up for explanations of the symbolism, I came upon two analysis of the video: the first one by NewVagabond.tumblr, the other one on the Ask John column of animenation.net. They are lengthy and detailed, full of screenshots and worth reading. Go read them, I'll wait.

At the end, the writer behind "Ask John" says:

After composing my own interpretation, I did a web search for other criticisms and interpretations. I encountered a number of analysis that interpreted the video entirely oppositely to the way I did. I encountered several interpretations that suggest that the video represents the boy’s effort to stop being an otaku, that the video is a criticism of hikikomori otaku culture.

He did his homework, it seems. But one other thing on his closing thoughts caught my eye:

(...) Hideaki Anno’s influence and involvement in the production (...)

Anno-sensei is well-known for his "Death of the Author" philosophy, where what the author meant with his work is replaced with what the viewer felt when consuming said work. From Anno-sensei's roundtable discussion at Anime Expo '96 convention:

"Animation makes sense to people in the process of their seeing it. (...) There has to be a relationship that comes into being between the person watching and what the character's saying in the animation itself."

I am inclined to assume that the production staff of Me!Me!Me! follows the same ethos. But all this about Anno's philosophical influence is totally an assumption on my part.

Since even the know your meme page (and the linked articles therein) also do not point to an official explanation (but do comment on the confusion the viewership feels when watching the video), I end my report with:

Is there anything official describing the relationship between the two characters?

No, to the best of my Google-jutsu, there is not.

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Appendix

1. Link to the translated lyrics.

2. Yet another translation, with Kanji and Romaji lyrics by newvagabond.tumblr.

3. The official site of Japan Animator Exhibition (Japanese) also have the Kanji lyrics.

4. Yes, I also felt like this:

   

Answer 2

The lyrics and parts of the video indicate that the guy and girl were in a relationship, but have since separated.

Specifically the first 9 translated lines of the song indicate a happy relationship and the 2:55 mark of the video where the breakup is presumably shown.

All the time, all the time
We were together, weren’t we?
All the time, all the time
I was thinking about you

You were that way too
You were the same
There were only two feelings
And going ahead, and going ahead
You felt like you were living too
- translated by newvegabond

As for the circumstances between the two, a quick analysis (speculation by me) of the video and the lyrics indicate that he forced his ideals on the girl in the beginning of the relationship. This is indicated by the next 20 lines of the song and the first half of the video where every thing is happy.

After that things go down hill.

I'm assuming he realizes that she isn't the girl he made her out to be, and so he unilaterally ends the relationship. At this point, the song seems to tell of how the girl still loves the guy, but hates the girl she had pretended to be.

The last part of the song -

I waited for you nonetheless
I loved you nonetheless

Eternal love
Within my cry for help
Eternal love
Certainly
Won’t be
Anywhere anymore

Goodbye

The song indicates she still loves him, but if the love isn't there anymore, she has to be gone. The image below shows her being swallowed up, and that's the last we see of her.

With that said, a quick wrap up of the short - the guy is bed ridden due to guilt. He dreams of his ex-girlfriend. He is haunted by his guilt, in the form of the masked succubus. The succubus shows him the break up scene and continuously attacks him. He tries to fight back but its all in vain. She's already dead.

• thanks krazer for pointing me to the translated lyrics

Answer 3

I think it would be tougher to prove that there wasn't some sort of relationship between the two.

In Me! Me! Me!, there's a lot of hints and inferences that these two were romantically involved. Around 3:30 in the video, you're shown flashbacks of various events that the two participated with each other - a lunch date, a trip to the aquarium, the beach, among others.

There's nothing official about their relationship, but the implications are very much there.

A year or so later, with Girl, we're shown a scene with the same couple.

I'm...really not sure what significant role they play in Girl, but that's where things really go off the deep end there...

There's nothing official about their relationship, but it's tough to deny their implicit relationship. Even if the creators don't outright say anything about it, their interactions leave little room for doubt.

Answer 4

I like to think that the blue haired girl from the "GIRL" video is actually the redheaded one from the first, showing her life and point of view before this "prince" came, once she sees herself and what she has become she freaks out and in the first ME!Me!Me! video we see her and what she became and the blue hair girl is actually her, in the transition.

Just a lame, no founded speculation but I like it.