It Ends With Us: Key differences between the book and the movie

Colleen Hoover's popular romantic novel It Ends With Us emerged as a breakthrough piece of art, especially on BookTok, and readers worldwide were gushing over Atlas and Lily's love story.

It was made into a motion picture in August 2024, starring Justin Baldoni, Blake Lively, and Brandon Sklenar in the titular roles.

The story follows a woman, Lily, who realizes that her marriage with Ryle is abusive like her mother's, and she gets a chance to reconnect with her former lover, Atlas.

While the movie adaptation was quite faithful to the book, there were some differences.

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It Ends With Us: Exploring differences between the book and the movie

1) Atlas' restaraunt name

While Lily grew up, moved out, and married Ryle, Atlas never forgot about her, and everything he did in life was to be a better man for her. While both in the book and the movie, he names his restaurant after an incident related to her, but the names are different in both the book and the movie.

In the book, Atlas names his restaurant Bib, short for 'Better in Boston', because in a flashback, he tells Lily that he wants to move back to Boston and that she will always be able to find him there. He also gifts Lily a fridge magnet of Bib.

In the movie, Atlas' restaurant's name is Root, symbolizing his bond with Lily. In a flashback, it was revealed how Lily tells her that roots are the most important part of a tree and compares him to the roots of an oak tree.

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2) 'Just Keep Swimming'

It Ends With Us readers would know this iconic line as it featured in the book many times. The line is from Pixar's movie Finding Nemo, uttered by Dory. Fans of the book were disappointed that this line was not given importance in the movie when it was crucial to Lily and Atlas' relationship.

Justin Baldoni discussed that while they could not include all the important details from the books, they did have references to the line:

“Right by the bathroom, if you look in between them, there is a frame on the wall with a very similar saying,"

“If you watch the movie, look in Lily’s bedroom on her wall, there’s a poster. I’m not going to say what it’s of, but you’ll see a little homage to maybe the movie or the saying, if you will,"

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3) Character's ages

This was a hot topic among fans when the casting details for It Ends With Us were out, and it was revealed that Lively would play the character of Lily. In the book, Lily is 23 years old, and many fans point out that Lively (36) is much older to play Lily.

That was when Hoover confirmed the characters' ages in the movie and revealed that Lily's age in the book was a mistake and that no "28-year-old becomes a neurosurgeon," referring to Baldoni's character. She revealed that to rectify this mistake, the characters were depicted as slightly older in the movie.

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4) Ellen DeGeneres

The Ellen DeGeneres Show is Lily's favorite in the book; she keeps a journal of all the letters she writes to her. Through these letters, readers learn about what happened in her life with Atlas when she was younger, and they are an essential part of the narrative.

While adapting letters in the movie is difficult, it is understandable that they are not a big part of the movie. However, she also has a journal in the movie, and, in a scene, she watches The Ellen DeGeneres Show with Atlas.

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