It’s July 2026.
The dust settled in May, didn’t it?
Not really.
Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni settled their dispute earlier this year. Or so you might think.
Now, Baldoni has filed a response. A big one. It addresses Lively’s recent request for him to foot a bill that hits somewhere just past $8 million.
She submitted her claim on June 29. He had until today—July 13—to push back. He didn’t wait.
In the filing obtained by People, Baldoni and his studio, Wayfarer Studios, call her fee motion “anything but typical.” They say her lawyers charge too much. That the staff is bloated. That it’s inefficient.
“The most cursory review… shows multiple lawyers at the same meetings… numerous charges for conferencing… and, to put it mildly… extremely excessive research.”
7,070 hours.
Counted by 82 people.
According to Baldoni’s team, that is roughly twenty times what courts usually allow in high-profile defamation cases like this.
It sounds like padding. To them.
He points to The New York Times. Baldoni sued them too. Over similar claims. The Times didn’t ask for millions to dismiss the exact same count.
They asked for $181,612.
Just over one hundred and eighty thousand.
The math doesn’t match the scale. Baldoni wants the judge to deny her request entirely. Or cut it down significantly. He says the evidence for such high costs isn’t credible.
The breakdown?
$7,495,268 in fees.
$539,000 in other litigation expenses.
Judge Lewis J. Liman set the July 13 deadline. Baldoni met it. Now the judge has to decide how much— if any— money actually changes hands.
Meanwhile, the human cost keeps surfacing.
Last month, Justin and his wife, Emily, took to Instagram. It was the first real comment since the storm began.
Emily called it trauma. For their kids—Maiya, 11. Maxwell, 7. Two years of wrestling with “how could this happen.”
Especially when it looked like a fight for women? She found that disguise hurtful. Hard to unpack.
Justin added to the grief. He talks about healing now.
Healing isn’t straight lines.
It isn’t a schedule.
“If you’ve ever been through something traumatic… it looks different every day.”
He says he has to redefine what is real.
Who matters.
His family. Friends. Faith.
Not the legal bills. Not the headlines.
The courtroom will decide the financials soon.
But the wound? That lingers.
