DCU co-chiefs James Gunn and Peter Safran have recently shed light on the upcoming film Clayface, confirming its place within the DCU canon and its R rating. Clayface, originally a criminal in Gotham City with the unique ability to morph his clay-like body into any form, is one of Batman's most enduring adversaries. The character, first introduced as Basil Karlo in Detective Comics #40 back in 1940, is set to star in his own movie.
Last month, DC Studios announced that Clayface will hit theaters on September 11, 2026. The decision to greenlight this project was influenced by the success of HBO's The Penguin series. The film will be penned by horror maestro Mike Flanagan, with Lynn Harris and The Batman director Matt Reeves set to produce.
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During a DC Studios presentation attended by IGN, Gunn and Safran clarified why Clayface is essential to the DCU, distinguishing it from Matt Reeves' The Batman Epic Crime Saga. "Clayface is totally DCU," Gunn stated emphatically. Safran added, "The only thing that's in Matt's world, his Crime Saga that he's telling, is the Batman Trilogy, the Penguin series, that's in that lane. So still under DC Studios, still under us. We have an incredible relationship with Matt, but those are the only things."
Gunn emphasized the importance of integrating Clayface into the DCU, saying, "It was important that Clayface be part of the DCU. It's an origin story for a classic Batman villain that we want to have in our world." He also noted that the character wouldn't fit within the more grounded narrative of The Batman Epic Crime Saga, explaining, "It was very outside of the grounded non-super metahuman characters in Matt's world."
Safran confirmed that DC Studios is in negotiations with James Watkins, the director of Speak No Evil, to helm Clayface. With shooting scheduled to begin this summer, Safran described the film as "an incredible body horror film that reveals a compelling origin of a classic Batman villain." He praised the screenplay by Mike Flanagan, noting, "This is another title that we added to the slate on the strength of an exceptional screenplay by Mike Flanagan."
Safran further elaborated that Clayface will be an "experimental" film, diverging from traditional superhero movies and leaning into an "indie style chiller." Gunn echoed this sentiment, describing the movie as "pure f\*\*\*ing horror, like, totally real. Their version of that movie, it is so real and true and psychological and body horror and gross."
Confirming the film's R rating, Gunn shared, "I think that one of the things Peter and I talked about when we first got the script is if we were producing movies five years ago when we were doing Belko Experiment and all of that stuff, and somebody had brought us this horror script called Clayface about this guy, we would have died to have produced this movie, because it was just a really excellent body horror script, and the fact that it's in the DCU is just a plus."
