R Kelly and Usher’s ‘Same Girl’ analysed

Millions across the world have debated the great mysteries of life like who shot JFK, how were the pyramids built, what is going on at Twin Peaks and how did the TV show Lost become so terrible. But not enough of us are debating the greatest mystery of all; what on earth is going on in the Usher and R Kelly ‘Same Girl’ music video?

The song by itself is basically an RnB update of the ‘Girl is mine’ by Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson with Ush and Kell’s (yep, they have super awesome friend nicknames for each other) finding out that they are dating the same girl and planning to surprise her.

However with the music video, we are treated to a surprise twist to the tale when it’s revealed they are dating twins, not the same girl at all! The sheer mind-melting twist defies every other piece of information we have been presented before, a twist of director M. Night Shyamalan portions (you know the twist that he can make loads of bad films and still make more).

Even the cast looked super shocked:

To attempt to crack this enigma I got a crack team of some of the greatest thinkers of our time, some even have philosophy degrees, (and yes most are unemployed) and we debated for hours the possible solutions to what it all means.

Below I present to you the various theories to the great ‘Same Girl’ mystery.

Theory One – the Literal version

A cynic would say that the director was just untalented and lazy and didn’t bother taking notice of the lyrics to the song but this can’t possibly be correct. The director for the video calls himself Director X and looks like this:

I refuse to believe that a man who looks this intelligent and calls himself something as socially challenging as Director X would possibly be anything other than a visionary genius.

In fact, the song’s lyrics actually don’t provide a conclusion to the story, U and K plan to surprise the girl at the end of the song but don’t actually say what happens, so it seems the resolution was always anticipated to be resolved in the music video.

So in Theory One, it is taken at face value that everything is literal and true in the video and Usher and R Kelly are dating twins. If this is the case then the twins both lead very similar lives, in fact exactly the same lives.

They drive black Durangos with the same license plate (which is probably illegal), both work at TBS, both went to Georgia Tech, both live at the same address, have the same mole, both call themselves TT, both have a kid, both have a blue and pink phone (but one uses their blue phone and turns their pink phone off and the other uses their pink phone and turns their blue phone off), both have the same tattoo in the exact same place and both love waffles. I bet they annoyingly finish each other’s sentences too.

But as the song suggests, despite their closeness as twins and their intimacy with both Usher and R Kelly, they at no time mention to the guys that they have a twin. And despite having practically the same lives, they somehow find themselves 700 miles away from each other, with one meeting Usher in Atlanta (or ATLANTA! as Usher shouts in the song for no reason) and the other meeting R Kelly in Chicago (or CHICAGO! as R Kelly shouts in the song for no reason). Maybe the twins both have a terrible sense of direction is my best guess.

It’s possible this could happen, weirder things have occurred of course like the success of the Twilight series or certain RnB singers getting off sex crime charges despite video evidence, right Kell’s? However, something about this theory just doesn’t add up for me, especially with visionary Director X at the helm, you just know there must be a deeper meaning somewhere.

Theory Two – Usher is a slut and doesn’t listen

“Oh R Kelly you’re dating a female? A female within potential geography of myself? Yep, I’m probably banging her.”

The very idea that there is a girl in the world that Usher isn’t sleeping with, is incomprehensible for him. He also doesn’t listen to anyone apparently, as R Kelly gives him plenty of details about this girl’s life and Usher just goes yeah yeah yeah whatever whilst probably trying to see his reflection in Kelly’s eyes.

I can’t blame Usher for not knowing one girl to the next though as he does choose to wear sunglasses in really dark clubs so he probably doesn’t know who the hell he’s talking to.

I also can’t blame Usher for not listening to R Kelly either especially when Kell’s says things like “She was the love of my life and my potential wife.” So the love of your life is only potentially going to be your wife? Does she need to complete a survey and pass an exam as well?

However, Usher self belief in his slutiness is actually justified as the video shows that he apparently is a massive slut because he recognizes the girl at the end of the video. So if you ever hook up with Usher you can tell him anything you like about yourself as he’s not listening which would be a lot of fun but probably make him wear at least 3 condoms at once for safety.

Theory Three – Usher and R Kelly are both super-high

“Holy shit, Hansel, haven’t you been smoking Peyote for six straight days, and couldn’t some of this maybe be in your head?”

Throughout the whole music video, there are no other people that Usher or R Kelly interact with or talk to about their relationships. The phone conversations they both have at the beginning with their agents are entirely focused on business matters (a cynic might say this was a way to promote the other shit, like fragrances and albums, that they’ve coming out but I think it really added to the realism of the plot).

Like many adults when they’re bored and with friends its entirely possible these two got super mind-bendingly high, had a bad trip and paranoia set in. Talking to each other, this paranoia escalated to crazy levels. The scene at the end is not them confused at there being twins but them being like “Oh yeah, forgot about the other one. Let’s get burritos.”

Always have a spotter who can tell you “Dude, shut up you’re high.” Rookie error, guys.

Theory Four – The twins are con artists

It seems highly coincidental that twins would both fall in love with two guys and then those two guys turn out to be best friends, especially as both the friends hadn’t told the other about their dating and the twins didn’t either. Also a bit convenient that both the twins would both separately date slightly dim multi-millionaires.

It makes more sense if you think that the the twins were con artists looking for easy targets. These back stories they use for their characters are the same because they are tried and tested from years of experience getting money from rich men.

This is something that is addressed in the video. The cogs in Kell’s and Ush’s heads slowly start to turn and they debate why a girl would possibly tell lies and distortions in her effort to make two multi-millionaires fall in love with her. They eventually come up with the most logical reason why she picked them, as R Kelly concludes “It must be a music thing.”

Swing and a miss.

Theory Five – R Kelly is lonely

R Kelly seems to be a bit isolated, at the beginning of the video he’s in an empty office and he flies a private jet by himself with not even one other passenger. We also see that R Kelly doesn’t have many friends, his phone only has 5 contacts on it.

One is his studio which isn’t even a person so that phone call would be a bit one-sided, Twon I guess is the real name of the TT character (If he’d used this name from the beginning this whole thing would have been resolved before it got started). He doesn’t even have his mom on there!

Poor R Kelly, if any of you see him, just give him a hug from me. 

(You could say the phone contacts list was lazy video production work but Director X. DIRECTOR X!)

So it’s well established Kell’s doesn’t have many friends so might be feeling a bit lonely. It makes sense as he is a bit socially awkward highlighted by that online video of him in which he seems unaware of when is the correct and proper place to urinate.

So maybe in his loneliness he creates an elaborate plot so he can hang out with Usher for a while. This theory makes sense as it is R. Kelly who feeds all the information to Usher about the girl. He maybe hired the twins so he could create this grand plan to be BFFs with Ush.

I mean he does look surprisingly calm about the love of his life and his potential wife cheating on him, in fact he looks like he’s having a great time playing basketball and having romantic fireside chats with Usher.

He doesn’t even get pissed when Usher says “The apple of my eye and YOUR potential wife”, in other words Ush is saying “I’m banging her but she’s nothing special, you can buy that cow.”

I’m kinda glad Usher says this because R Kelly is trying to play with his emotions by making Ush fall for a girl before pulling the rug from under him. I guess Kell’s didn’t realise how slutty his friend was and how little this ploy would affect Ush so decides in the end to reveal all and probably later think of a new plan for attention.

Possibly the biggest clue to this theory being correct is at the end of the video when for no reason R Kelly gives a big C sign to the camera behind Usher back. No one in the video has a C in their name so he is most likely subtly telling the audience “Yes, I’m a massive cunt.”

Conclusions

I’ve discussed all the theories my group of elite thinkers could come up with so it is really up to you to decide which you think is true. This is the beauty and genius of ‘Same Girl’ in that the answer can be which ever one you most believe in your heart.

For me, I think Theory Five ‘R Kelly is lonely and made up everything’ is the correct solution. If nothing else but for the subtle clue at the beginning in which it says on screen ‘Story written by R Kelly.’