When you think of Blake Lively, most people’s first thought is “Gossip Girl,” her hit show that she started filming in 2007 and ended in 2012 with six seasons. Now, Lively has just starred in “It Ends With Us,” a film based on Colleen Hoovers’s best-selling book of the same name.
The novel, turned film is about a young girl, Lily Bloom. Lily lives in Boston and has always dreamed of opening her own flower shop. One day, she meets a handsome neurosurgeon, Ryle, and they instantly spark. As Ryle and Lily grow closer, she starts to get flashbacks to her past relationship with her first love, Atlas. When Atlas comes back into her life, she must decide who she really loves and which man she wants to be married to, for better or for worse.
In the film, Lively plays the role of Lily Bloom, the main protagonist in the movie. Lively has recently faced major backlash from her role, mainly because of how she has handled the press regarding the film. In “It Ends With Us,” there are multiple occurrences of domestic abuse. Many critics feel that Lively did not address this subject enough and that she almost normalized domestic abuse. Viewers were first upset with her and “It Ends With Us” when she told people to “wear florals and come with your girlfriends” to the movie. To most people, this suggestion felt insensitive to the other material in the movie, which is heavy and dark. Many people also felt that the movie “glorified” domestic violence, and Justin Baldoni, the director of the movie and an actor in the movie commented on the criticism. Baldoni told Buzz Feed, “I think that they are absolutely entitled to that opinion. And it makes perfect sense as to why they would feel that way.”
Like always, once people find one thing to criticize, they are quick to find more. Old interviews with Lively have been resurfacing. One such interview was conducted in 2016 when Lively was promoting her movie, “Café Society.” The interview was with Parker Posey, who was also in the film, and Norwegian journalist Kjersti Flaa. Flaa posted the clip on YouTube, titling it “The Blake Lively Interview That Made Me Want to Quit My Job.” Weeks before the interview, Lively announced her pregnancy and Flaa congratulated her; Lively snapped back asking how Flaa’s “little bump” was, even though she was not pregnant and was going through IVF trying to have a baby. It has also come out that in a 2012 interview with Elle Magazine, she said that she wished for her child to be transgender if not a girl, “because I have some amazing shoes and bags and stories that need to be appreciated.” When she made this comment, she used a slur which also upset people. Many people took major offense to this comment and Lively faced backlash for it in 2012, and she is feeling the repercussions again.
All of the controversy with “It Ends With Us” and the resurfacing of old interviews definitely is making Blake Lively fans question her persona. To the public, she always seemed like a fun, bubbly, and kind person. But now, people are starting to see her as rude, demanding, and insensitive.
