Ryan Murphy's next Monster series gets a definite release date and a very vague teaser

Well, at least this time they edited the title a bit. Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story officially premieres on Netflix on September 19. The new true-crime series is Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan’s follow-up to the controversial (and terribly named) Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story, which brought in a somewhat uncomfortable number of viewers in 2022.

The teaser itself doesn’t tell us much we don’t already know—we simply see the brothers entering their family home, firearms in hand. Per a press release, the official synopsis for the upcoming season reads as follows: 

Following the massive success of DAHMER, Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan’s true-crime anthology series returns with Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, chronicling the case of the real-life brothers who were convicted in 1996 for the murders of their parents, José and Mary Louise “Kitty” Menendez.

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While the prosecution argued they were seeking to inherit their family fortune, the brothers claimed – and remain adamant to this day, as they serve life sentences without the possibility of parole – that their actions stemmed out of fear from a lifetime of physical, emotional, and sexual abuse at the hands of their parents.

Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story dives into the historic case that took the world by storm, paved the way for audiences’ modern-day fascination with true crime, and in return asks those audiences: Who are the real monsters?

As in previous Murphy-verse outings, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story has a stacked cast. Javier Bardem and Chloë Sevigny (who previously starred in Murphy’s Feud: Capote vs. The Swans) lead as José and Kitty Menendez, with Nicholas Alexander Chavez (who will also appear in Murphy’s upcoming Grotesquerie) and Cooper Koch starring as Lyle and Erik respectively. Nathan Lane and Ari Gaynor round out the main cast as Vanity Fair reporter Dominick Dunne and criminal defense attorney Leslie Abramson.

They’ll be joined by a supporting cast including Leslie Grossman, Dallas Roberts, Paul Adelstein, Jason Butler Harner, Enrique Murciano, Michael Gladis, Drew Powell, Charlie Hall, Gil Ozeri, Jeff Perry, Tessa Auberjonois, Tanner Stine, Larry Clarke, Jade Pettyjohn, and Marlene Forte. 

It’s been a big week full of trailers and announcements for the Murphy-verse. Make sure you don’t confuse the Monster series with American Crime Story (The People V. O.J. Simpson, The Assassination Of Gianni Versace, Impeachment), which you also shouldn’t confuse with the upcoming American Sport Story, which will be focused on… you guessed it… another major crime. The first season will tell the story of former NFL player Aaron Hernandez. And while we’re talking about football, we can’t not mention Grotesquerie, which dropped its first trailer featuring Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce last week. Ryan Murphy’s web really does connect them all.