It Ends with Us is a 2024 American romantic drama film directed by Justin Baldoni from a screenplay by Christy Hall, based on the 2016 novel by Colleen Hoover.

The story follows florist Lily Bloom (Lively), whose troubled relationship with neurosurgeon Ryle Kincaid (Baldoni) is compounded when her ex-boyfriend Atlas Corrigan (Sklenar) re-enters her life.

The production became mired in controversy due to disputes between Lively and Baldoni,[4] with the former drawing criticism for not addressing the film's themes of domestic violence and emotional abuse during its promotional tour.

In December 2024, Lively filed a lawsuit against Baldoni and his production company Wayfarer Studios, accusing them of sexual harassment and intimidation.

Back home in Boston, Lily sits on the rooftop of an apartment complex when a man arrives and angrily kicks a chair.

Ryle convinces her to take him to meet her mother Jenny at a new restaurant, Root; while there, Lily discovers that the owner and head chef is her high school boyfriend, Atlas Corrigan.

One day, Lily discovered Atlas living in a vacant home next door after he ran away to escape his mother's abusive boyfriend.

Lily stays with Atlas for a few days, during which he reveals that he planned to commit suicide on the night she found him as teens, but she inspired him to continue living.

[21] During her promotional tour for the film, Lively received criticism from social media users who accused her of being "tone-deaf" for displaying a "light-hearted humorous" attitude and not explicitly addressing her character's experience of domestic violence and abuse.

Users were also critical of Lively for promoting her new haircare line, as well as her alcoholic drinks brand, during the press tour, and for encouraging movie-goers to wear floral clothes, which some deemed insensitive to the film's messaging surrounding domestic violence.

[26][27] Reid had previously worked on the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) film Deadpool & Wolverine (2024) starring Lively's husband, Ryan Reynolds, and the Lively-directed Taylor Swift music video "I Bet You Think About Me".

In addition, the publication confirmed that Reynolds wrote "a large chunk" of the dialogue for a scene set on a roof, allegedly in April 2023 before the WGA strike, which Baldoni was not told of.

[26][28] Speculation about the alleged rift grew on platforms such as TikTok (where the book was massively popular on the "BookTok" subcommunity)[29] in videos that noted Baldoni's absence from joint press events.

[28] On December 20, 2024, Lively filed a legal complaint with the California Civil Rights Department accusing Baldoni, producer Jamey Heath, and their studio Wayfarer of creating a hostile work environment and retaliating against her for reporting misconduct.

According to the filings, she claimed Baldoni had improvised unwanted kissing and discussed his sex life, Heath had shown her a video of his wife giving birth naked, and both men repeatedly entered her makeup trailer uninvited while she was undressed, including when she was breastfeeding, among other inappropriate actions.

[31][32] Documents obtained by Lively via subpoena claimed to show that Baldoni and his agents ran a public relations campaign to damage her reputation, which involved social media manipulation, planting negative stories, and amplifying criticism of her.

Lively's complaint, though filed privately, was published the following day in a The New York Times exposé by Megan Twohey, Mike McIntire and Julie Tate under the title "We Can Bury Anyone: Inside a Hollywood Smear Machine.

[33][34] The following day, Baldoni's publicist stated that his PR team had "sophomorically reveled" in the Lively coverage, yet "although we were prepared, we didn't have to do anything over the top to protect our client.

[31] She also filed a lawsuit against the same, except Wallace and Street Relations, alleging sexual harassment, planned public smear campaign, and causing her emotional distress.

[36][37] On December 31, 2024, Baldoni and the other plaintiffs responded with a $250 million lawsuit against The New York Times, saying that the newspaper had defamed them by publishing a “‘cherry-picked’ and altered communications" and "stripped of necessary context and deliberately spliced to mislead.”.

The website's consensus reads: "Earnestly performed if marred by clunky dialogue, It Ends with Us is surprisingly at its most graceful when handling the more provocative elements of its melodramatic source material.

"[63] The Globe and Mail's Johanna Schneller praised Lively's performance, writing: "Beyond nailing Lily's exact shade of auburn hair, funky/sexy dress and vision-notebook stuffed with flowers, she also conveys her luminousness and strength, and reminds you how pleasurable it can be to watch a romantic thriller.

"[65] Hannah Giorgis of The Atlantic was more critical, writing: "To young people who have become inured to the misery of modern life, there's a seductive premise in these novels: Relentless suffering can give way to freedom—and hot sex—if women want it badly enough.

"[66] The Sydney Morning Herald's reviewer Sandra Hall gave the film two and a half out of five stars, saying that it was "packed with erotic cliches overlaid with a rolling soundtrack of pop hits that includes songs by Taylor Swift and Lana Del Rey", and called the dialogue "risible".