Blake Lively plays Lily Bloom, a Boston florist who has spent years running from her past. Her father Andrew abused her mother Jenny, and Lily found her first love, Atlas Corrigan, hiding in an empty house next door after he fled his own home. Now Atlas has returned, and the man Lily married, neurosurgeon Ryle Kincaid, is jealous, possessive and capable of violence. That is the engine of It Ends with Us, Justin Baldoni’s 2024 adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s novel, and it drives the film for 131 minutes.
The film premiered at the AMC Lincoln Square in New York City on August 6, 2024, and reached U.S. theaters on August 9 through Sony Pictures Releasing. It grossed $351 million against a $25 million budget. Critics were mixed, and audiences disagreed. The story asks Lily to choose between her present and her past, and it leans hard into the idea that toxic patterns repeat until broken.
Trailer, via Sony Pictures Entertainment.
The Triangle and the Trauma
The setup is simple. Lily delivers a eulogy for her father, lists five favorite things about him, then walks off the podium. She meets Ryle at a hospital, falls for him, and moves in. Then Atlas shows up at Root, the restaurant owned by her high school boyfriend, and the film’s central question snaps into focus: which man gets to define her life?
Ryle is the clear threat. He burns his hand while cooking breakfast, and when Lily tries to help, he slaps her. He apologizes immediately, calling it an accident. Later, at Root, Atlas notices Lily’s bruised eye and Ryle’s bandaged hand. He confronts her, telling her to leave Ryle. When Ryle finds them together, a fight breaks out and Atlas ejects him. The film never lets you forget that Ryle is the one who hurt her.
Atlas is the memory. He ran from his mother’s abusive boyfriend as a teenager, and Lily found him living in the empty house next door. They fell in love, and when Andrew found them in bed together, he beat Atlas badly. The teen later joined the Marines. Atlas’s return forces Lily to reckon with a choice: the man who loved her once, or the man who abuses her now.
Lively’s Performance
Blake Lively carries the film. She plays Lily as a woman who has spent her whole life protecting herself, and the performance earns the film’s mixed reception. Her scenes with Baldoni are the strongest in the picture. When she stands at her father’s funeral podium and walks off, she reads as grief-stricken and trapped. When she stands in front of Ryle and Atlas, she reads as frightened and torn.
The film’s problem is that the script expects the audience to feel everything Lily feels without giving her much agency beyond reacting to the men around her. Lily is repeatedly told to leave Ryle, but she stays. The film trusts Lively to make that choice feel inevitable, and mostly she does. The film does not trust itself to show Lily making the choice on her own terms.
Baldoni’s Direction
Justin Baldoni directs the film, and also plays Ryle. That double duty is the source of much of the film’s trouble. Jenny Slate plays Allysa, Ryle’s sister, and Brandon Sklenar plays Atlas. Both actors appear in the credits, but the source does not describe their roles in detail.
Hasan Minhaj plays Marshall, Allysa’s husband, and Kevin McKidd plays Andrew Bloom. Amy Morton plays Jenny Bloom, and Alex Neustaedter plays Young Atlas Corrigan while Isabela Ferrer plays Young Lily Bloom. Robin S. Walker plays Doctor Johnson and Robert Clohessy plays Sheriff. Emily Baldoni plays Doctor Julie. The film’s production was mired in controversy due to disputes between Lively and Baldoni, leading to extensive litigation.
The Pattern Problem
The film presents abuse as a pattern that repeats across generations and relationships, and it suggests that the only way to escape it is to break it. That is a reasonable starting point, but the film never quite explains what breaking the pattern looks like beyond leaving the abuser.
The film also leans on the idea that love can be both abusive and true. Atlas is described as having loved Lily deeply, and the film treats that love as real even as it condemns the abuse. This is a tension the film does not resolve. It wants to say that love can survive abuse and that abuse destroys love, sometimes in the same scene.
What Works and What Doesn’t
The film’s strengths are its performances and its settings. The Boston locations are used well, and the florist shop and the hospital scenes give the story a sense of place. The weaknesses are structural. The film runs too long and repeats itself. The story about Andrew’s abuse of Jenny and Atlas is told in pieces across the film, and the film’s final act stretches the climax into a slog.
Here is how the film’s elements stack up:
- Lively’s performance — strong
- Baldoni’s direction — competent
- The screenplay — thin on stakes
- The supporting cast — talented
| Element | Strengths | Weaknesses |
|---|---|---|
| Lively’s performance | Strong, emotional | Limited range within the script |
| Baldoni’s direction | Competent | Undercuts the supporting cast |
| Screenplay | Thematic ambition | Thin on stakes, repetitive |
| Supporting cast | Talented | Talented but underused |
The film’s production was mired in controversy due to disputes between Lively and Baldoni, leading to extensive litigation. That history hangs over the finished product. The film feels less like a collaboration and more like a project shaped by external conflict.
Final Word
It Ends with Us is a flawed but watchable film. Lively gives it everything, and the story has a genuine emotional core. But the screenplay is too thin, the direction is too reliant on close-ups, and the supporting cast is too underused. The film’s central idea — that abuse is a pattern that must be broken — is worth saying, but the film does not say it clearly enough.
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