Justin Baldoni, his partners, and associates have filed a countersuit against Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds accusing them of civil extortion, defamation, and invasion of privacy. Justin and his cohort are seeking $400 million in damages; this is in addition to the $250 million they’re suing The New York Times for. It’s an outrageous amount of money but outrageous is the point and part of the strategy: to maximise as much attention as possible, not only in the dollar amount of the lawsuit but also the details included in it. 

 

The document is 179 pages and bloated by all kinds of miscellaneous accusation-info (much of which sounds like it was written on Wattpad) that isn’t relevant to his actual allegations but the purpose of those particulars isn’t necessarily legal. The purpose is for gossip. The purpose is for the internet to pick it apart and lift the most gossipy and chaotic examples out of the file and blow them up on social media and continue to the court of public opinion. 

 

If we’re looking at the Blake Lively vs Justin Baldoni battle as a ledger, prior to Blake's December surprise, she was deeply in the red. Social media turned sharply against her back in August when It Ends With Us came out. She was criticised for everything, from how she promoted the film to what she said in past interviews; by contrast Justin was held up as a hero, praised for his allyship, his sensitivity, pointed to as a pillar, the model of what a male feminist should be. 

Blake’s complaint, then, filed just before Christmas, would have only brought back out of the negative, to neutral… if that. And this is being generous. Because internet grudges run deep. Once social media decides they hate someone, it takes a lot to change their minds. Blake’s side of the ledger after her complaint was hovering around zero to, say, minus-ten. Maybe. 

 

Justin’s side of the sheet, meanwhile, given that he was coming into the holidays way into the positives, likely experienced a drop, but he was working with a LOT more cushion. His lawsuit against the NYT probably negated any dip, and now his lawsuit against Blake and Ryan has probably restored any ledger losses he’s seen in the last few weeks. Especially since, as previously noted, so many of those unnecessary details he includes in his filing are tailored to the appetite preferences of those who already hate Blake. They believe she’s power-hungry, throws her influence around, insensitive, and stupid. So in his lawsuit he’s serving up gossip that feeds that hunger. People are now isolating the “Khaleesi” and “dragons” text message that refers to Ryan and Taylor Swift. They’re seizing upon Justin’s gotcha reveal about how Blake didn’t read Colleen Hoover’s book to support their assumption that she was disrespectful to the source material and victims of intimate partner violence. He told a story about how she mocked his nose and that reinforces her reputation as a meangirl. Not sure how that pertains to extortion, defamation, and invasion of privacy, but again this is tea for the internet, not for the court. 

And the internet is responding exactly the way that Justin Baldoni and his team are hoping it would. Because, of course, there’s already a precedent for this. Multiple precedents. Amber Heard, Megan Thee Stallion, Meghan Markle, and more. 

 

Blake’s team, meanwhile, has called this out. They’ve named it. Her lawyer released a statement in response to Justin’s lawsuit:

“This is an age-old story: A woman speaks up with concrete evidence of sexual harassment and retaliation and the abuser attempts to turn the tables on the victim. This is what experts call DARVO. Deny. Attack. Reverse Victim Offender. 

Wayfarer has opted to use the resources of its billionaire co-founder to issue media statements, launch meritless lawsuits, and threaten litigation to overwhelm the public’s ability to understand that what they are doing is retaliation against sexual harassment allegations. [They are] trying to shift the narrative to Ms. Lively by falsely claiming that she seized creative control and alienated the cast from Mr. Baldoni. The evidence will show that the cast and others had their own negative experiences with Mr. Baldoni and Wayfarer. The evidence will also show that Sony asked Ms. Lively to oversee Sony’s cut of the film, which they then selected for distribution and was a resounding success. Their response to sexual harassment allegations: she wanted it, it’s her fault. Their justification for why this happened to her: look what she was wearing. 

In short, while the victim focuses on the abuse, the abuser focuses on the victim. The strategy of attacking the woman is desperate, it does not refute the evidence in Ms. Lively’s complaint, and it will fail.”

 

Putting DARVO right up there in the statement is smart, because those who know it can recognise the patterns, but I don’t know how well it’s going to work in these TikTok times because DARVO isn’t nearly as tasty and viral as “OMG Blake goes around thinking she’s Khaleesi and Taylor is Drogon”. People don’t read statements anymore, they listen to those statements being read and broken apart on the timeline. So this lawsuit, as poorly written as it is (approaching hysteria in parts) does the job. At worst, it adds to the confusion, giving some the impression that these are two terrible people behaving terribly, thereby undermining her very serious claim of sexual harassment and retaliation as a result of calling out that harassment and at best he’s reactivating the mob that had already taken her down once and is mobilising them to sharpen their digital swords. 

Never mind that in the statement from Blake’s legal team, it is very clearly stated that “evidence will show that the cast and others had their own negative experiences with Mr. Baldoni and Wayfarer”, which she’d already mentioned in her complaint. Justin’s counter doesn’t do much to offset this incoming problem, but then again he doesn’t have to, at least not right now, because the gallery isn’t paying attention to this detail, not following up on other people who can corroborate Blake’s account but might have their own story about Justin to share. This has been buried… 

 

But then again, maybe not surprising, since Justin’s team did promise they could “bury” and they are certainly coming through and letting social media do the rest the way it went with, for example, Amber Heard. There are many more bury tactics in the arsenal if we’re following the Johnny Depp lead. 

You’ll recall, prior to the Depp-Heard trial, audio recordings were leaked online that were then taken out of context and often edited to further the narrative that Amber was manipulative, out of control, and schemed Johnny’s downfall. These recordings were widely shared on socials, picked apart on YouTube, a huge contributor to the online attacks against Amber in favour of Johnny. 

How long before this happens with Blake with footage from the It Ends With Us set? As I was reading Justin Baldoni’s lawsuit, with all the back and forth about Blake insisting on securing the footage from filming, I was thinking about how all that film would be used for the actual movie but also for either protection or as artillery. That, again, depends on how social media wants to interpret it. How often does the internet interpret to a woman’s benefit? HAHAHAHAHAAH. So far, as we’ve seen, Justin has the advantage there.