Colleen Hoover Says She’s Almost Embarrassed After Picking Sides in the Blake Lively–Justin Baldoni Feud

Colleen Hoover finally weighed in on the Baldoni/Lively mess swirling around the It Ends With Us movie, and yeah, she sounds over it. After months of watching the legal fight between her two leads dominate the conversation, the author says the drama has stomped all over what her book — and the film she co-produced — was supposed to be about.

Hoover says the lawsuit overshadowed the point

In a new interview with Elle, Hoover said she is disappointed and at times almost embarrassed by the situation. The way she puts it:

"I feel like the lawsuit has overshadowed it. I’m almost embarrassed to say I wrote it."

The whole point, she says, was to raise awareness about domestic violence. Instead, the narrative got hijacked by a very public feud between the movie’s two stars, Justin Baldoni and Blake Lively.

Why she stayed quiet (until now)

Hoover didn’t jump into the crossfire when the Baldoni-Lively legal back-and-forth first blew up. According to her, the situation ballooned so much that nothing she said was going to change anyone’s mind. She told Elle she’s trying to stay out of the negativity. She also made it clear she has her own version of events but refuses to use it as ammo: she doesn’t want to put someone else down to lift herself up. At this point, she joked, the noise is so loud that "not even me" has the full picture anymore.

Yes, she publicly backed Blake Lively once

Worth noting: back in December, Hoover posted a warm Instagram Story about Lively, calling her "honest, kind, supportive and patient" and adding, "Never change. Never wilt." For someone who hates getting dragged into drama, that read like a rare moment of picking a side — and fans definitely clocked it.

The personal story underneath all the headlines

Separate from the movie chaos, Hoover has long dealt with criticism that her novel romanticizes abuse. She’s pushed back on that, reminding people the book was inspired by her mother, Vannoy Fite, who survived abuse from Hoover’s father, Eddie Fennell. She never intended the book to speak for every survivor or serve as a universal template — it was personal. Now, she says the fallout from the film has forced her mom to relive painful memories all over again and that she feels awful about that.

Where the movie is right now

• Title: It Ends With Us
• Director: Justin Baldoni
• Cast: Blake Lively, Justin Baldoni, Jenny Slate, Hasan Minhaj, Brandon Sklenar
• IMDb: 6.3
• Rotten Tomatoes: 54%
• Streaming: Netflix

It’s a frustrating turn for a project that started as a tribute and a conversation starter. Instead of the movie pushing the topic forward, the headlines are doing it backward. Here’s hoping the focus eventually returns to the story that started this in the first place.