Credit: Netflix

Lizzie Borden has been dead for nearly a century, and yet she is everywhere. The rhyme never went away, and neither did the axe. Every so often, somebody takes the case back into the light and has another go at working out what on earth happened. This time, it is Ryan Murphy‘s turn with his ambitious series Monster.

Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story arrives on Netflix on September 17th, with Ella Beatty playing the Massachusetts woman accused of killing her father and stepmother in 1892.

She was acquitted, yes. Did that stop the public from deciding she was guilty anyway? Not a chance.

This is the fourth instalment in Murphy and Ian Brennan’s Monster anthology, which has worked out rather well for Netflix. The Jeffrey Dahmer series became a huge hit and turned what might have been a one-off drama into a proper franchise almost overnight.

Then came the Menendez brothers, who were followed by Ed Gein, with Charlie Hunnam taking on the killer whose crimes later fed into some of horror cinema’s most famous nightmares.

Lizzie Borden feels a bit different, though. For one thing, she is the anthology’s first female subject. More importantly, the series does not seem keen on presenting her as a straightforward monster.

Instead, Lizzie and the family maid, Bridget Sullivan, are shown trapped inside a wealthy household that sounds utterly miserable. There is cruelty in it. After a point, the story starts tipping towards revenge. So, no, this is not a polite little courtroom drama if that’s what you are expecting.

The cast is excellent. Vicky Krieps plays Bridget, Rebecca Hall is Abby Borden, and Hunnam returns as Andrew Borden. Sarah Paulson and Billie Lourd are also involved.

And that, really, is the interesting part. The question has always been whether Lizzie did it. Murphy’s version appears more interested in what happened afterwards and how an acquitted woman became a lasting symbol of rebellion in American folklore.