Content Warning: this article contains discussions of domestic abuse and sexual assault.

Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni’s film “It Ends With Us,” based on the bestselling 2016 novel by Colleen Hoover, became an enormous box office sensation when it hit theaters in August 2024. It’s also been the source of some serious drama behind the scenes that has seemingly spiraled out of control (and resulted in a few lawsuits), but I’ll circle back to that later. For the uninitiated, what is “It Ends With Us” about? Is it appropriate for young audiences? (No, it’s not; I’ll also circle back to that shortly.)

The story focuses on Lily Blossom Bloom (Lively), a particularly aptly-named young woman who dreams of opening a flower shop in Boston and meets hot-tempered neurosurgeon Ryle Kincaid (Baldoni, who also directed the film) one night while she’s loitering on a random rooftop in the Massachusetts capital. Despite Lily’s initial hesitance, she and Ryle hit it off quite well and start a romantic relationship, only for the entire thing to go haywire after Ryle has a cooking mishap the night before an extremely important surgery. From there, Lily has to decide if she’s willing to stick it out with Ryle … or if she wants to reconnect with her childhood love Atlas Corrigan (Brandon Sklenar), who now runs a buzzy restaurant in Boston. So why isn’t the movie fun for the whole family? A whole host of reasons, actually!

Let’s go over some of the many, many reasons why “It Ends With Us” isn’t a good watch for young viewers. If you’re at all familiar with the source material — or anything Colleen Hoover has ever written — you know that her novels deal with decidedly adult themes, and “It Ends With Us” certainly fits that pattern.

There’s basic profanity — not the f-word but a few “damns,” “a**holes,” and s-words are scattered throughout the film — but its depiction of both sex and domestic violence are the two things that keep the movie firmly at a PG-13 rating. Ryle and Lily’s relationship is, at first, extremely steamy. Ryle basically begs Lily to sleep with him, and even though she demurs at first, she ultimately shows up to Ryle’s sister Allysa’s (Jenny Slate) birthday party in an incredibly provocative outfit meant to capture Ryle’s attention, and their sexual relationship begins more or less immediately. We also see young Lily, played by newcomer Isabela Ferrer, sleep with Atlas as a teenager (“Colony” star Alex Neustaedter), and the scene that follows is particularly harrowing … because Lily’s abusive father Andrew (Kevin McKidd) finds them in bed together and beats Atlas so severely that the boy ends up hospitalized.

As an adult, Lily realizes she’s part of the cycle of abuse after Ryle loses his temper and hits her for the first time (he takes a hot pan out of the stove without a glove and burns his hand; after Lily impulsively laughs and Ryle slaps her across the face), and the movie’s dark turn about halfway through definitely contributes to its rating. To be honest, the sex scenes in “It Ends With Us” are pretty tame compared to the depictions of domestic violence.

The first two times that Ryle physically abuses Lily in “It Ends With Us,” the camera plays a trick on both the audience and, by extension, Lily herself. After Ryle hits Lily when she laughs at him burning his hand, it initially feels like a complete accident, and later, Ryle has another outburst over Atlas and Lily’s previous connection. When Ryle and Lily (unwittingly) go to Atlas’ restaurant Root, Ryle realizes that Atlas and Lily know each other and physically attacks Atlas; later, when Ryle finds a piece of paper with Atlas’ phone number tucked inside Lily’s phone case, the two argue and she heads to the stairs of his apartment building to leave. Even though it looks like Lily fell down the stairs on her own — based on Ryle’s profuse apologies and the fact that he’s quick to take care of her after she gets hurt — the truth later emerges, which is that Ryle meant to hurt her both times.

Ryle’s worst attack on Lily is, once again, over Atlas. When Root is featured in a magazine and the interview notes that the restaurant is in honor of a girl Atlas once loved, clearly meaning Lily, Ryle forces himself on Lily and nearly sexually assaults her before she gets away; when she runs directly to Atlas, he takes her to the hospital. It’s there that Lily realizes she’s pregnant, a fact that pushes her to put serious distance between herself and Ryle. Though he begs for her back, Lily stands firm throughout the pregnancy and, in the immediate aftermath of the birth of their daughter, tells Ryle she wants a divorce. That’s where the title comes in: the cycle of abuse ends with Lily and her daughter Emerson.

Although “It Ends With Us” helped save the box office in 2024, the fact is that we probably won’t get a sequel, especially when you consider that the two stars are currently embroiled in multiple lawsuits against each other. (In brief, Blake Lively filed a civil complaint in California against Justin Baldoni, alleging that he sexually harassed her and created a hostile work environment while filming “It Ends With Us,” at which point Baldoni sued The New York Times over their coverage of the complaint. Lively then sued Baldoni in federal court; as of this writing, nothing has been settled.)

There is a written sequel to “It Ends With Us,” though; in 2022, Colleen Hoover published “It Starts With Us,” which splits its focus between Lily and Atlas as they try to forge ahead with a relationship despite near-constant obstacles. Despite his history of violence, Lily is attempting to co-parent with Ryle, an endeavor that’s already not going well and is further complicated by Atlas’ presence in Lily’s life. Meanwhile, Atlas, who dealt with an abusive mother of his own, discovers that his younger brother Josh has run away from home and takes the boy in. If “It Starts With Us” ever got adapted into a film, it’s not out of the realm of possibility that Lively herself could take over as the director … but based on the fact that Baldoni and Lively will probably only show up in the same place going forward in a courtroom, we can probably rule out the existence of a film adaptation of “It Starts With Us.”

“It Ends With Us” is rated PG-13 and is available to stream on Netflix now.

If you or someone you know is dealing with domestic abuse, you can call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1−800−799−7233. You can also find more information, resources, and support at their website.

If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or contact RAINN’s National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).