The unusual romantic interest of James Franco's character is part of a real Japanese subculture that was detailed in a July 2009 "New York Times" article.
Jack's German poem he leaves on Nancy's voicemail translates to: "From endless desire to end finite acts like weakness fountains."
After Jenna says she'd like to have a relationship in her life like James Franco does with Kimiko, his anime human pillow-girl, Franco exclaims, lovingly, "Kimiko-tan!". The Japanese language uses honorific suffixes with people's names, and "-tan" is a less common, baby-talk version of "-chan," a particle added to the names of children and loved ones. By using "-tan", a rather obscure Japanese particle signifying endearment, Franco's character signifies that he is even more into the extreme anime-fan culture than the average anime fan.
Kenneth's boxers have little NBC peacock logos on them.
Frank's trucker hats say "One Tone" (red letters on a red hat) and "I Tried".