I watched It Ends With Us so you don’t have to
"It was just an accident." It's something I've heard too often in cases of domestic violence. The first hit, the first moment of violence, is always excused and brushed off as a one-time incident.
It was no different for Lily in It Ends With Us, played by Gossip Girl lead Blake Lively. The latest Hollywood blockbuster was produced by her and Justin Baldoni, who I know as “the hot one” in Jane the Virgin. The pair plays the picture-perfect but deeply problematic couple of Lily and Ryle.
The film, adapted from Colleen Hoover’s bestselling novel (who also has her fair share of controversies), touches on domestic violence, intergenerational trauma, and the struggle of breaking toxic cycles.
Lively seems to have missed that note. In a failed attempt to create a Barbie-like hype around it, she told women to “wear florals” – a nod to her character’s career as a florist – to the film while failing to mention the film’s central theme of domestic violence.
“Grab your friends, wear your florals and head out to see it,” she encouraged viewers, entirely out of touch with the gravity of the film’s subject.
Lively’s tone-deaf promotion doesn’t stop there. Reports of her dismissive and even rude behaviour in interviews around the topic of the film suggest a total disconnect between the film’s subject and its main star.
As part of the promotion campaign, she made fun of domestic violence victims when an interviewer asked her how domestic abuse victims could approach her for support: “Are you asking for like my address, my phone number… Or location share? I can just location share you.”
She also insulted an interviewer who commented on her pregnancy, and even used the hype she got from the film to push for her new hair care line.
Her male co-star and director Baldoni, on the other hand, has been vocal in his advocacy against domestic violence. As a feminist, he often tackles the topic of masculinity, for example in his memoir Man Enough?, which explores what it means to be a man in this day and age.
For this film, he teamed up with and promoted the No More Foundation, dedicated to ending domestic and sexual violence and opened the film’s first screening with a speech about domestic violence.
There has been plenty of drama between the two and media speculate it might end in a ‘feud’ between them. But that's not what this piece is about – it’s about something for more serious.
Picture-perfect yet deeply problematic
Starring Lively as Lily Blossom Bloom (yes, that’s her character’s real name) and Baldoni as Ryle Kincaid, we’re introduced to a relationship that, on the surface, appears idyllic. Lily, haunted by the memory of her abusive father, meets Ryle, a charming and successful neurosurgeon, by chance on a rooftop.
Their initial encounter is flirtatious and fun, setting the tone for what appears to be a blossoming love story. But after the break, the seemingly sweet romance quickly unravels into something far darker.
The first incident of violence occurs when they’ve burnt a homemade frittata. Both Lily and Ryle brush it off as an “accident,” a word that becomes disturbingly recurrent throughout the film.
Domestic violence in Europe
The themes, of course, resonate far beyond the confines of the film. In the EU, one in three women has experienced physical or sexual violence since the age of 15.
One in ten women has experienced sexual violence, and one in twenty has been raped.
Nearly 22% of women in Europe have experienced intimate partner violence, a report by UN Women shows, while nearly 43% have experienced psychological abuse or controlling behaviour within relationships.
The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated the situation, leading to a surge in cases across the continent.
These figures are what make the way domestic violence is portrayed in media so important.
Films like It Ends With Us have the potential to shed light on this issue – but they must do so responsibly and sensitively. Apart from Lively completely ignoring the topic in her film promotion, critics have also called out the producers for “romanticising domestic violence” and pointing out that the average domestic violence victim needs seven attempts to leave their partner – not one, like Lily.
The next part of this article contains spoilers
It Ends With Us doesn’t shy away from depicting the harsh realities of abuse. Ryle’s violence escalates from a single “accident” to repeated assaults: Lily is pushed down the stairs, forced into sexual acts, and gaslit into believing she’s responsible for her suffering. It’s a grim portrayal of how abuse often plays out in real life – hidden behind closed doors, dismissed as momentary lapses rather than behavioural patterns.
The film opens with the death of Lily’s father, an abusive man whose actions have left deep emotional scars on her and her mum. Finding a quiet spot to process her grief, she finds herself on a rooftop when a man storms onto the rooftop and kicks a chair in frustration. He turns out to be Ryle, a charming neurosurgeon. Their first encounter is flirty yet turns into a deep conversation where they exchange “naked truths” – the start of their whirlwind relationship.
Ryle says he operated a boy that day who was accidentally shot by his brother but died. Lily talks about how she loved her virginity to a homeless boy, Atlas, who escaped his abusive home and found solace in Lily’s care and understanding.
Meanwhile, Lily begins a new chapter by opening a flower shop in Boston, where the first customer – who claims to hate flowers – offers to help her with her business. She becomes Lily’s best friend, and later turns out to be Ryle’s sister.
Ryle’s violence escalates from the burnt frittata into worse. Each act of abuse is initially portrayed as an accident and only come back to Lily in flashbacks. She doesn’t realise she is being abused until weeks or months later – a common trauma response.
In total, there are three “accidents” involving Ryle and Lily. After the burnt frittata, they end up in a fight over Atlas, and he pushes her down the stairs, resulting in her losing consciousness and a nasty head wound. The final, most disturbing act of violence, is when he finds out she has a tattoo that she got for Atlas, and he forces himself upon her while she screams no and tries to stop him from sexually assaulting her.
Flashbacks to Lily’s youth reveal the importance of her roots, including her difficult upbringing with abusive parents and her deep connection with Atlas, her first love. Her parents’ abusive relationship and her father’s attempt to murder Atlas when he finds him in her room left her deeply scarred.
You wouldn’t notice if you weren’t paying attention, but Ryle’s red flags are evident from the start. He’s pushy, controlling, and dismissive of her boundaries, but his charm and persistence keep her (and the viewer) invested in the relationship. Ryle hits Lily for the first time as they burn frittata and both call it an “accident”.
Along the way, we find out that Ryle has his own very dark past. The story he told Lily on their first meeting, about operating a boy shot by his brother, was about him. He killed his brother Emerson when he was young.
Just as Ryle’s violent tendencies begin to surface, Lily’s first love comes back into in her life. This timing is no coincidence – it’s a timely reminder of the youth trauma Lily is trying to escape. A flashback to their teenage years reminds us how important our early years are for our psychological development. She explains to Atlas why she loves plants: “You have to treat them right from the start. The roots are the most important.” Pointing at a tree, she notes how it grew to be strong and self-sustaining over time – a metaphor for how we tend to bloom when taken care of properly.
Over time, both Atlas and Lily’s best friend, Allysa, start noticing the signs of domestic abuse. Lily’s best friend, Ryle’s sister, tells her she never thought he was capable of this. “I felt like he was dying inside until he met you. As a sister, I want your forgiveness,” she tells Lily, “But as a best friend, Lily, if you take him back, I will never speak to you again.
The turning point in the film comes when Lily discovers she is pregnant with Ryle’s child. Faced with the prospect of raising a child in an abusive environment, she finally finds the strength to leave him. With the support of her childhood love Atlas, her best friend Alyssa and her mother, Lily decides to break the cycle of abuse for the sake of her daughter.
But Ryle doesn’t let go that easily. “Come home, it’ll never happen again, please come home,” he begs her in the hospital. Lily replies that she wants to call their daughter Emmy, after Ryle’s brother Emerson. “I think that at the nicest thing anyone’s ever done to me,” Ryle says. “I’ll keep you safe, Emmy.”
“I want a divorce,” Lily says in that moment. “It’s not for me or you, it’s for her.”
She relays it all back to him as he holds their child. “What would you say to her, if she was hit in an accident, pushed down the stairs and forced into sex without consent?”
“I would beg her to leave him and never go back,” Ryle replies. “You have such a good momma.”
The film ends as Ryle leaves the hospital and Lily tells Emmy: “Momma’s got you. It stop right here bebe, with you and me.”
It Ends With Us is a film that tries to tackle tough topics but stumbles along the way. Domestic violence is a life-threatening for women everywhere, and while the film brings attention to it, the conversation surrounding it needs to be handled with more awareness and sensitivity.
As a film about domestic violence for women and girls in 2024, it must teach us that breaking the cycle of toxic and abusive relationships with men is not just about paving a better path for our daughters, but for ourselves.
For too long, we’ve been conditioned to accept apologies after that “first accident”, to brush aside red flags, and to internalise the idea that love must endure pain. This ends with us.
We deserve to choose ourselves, to demand healthy love and respect without needing a life-changing event or motherhood to spur us into action. Ending these toxic patterns is about reclaiming our worth and agency, because we deserve happiness, safety, and peace right now – not just for the generations to come, but for the women we are today.
So, no, Blake – I’m not wearing florals to your domestic abuse film.
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