Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story Recap & Ending Explained: What Really Happens to Lizzie After the Murders

Ryan Murphy’s Monster anthology has built its reputation on turning America’s most notorious true-crime cases into sprawling character studies, moving from Jeffrey Dahmer to the Menendez brothers to Ed Gein over the course of three previous seasons. Each installment has leaned into the psychology behind the violence rather than simply recounting the crimes themselves.

The fourth season takes that approach somewhere entirely new. ‘Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story’ marks the franchise’s first season built around a female central figure, dramatizing one of America’s oldest and most enduring unsolved murder mysteries: the 1892 ax killings of Andrew and Abby Borden in Fall River, Massachusetts.

By the time the eight-episode season reaches its finale, Lizzie’s carefully controlled life has completely unraveled, and the anger that’s been simmering for years finally erupts into violence. The murders become the central event around which the rest of her story is shaped, and the aftermath forces both Lizzie and her maid Maggie to reckon with consequences neither of them fully anticipated.

Yes, and the show sticks closely to the historical record on this point. Lizzie is found not guilty, with the trial hinging heavily on her public image as a respectable Victorian woman, since the prosecution struggled to convince the jury that someone with her social standing could be capable of such brutal violence.

That dynamic creates one of the season’s central ironies. The same society that gave Lizzie almost no control over her own life also had a difficult time accepting that she could be capable of extreme violence, and the real historical evidence against her was largely circumstantial, leaving her acquitted by an all-male jury with the murders still unsolved to this day.

Legal freedom doesn’t translate into a normal life for Lizzie. After the trial, she and her sister Emma inherit money from their father’s estate and purchase a large home in Fall River that they call Maplecroft, with Lizzie also beginning to go by the name Lizbeth as she attempts to build a new identity.

That new house represents both freedom and isolation at once. Lizzie finally has the independence and material comfort she lacked under her father’s control, but she can’t escape the Borden murders, and the public story surrounding her grows far bigger than the woman herself. The finale, titled “Carnival,” centers on that tension directly, with Netflix describing it as the point where the weight of Lizzie’s “monstrous legacy” threatens to overwhelm her.

Who knew a blood bath could be this sweet? 🩸 Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story is now playing! #MonsterTheLizzieBordenStory #EllaBeatty #VickyKrieps #Thriller pic.twitter.com/w4hK1mLZ50

— Netflix Philippines (@Netflix_PH) September 17, 2026

Much of the season’s emotional core comes from the relationship between Lizzie and Maggie, a fictional element the show uses to explore Lizzie’s desire for affection and independence outside her family’s rigid expectations. It’s worth noting that the historical record doesn’t establish any romantic relationship between the real Lizzie Borden and Bridget Sullivan, making this one of the series’ most significant creative departures from the documented case.

Creator Ian Brennan has said the decision to finally center the anthology on a female killer felt overdue, telling TV Insider that once Lizzie’s story came up during development, it immediately felt right and practically wrote itself once the writers began working on it. Ella Beatty, who stars as Lizzie, echoed that sentiment in comments shared with Netflix’s Tudum, calling the season’s focus on female rage and repression something she found “strikingly relevant” and describing the role as a dream chance to investigate the psychology behind an American crime that feels “almost mythic” in scale.

Director and executive producer Max Winkler expanded on that idea further, explaining that the show doesn’t assume anyone is born evil, but rather examines the pressure that builds until someone reaches a breaking point. The season also weaves in Sarah Paulson’s Aileen Wuornos as a thematic parallel rather than a historical one, using her as a later example of how society remembers women who commit extreme violence.

Ultimately, the ending isn’t really about solving the historical case. Lizzie wanted freedom, and the murders become the most extreme possible break from the restrictions that defined her life, but that freedom comes at a steep cost, since she remains legally free yet never fully escapes public suspicion, her identity permanently reshaped by the legend that grew around her name.

Have something to add? Let us know in the comments.