2025 is off to a wild start, because Olivia O’Brien just sneakily shared some lore building on the Emma Chamberlain and Ethan Dolan situationship conversation. On Jan. 8, O’Brien took to TikTok where she uploaded a video of her lip syncing to her song “Purpleworld,” which fans think seemingly confirmed her rumored relationship with Ethan’s twin brother, Grayson, whom she was believed to have dated between 2018 and 2019. O’Brien originally captioned the TikTok “lore mentioned,” seemingly confirming fan speculation that her relationship with Dolan may have been true all along. Her Campus reached out to O’Brien’s team for comment on the fan speculation about her and Dolan, but did not hear back by the time of publication. However, she’s since deleted the caption while leaving the video up.
As O’Brien lip-synced, she seemed to hint at her rumored relationship with Dolan as she mouthed, “I’ve been talkin’ to your brother, he said that you found another girl.” Fans think the “brother” O’Brien was singing about was Ethan, which only adds to the speculation that “Purpleworld” might *actually* be about Grayson.
On top of all of this, the name “Purpleworld” could point to the notorious filming room the twins had, famously black with neon purple light strips in the background. They even brought back this iconic background when they announced their return to YouTube in 2018.
In 2019, O’Brien revealed to Paper Magazine that “Purpleworld” was inspired by an ex and their messy situationship, but didn’t name any names. “I thought that this song was a perfect intro to the album because it best describes how I felt about the person I wrote this album about and what happened between us. I held nothing back, writing this song was like a therapy session,” she said at the time.
O’Brien also used this relationship as inspo for other songs on the album, including “Care Less More.” She said, “I wrote this song about the same guy that most of the songs are about, and also wrote it with Drew, Anton, and Tobias. This guy was still in love with his ex-girlfriend the entire time we talked, and I knew that but somehow convinced myself I didn’t care. I always thought of myself as someone who was too independent for a relationship, but I liked this guy so much I would have set that rule aside for him.”
After seeing her TikTok on Jan. 8, many fans were convinced O’Brien was referring to Dolan, and have since shared their reactions on social media.
NO ONE TOLD ME GRAYSON DOLAN HAD A SITUATIONSHIP WITH OLIVIA O’BRIEN WHAT???
— Ari 💌🪶| {TTPD AOTY‼️} (@ariishere22) January 10, 2025
bro purple world by olivia o’brien being confirmed to be about grayson dolan is confirmation i never thought i would get in 2025
— anna (@returnofbizzle) January 8, 2025
I’m glued to my seat for this lore, and need O’Brien and Chamberlain to do a podcast episode together ASAP.