Rivers Cuomo's songwriting on Make Believe was described as "[a] return to musical, emotional bloodletting",[6] although the lyrics were noticeably simpler than before.

Beginning in spring 2002, and at random points in late 2002 and early 2003, demos for possible use on Weezer's fifth album would be uploaded to weezer.com's audio/video page.

Studios for additional sessions, the band ultimately decided to start from scratch with a fresh group of songs.

Make Believe marks a return to Cuomo's more personal songwriting style after taking a more distant approach on the previous two albums.

[8] "The Other Way" was written for Cuomo's ex-girlfriend Jennifer Chiba after her then-boyfriend, singer-songwriter Elliott Smith, died by suicide.

[10] In addition, early in the recording process, Rubin told Cuomo to "write a Billy Joel or Elton John type of song."

While deciding on the name of the album, one of the title suggestions given by Patrick Wilson was One Thousand Soviet Children Marching Towards the Sun.

[7] Much of the album's art direction was handled by Francesca Restrepo, with photography from Karl Koch and Sean Murphy.

[14][15][16] It featured Wilson, Cuomo, Scott Shriner and Brian Bell standing left-to-right in front of a black backdrop, with illustrations by Carson Ellis.

[21] The monologue is as follows: This rough magic I here abjure, and, when I have required some heavenly music, which even now I do, To work mine end upon their senses that This airy charm is for, I'll break my staff, Bury it certain fathoms in the earth, And deeper than did ever plummet sound

[22] Some publications like AllMusic and Rolling Stone lauded the album, comparing it to the band's earlier release Pinkerton in terms of its songwriting, sound and initial critical reaction.

[citation needed] IGN gave it a 9.3 out of 10, declaring that "The Weezer you've been missing is back", calling it the band's third great album.

"[35] Sal Cinquemani of Slant Magazine gave the album 2.5 out 5 stars, saying, "The truth is that any Weezer copycat band could have made this record.