Clayface Review: James Gunn's DC Universe Embraces Horror With Mixed Results

As the DCU's first foray into the horror genre, "Clayface" is a solid endeavor, but its mere existence feels like tempting fate. Sony has, after several years, seemingly abandoned their attempts to spin-off random Spider-Man villains and supporting characters into their own solo adventures after epic misfires like "Madame Web," so the fear that this could be DC's "Morbius" has been high. But in terms of extracting standalone value from a specific superhero's rogues gallery, Batman's host of enemies have contributed to two best actor wins at the Oscars.

Clayface, a shape-shifting monstrosity, seems like he would have more in common with the misunderstood figures in Guillermo del Toro's sympathetic brand of creature feature than either statuette earning portrayals of The Joker. The particulars of how his powers work are as fertile ground for body horror as his iconic visuals are a high bar to clear for a live-action depiction. Whether or not a feature film starring or about this villain is something anyone, even the most ardent of fanboys, were actually clamoring for is beside the point — if it proves to be an opportunity for a worthwhile storytelling experience. 

"Clayface" is a fine picture, to damn a big effort from a variety of creatives with faint praise. It just exists in the shadow of the more ambitious film it could have been, all while avoiding being the fan service endeavor some may have hoped it would be.

For the first third of its runtime, "Clayface" actually does flirt with being the potential disaster it eventually avoids becoming. In setting up the ballad of Matt Hagen (Tom Rhyes Harries), an Oscar-nominated heartthrob who built himself up from a hard luck upbringing in the Narrows of Gotham City, director James Watkins seems to make the blandest, least interesting staging and framing decisions. Working from a somewhat flat script penned by two disparate writers (more on this later), Watkins appears severely uninterested in the Hollywood industry elements of this origin story. There's a scene early on between Hagen and Rob Brydon as a late night talk show host that, given the subject matter, felt entirely too "Joker" adjacent. 

But once the inciting incident and Hagen's disfigurement at the hands of a jealous crime boss leads his life to ruin and the experimental care from Dr. Caitlyn Corr (Naomi Ackie), the "slowly turning into a goopy monstrosity" main event can get underway. The film feels its most alive when it extrapolates the inherent horror surrounding body modification and plastic surgery into grislier sci-fi imagery. The make-up work and digital effects run the gamut from astonishing to dodgy, but seeing Hagen's face droop and contort relative to his mental state proves as heartbreaking as it is unsettling. 

As his genetic alterations evolve to the point that he learns he can become anyone else, not just an uncanny valley simulacrum of his pre-tragedy self, the film threatens to explore more interesting ideas about gender and identity. However, it settles for some inventive and effective jump scares that keep the thriller from devolving too far into repetitive mediocrity. But it's also clear that every time the story feels like it might make room for something more challenging and fascinating, it's plenty happy to go the crowd-pleasing route with a revenge thriller punctuated by a handful of gnarly and gratifying kills.

When "Clayface" is making a tragic anti-hero whose inability to let go of his past dooms his chance at a happier future, it works. It's fun enough and doesn't overstay its welcome. But Harries' central performance is impactful and haunting and feels like it would be better employed in a picture that aimed for something deeper and more complex. Stopping short of that to explore a new corner of the DCU would be a cynical but understandable fiscal decision, if not a creative one. Except it doesn't really do that, either.

Before it was a DCU project, "Clayface" began its life as a potential spin-off to Matt Reeves' "The Batman," where it would have lived alongside other horror and crime experiments within that world's more grounded take on Gotham City. It was an idea prolific horror filmmaker Mike Flanagan was really passionate about and his name, thanks to a beloved CV of streaming series, lent the project a gravitas that led most to believe it would not be Gotham's Morbin' Time. But James Gunn and Peter Safran chose to adapt it for the DCU, and James Watkins replaced Flanagan and brought in "Drive" scribe Hossein Amini to do extensive rewrites.

The result is a film that has these fleeting passages that feel like detritus from Flanagan's original vision mixed in with the take seemingly designed to fit better into this new franchise. Skittish about any explicit world-building that could cause continuity issues for the future "The Brave and The Bold" project that is still in flux, Gunn and company have created the Gotham that may as well be a nameless fictional city. This is supposed to be the same Clayface briefly seen in the HBO Max show "Creature Commandos," just earlier in his "career." But while this film is very tenuously a prequel to that animated series, it feels like a technicality at best.

At no point does this Gotham feel realized or considered enough to actually be Gotham City. There's a specific scene where Hagen and Dr. Corr debate about word getting out of her scientific breakthroughs and how fundamentally changed he has become. As fantastical as Hagen's evolutions are, however, they're not that crazy in a world where everyone knows aliens exist. 

It is impossible to imagine that Hagen lives in the same world as Hal Jordan, let alone Superman, or even John Cena's Peacemaker. And if that wasn't going to be a concern, then why not make this an "Elseworlds" branded picture that could really have been given more room to get real weird and different with it? "Clayface" isn't a bad movie by any stretch of the imagination. But it's hard to argue it's much better than a good one.

"Clayface" premieres in theaters on October 23.