The new adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s bestseller Verity directed by Michael Showalter and headlined by Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson, and Josh Hartnett, refuses to settle into a tidy romance. Instead, it delivers a psychological thriller that ends with a reality-bending revelation. Fans have split into two camps—Team Manuscript and Team Letter—each arguing which of the discovered texts actually reflects the truth. This article untangles the clues, examines the motivations of the characters, and asks whether the film ever provides a definitive answer.
The manuscript: confession, psychosis, or writing exercise?
While ghostwriting for the famed author Verity Crawford, Lowen Ashleigh (Dakota Johnson) moves into the Crawford home with her husband Jeremy (Josh Hartnett) and their son Crew. Behind a locked drawer she uncovers a handwritten manuscript that reads like a harrowing autobiography. It alleges that Verity, after the birth of twins, fell into a deep depression, resented her children, and even plotted a fatal boating accident that claimed one of the infants. The text later describes an attempted suicide by car crash, which would explain Verity’s current paralysis.
The manuscript’s content aligns closely with symptoms of postpartum psychosis a severe mental-health condition often misdiagnosed. If the document is genuine, it paints Verity as a mother on the brink of catastrophe, driven by untreated illness. However, Lowen dismisses the possibility of a mental-health crisis and immediately brands Verity as a cold-hearted manipulator, urging Jeremy to kill her. The manuscript’s raw, accusatory tone fuels Lowen’s decision to expose Verity, setting the stage for the film’s climactic confrontation.
The hidden letter: deliberate deception or salvaged truth?
Seven months after the dramatic encounter, Lowen discovers a sealed letter tucked beneath the floorboards. In it, Verity claims the manuscript was merely a creative exercise assigned by her editor, Amanda Thomas of Hachette Books, called antagonistic journaling—a technique that asks writers to inhabit the role of their own villain. According to the letter, the disturbing passages were fictional, meant to help Verity tap into a dark mindset.
The letter flips the narrative: it accuses Jeremy of finding the manuscript, wrongly assuming Verity murdered their daughter, poisoning her, and staging the car crash to disappear with Crew. If the letter is truthful, Jeremy becomes the true antagonist, and the manuscript is an elaborate alibi. Yet the possibility remains that Verity authored the letter to frame Jeremy and protect herself from potential murder charges. Because Verity dies before she can clarify, the audience is left with two mutually exclusive explanations, each supported by selective evidence.
What the final Hot Ones clip hints at
The film’s closing moments feature a brief excerpt from Verity’s appearance on Hot Ones. In the interview, she tells host Sean Evans that she enjoys “finding ways to manipulate the truth” in her writing. This admission blurs the line between fiction and fact, echoing the central dilemma: are the two documents—manuscript and letter—both layers of performance? Even a seemingly candid interview is a crafted persona, suggesting that Verity, the author, may have deliberately concealed her reality behind multiple façades.
Because the story ends soon after Lowen drives away with Jeremy and Crew, the film never allows the audience to verify handwriting, consult Amanda Thomas, or involve law enforcement. The unanswered questions feel intentional, encouraging viewers to align with either Team Manuscript or Team Letter based on personal interpretation rather than concrete proof. The ambiguous ending, therefore, serves as a narrative device that mirrors the unreliable nature of storytelling itself.
