The "It Ends With Us" legal war is nowhere near over.
A federal judge in New York has now set a trial date of March 2026 for the tangled mess of lawsuits between Justin Baldoni, Blake Lively, and Ryan Reynolds — and the discovery phase is already getting ugly.
For those who lost the plot: Lively sued Baldoni in December 2024, accusing him of sexual harassment on set and of orchestrating a retaliatory smear campaign against her.
Baldoni fired back with a $400 million defamation countersuit against Lively, Reynolds, and their publicist, claiming the trio hijacked the film's rollout and tanked his reputation.
Baldoni's legal team has been pushing to depose Ryan Reynolds, arguing he was deeply involved in the fallout — including that infamous press tour and the editing disputes over the film's final cut.
Lively's camp has called the request a fishing expedition designed to embarrass her family.
The judge hasn't fully slammed the door, which means Hollywood's favorite power couple could face sworn testimony under oath.
Meanwhile, text messages and emails have been leaking into the public record at a steady drip.
Some show tense exchanges between Baldoni and Lively about script changes and intimate scenes.
Others reveal publicists openly strategizing about how to shape media coverage.
Every new filing spawns a fresh wave of TikTok breakdowns and Reddit threads dissecting who said what.
The court has also been wrangling over a protective order — basically, a fight over how much of this dirty laundry stays private.
Lively's team wants tighter guardrails on sensitive material.
Baldoni's side argues the public has a right to see the evidence, which critics say is a PR play as much as a legal one.
A trial is still more than a year out, so expect the leaks, the filings, and the dueling statements to keep coming.
Both sides are clearly playing for public opinion as much as for a verdict.
And with a movie franchise, a production company, and two A-list reputations on the line, nobody's blinking.
The real loser here might be the audience. "It Ends With Us" was supposed to be a Colleen Hoover adaptation about domestic violence awareness.
Instead, it's become a case study in how fast a Hollywood press tour can curdle into litigation.
The sequel, which was announced before any of this blew up, now sits in limbo while lawyers rack up billable hours.
Our take: this is less a courtroom drama than a slow-motion reputation demolition derby.
Both sides have already lost control of the narrative, and a 2026 trial just guarantees more headlines nobody asked for.
Final Thoughts
The only winners so far are the publicists, the podcasters, and anyone selling popcorn.