Aileen Wuornos-Lizzie Borden connection explained: Why serial killer appeared in Netflix's Monster series?

Aileen Wuornos appeared in Netflix's Lizzie Borden series, leaving viewers confused about the link between the serial killer and the 1892 ax murders.

Aileen Wuornos appeared on Netflix's Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story leaving viewers wondering about the connection between the two. Wuornos was a serial killer executed in 2002 while Borden's parents were killed with an ax in 1892.

Aileen Wuornos, played by Sarah Paulson, appeared in Netflix's Lizzie Borden series where Ella Beatty plays the titular character. (X/@actorkasim)

While Borden was tried for the case, she was acquitted. Wuornos, meanwhile, killed seven men across central Florida, over 12 months, starting in 1989. She was arrested in 1991 and confessed to the murders, initially claiming self-defense. In a 2000 interview, she said this claim was a lie as well.

Wuornos was sentenced to death penalty in 1992 and was killed by lethal injection in 2002. While Charlize Theron played the role of Wuornos in the 2003 Oscar winner Monster, the role is played by Sarah Paulson in the Netflix series which aired September 17.

Wuornos appears at the start and end of the final episode of Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story. It shows Wuornos in an interview while in jail, where she says she killed the men in self-defense. She is also shown in court outlining the alleged brutality she faced from a man who had hired her as a prostitute, before she killed him.

Wuornos is also shown outside the courtroom, telling reporters “Trying to defile my character, make me look like a monster, deranged or something like a Jeffrey Dahmer, which I’m not.” Her death by lethal injection is also shown on the show.

“Just another woman put to death for something a man would’ve gotten away with,” she tells a visitor before her final moments. Natalie Merchant's 1995 song Carnival plays while Wuornos' execution is shown in the series and again when Borden's story in the episode ends. Notably, the serial killer was a fan of Merchant and had requested her music be played at her funeral, as per a New Yorker report.

Meanwhile, in the Netflix series, Wuornos wakes up on the table where she was executed. She sees both Lizzie Borden and her housekeeper Bridget “Maggie” Sullivan. Borden says “You’re going someplace safe. All is forgiven. All is understood. At last.”

Aileen Wuornos-Lizzie Borden link explained

Ella Beatty, who plays Borden, told Netflix about the possible connection between Wuornos and the woman accused of killing her parents with an ax almost a century apart.

“The show is exploring a legacy of female rage and reaction to the set of circumstances that they are presented with,” Beatty said, adding “I think there’s a connection (between Borden and Wuornos) that Ryan and Ian were interested in mapping and exploring.”

Further, Beatty said “Every season of Monster has been an exercise in understanding the person’s psychology. Are they born or are they made? I knew from the beginning that Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan were really interested in exploring what brings a woman to the point of violence.”