Both in real life and on-screen, Monroe says, there’s a link between female killers and sex, and the judgment associated with being a transgressive woman. According to her, crime narratives about female killers “give audiences a chance to pry into people’s private lives and judge them. You see this a lot when women are victims or perpetrators — there’s this obsessive focus on [their] sex lives, as if that’s going to tell us something about the [murder].” When you’re following a real case, it’s common to seek out biographical information about the accused — what she does for a living and who she dates and how she dresses. It’s easy to justify one’s obsession with a female killer, Monroe notes, “because there’s a court case involved, it’s like, ‘No, I'm trying to solve the crime,’ but it plays into those same desires to police and judge and evaluate women’s behaviors I think. Whether it’s a crime that you commit or a crime that someone commits against you, both open you up to scrutiny and criticism of your sex life or anything that might be an indicator of your sex life.” This harkens back to the femme fatale and has never been part of male murder narratives.