Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds at the NYC premiere

Blake Lively is keeping her head up and looking onwards. It was an unexpected summer for the actress, who though was celebrating her new movie, the adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s popular novel It Ends with Us, the movie’s rollout wasn’t without its fair share of backlash and online trolling.

The Gossip Girl alum in turn took a break from social media for over a month, save for a few Instagram Stories here and there, however has now returned to celebrate another recent exciting project.

Blake took to Instagram over the weekend — her last post was on August 9 — to promote her new haircare brand Blake Brown Beauty, which she launched amid the release of It Ends with Us.

Sharing several photos from the brand’s first campaign, she is seen wearing a chocolate brown coat with nothing underneath paired with classic blue jeans, and her signature blonde hair is perfectly tousled.

“Our @blakebrownbeauty All-In-wONEder potion does it all… except provide you a shirt… or a hairbrush… I don’t know what those are,” she teased in the caption. Though Blake still has her comments section disabled, she did receive support from her husband Ryan Reynolds by way of a like.

At the root of the backlash Blake faced throughout the summer was her marketing approach for It Ends with Us, a movie which is largely concerned with surviving domestic violence.

Moreover, ahead of and amid its release, rumors swirled that there had been a rift between Blake and her co-star and director Justin Baldoni, who promoted the movie noticeably separate from the rest of the cast, which includes Brandon Sklenar, Jenny Slate, Isabela Ferrer and Hasan Minhaj.

Some fans criticized her for incorporating promotion of her brands Betty Booze as well as the new haircare line into promotion of the film, and many perceived her as having failed to bring light to the serious issues the movie covers.

blake lively it ends with us nyc premiere 2024© Getty Images

Blake at the New York City premiere of the movie

The backlash was amplified when some unflattering past interviews and comments by her also resurfaced. Though she has largely shied away from addressing the drama, following the movie’s release, she did issue a statement on Instagram Stories addressing its themes of domestic violence.

Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni in It Ends With Us © USW
There was an alleged rift and tension between the actress and her co-star

“Thank you to everyone who came out to show that people WANT to see films about women, and the multitudes we hold. It Ends with Us is a story of the female experience. All the highest highs, and lowest lows. And we are so proud of it,” she wrote.

Actors Blake Lively (L) and Ryan Reynolds attend the 'Deadpool 2' screening at AMC Loews Lincoln Square on May 14, 2018 in New York City. © Michael Loccisano
Blake and Ryan have been married since 2012

She also added: “1 in 4 women aged 18 and older in the U.S. alone have been the victim of severe physical violence by an intimate partner in their lifetime. Intimate partner violence affects all genders, including more than 12 million people every year in the United States. Everyone deserves relationships free from domestic violence.”

She and Ryan, who married in 2012, are parents to three girls and one son; they share James, nine, Inez, eight, and Betty, four, plus they recently confirmed that their fourth baby, who was born in late 2022, is a baby boy named Olin.