Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story is coming to Netflix September 17th.

After covering Jeffrey Dahmer, the Menendez brothers, and Ed Gein, Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan’s Monster anthology series is telling the story of a female killer. The fourth instalment will follow Lizzie Borden (Ella Beatty), the prime suspect in one of the most famous unsolved mysteries in American history.

Centred on Lizzie Borden’s (Feud: Capote vs. The Swans actress Ella Beatty) alleged axe murder of her father (Monster: The Ed Gein Story lead Charlie Hunnam) and stepmother (The Beauty star Rebecca Hall), Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story will endorse the theory that Lizzie was having a lesbian affair with the live-in maid (Vicky Krieps of Phantom Thread).

As showrunner Ian Brennan, director Max Winkler, and the cast explain, the series is taking a queer feminist approach to the story of a person who was acquitted in part because the jury could not comprehend that a woman was capable of such a violent crime. “They literally thought that a woman was too weak to pick up an axe,” Brennan told Vanity Fair. “To be a woman in that period was to be almost a completely different species.”

The series will explore how Lizzie’s cruel stepmother and the pressures of being a woman in the late Victorian-era could have pushed her to commit the crime, while also suggesting a financial motive. A major figure contributing to Lizzie’s killings will be Krieps’ character, Bridget Sullivan, who encourages the protagonist to hatch the plan after the pair begin a sexual relationship.

“The way Ryan thought of it, she’s almost like a Mary Poppins that comes out of nowhere,” Krieps said to VF. “Who can be anyone from any time…. Ryan said, ‘It’s women-driven, feminist, lesbian, dirty, unapologetic.’ You immediately felt almost a psychedelic, Courtney Love kind of vibe in the whole thing.” On the subject of Courtney Love, the series will feature anachronistic needle-drops from the likes of Kate Bush and Wet Leg.

In addition to Ella Beatty, Vicky Krieps, Charlie Hunnam, and Rebecca Hall, Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story stars Billie Lourd (American Horror Story) as Lizzie’s older sister, Jessica Barden (Dune: Prophecy) as her actor friend, Nance, and veteran Ryan Murphy collaborator Sarah Paulson as notorious serial killer Aileen Wuornos.

See the poster and first-look photos below.