Netflix has returned to one of the most famous murder mysteries in American history.
But this time, the biggest mystery may not be who killed Andrew and Abby Borden.
It may be this:
How much can a true-crime drama change before it stops feeling true?
Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story, the fourth installment of Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan’s Netflix anthology, began streaming on September 17.
Lizzie Borden was accused of murdering her father and stepmother with an axe in Fall River, Massachusetts, in 1892.
But there is one fact viewers should know before watching:
Lizzie Borden was acquitted.
No one was ever convicted of the murders.
Yet Netflix’s version makes much stronger dramatic choices.
And judging by the reaction on Reddit, many viewers are not comfortable with them.
Reddit Viewers Keep Asking the Same Question
One of the biggest discussions on r/netflix came from a viewer frustrated by the series’ decision to leave the historical period and introduce a storyline set decades later.
That post received more than 1,400 upvotes within days.
Another discussion with hundreds of votes complained that the series mixed too much speculation into the historical story and wished it had stayed closer to the known facts.
The complaints vary, but they repeatedly return to the same issue:
Viewers came expecting the Lizzie Borden case.
Instead, many felt they were watching a modern interpretation built around the case.
That’s an important distinction.
Netflix Never Claims This Is a Documentary
To be fair, Monster is a scripted drama.
Netflix describes the series as telling the story of a young woman trapped by repression who becomes an icon after gruesome murders.
The official description is clearly dramatic rather than documentary in tone.
And because the real case remains unresolved, any dramatization faces an obvious problem:
There are enormous gaps in what we actually know.
A television writer has to decide what happens inside those gaps.
But Monster goes further than simply filling them.
It constructs its own interpretation of Lizzie.
The Real Lizzie Borden Was Found Not Guilty
This is where the series becomes especially interesting — and controversial.
Lizzie was charged with the murders.
She went to trial.
A jury acquitted her.
And the murders remain officially unsolved.
That doesn’t prove Lizzie was innocent.
But it also doesn’t prove she was guilty.
More than 130 years later, historians, writers and amateur investigators still debate what happened inside the Borden house.
Netflix therefore isn’t adapting a case with a legally established killer.
It is dramatizing a mystery.
And that creates a very different responsibility for the storyteller.
How Much of Monster Is Fiction?
Quite a lot.
A recent fact-check of the series concluded that this season contains substantially more invention than historical fact, partly because so much about the Borden case remains unknown.
Reddit viewers noticed immediately.
One discussion complained about discrepancies involving relationships, the murder timeline and other elements of the story.
But another commenter made an important counterargument:
This is a Ryan Murphy drama inspired by historical events, not a documentary promising a literal reconstruction.
And that may be the real debate.
Not:
“Is every scene historically accurate?”
Obviously, it isn’t.
The better question is:
How much invention should audiences accept when real people and real murders are being used as entertainment?
Then Aileen Wuornos Appears
This is where The Lizzie Borden Story becomes even stranger.
Sarah Paulson appears as Aileen Wuornos, a real serial killer born more than 70 years after the Borden murders.
Netflix’s own cast information confirms Paulson’s role.
The series uses Wuornos to create a thematic connection between women, violence, public fascination and the way female killers are perceived.
Some viewers appreciated the ambition.
Others thought it completely distracted from Lizzie Borden.
One Reddit viewer who otherwise enjoyed the season said the Aileen material didn’t fit, while another major discussion argued that mixing the two periods simply didn’t work.
This is exactly where the show stops behaving like a traditional historical crime drama.
It wants to say something larger about women who kill — or are believed to have killed.
Whether that idea works is another question.
Even the Tone Is Dividing Viewers
Historical accuracy isn’t the only complaint.
Viewers have criticized the modern music, exaggerated scenes and tonal shifts.
One Reddit discussion described the production as visually impressive but said the contemporary feeling repeatedly broke the illusion of Victorian America.
Another viewer actually enjoyed the series but still felt that its later episodes should have treated the subject more seriously.
Even Episode 2 has generated its own controversy because of an extended vomiting sequence that some viewers found extremely difficult to watch.
So the criticism isn’t simply:
“Netflix got the facts wrong.”
It’s broader.
Some viewers seem to be asking whether the series is using one of America’s most famous unsolved murders primarily to tell the Lizzie Borden story — or to create the most provocative television possible.
And That Leads to an Uncomfortable Question About Monster
The franchise is enormously successful.
Netflix says DAHMER — Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story passed one billion viewing hours within its first 60 days.
The Menendez season followed.
Then came Ed Gein.
Now Lizzie Borden.
And that progression has started another conversation.
A recent r/netflix post criticizing Netflix’s promotion of the new season argued that the franchise increasingly makes notorious killers feel like characters belonging to the same entertainment universe. The post registered roughly 4,400 net upvotes.
That’s a fascinating criticism because Monster now faces a problem created partly by its own success.
The more seasons Netflix produces, the more recognizable the brand becomes.
But the stronger the brand becomes, the easier it is to forget that these aren’t fictional villains created for a franchise.
They came from real deaths, real families and real criminal cases.
Maybe That’s Why Lizzie Borden Is the Perfect Test
There is a strange irony here.
Lizzie Borden became a pop-culture character long before Netflix existed.
The famous rhyme about the axe murders helped turn her into an American legend even though she was acquitted. Netflix itself notes that the case transformed her into one of America’s earliest celebrity murder suspects.
So Monster isn’t the first piece of entertainment to turn Lizzie into something larger than the historical woman.
But Netflix is doing it at enormous global scale.
And that leaves viewers with a question that may be more interesting than whether the show is good or bad:
When the truth is uncertain, should a true-crime drama preserve that uncertainty?
Or is a storyteller free to choose an answer and build the more entertaining story?
More than 130 years after the Borden murders, nobody can definitively tell us what happened inside that house.
Netflix can give us its version.
But its version should not be confused with a verdict.