The first teaser trailer for the DC Universe’s Clayface has been released online following its debut at CinemaCon last week, and it looks pretty great. There is no Batman in James Gunn’s burgeoning DCU (yet), but that doesn’t mean there can’t be Batman villains. Taking a page out of Joker’s playbook, Clayface will be an R-Rated solo film that puts the spotlight on an iconic Dark Knight enemy (and occasional ally), who has been around since 1940 but never been seen in a live-action movie, until now.
Directed by James Watkins (The Woman in Black, Speak No Evil), with a screenplay from Mike Flanagan (Doctor Sleep, Netflix’s Haunting shows) and Hossein Amini (Drive, Obi-Wan Kenobi), Clayface stars Tom Rhys Harries (Britannia, Suspicion) as Matt Hagen. He’s an upcoming actor – the first look image from Clayface saw him gracing a magazine cover and labelled a rising star – who gets disfigured by a gangster. That leads him to undergo surgery that transforms his body into clay, which is teased in the first footage. Check out the trailer below:
The trailer is rather gnarly and graphic, living up to the promise of this being a DC horror movie. While it doesn’t give away a lot in terms of plot, it does still give us an idea of what to expect and plenty to get excited about.
The trailer begins with a shot of Matt in a hospital bed, covered in blood and bandages, which gives an immediate idea of just how much damage has been inflicted upon him. It’s neatly intercut with shots that help us piece together the backstory that led to that point: we see him smiling on what looks like a red carpet, then him being held down and attacked, with his face being cut open, and then him undergoing treatment. It paints him as a figure of tragedy, one who’ll presumably be out for revenge and becoming in isolated outcast, rather than an outright villain.
The surgery that Matt undergoes, carried out by Naomi Ackie’s doctor, ends up giving him shapeshifting abilities, with him able to change his clay-like body at will. We get a couple of great examples of this in the trailer, including one where it transitions to his face looking like it’s melting, and then the face wipe scene at the very end. It’s creative, gruesome, and freaky, in the best kinds of ways, and shows that DC is not shying away from this being a bona fide body horror.
There are also a few glimpses of the DCU’s Gotham City, which is marking its movie debut here. While the wide establishing shot of it looks like a typical big city with the New York influence we’re used to, the shots we get at street level look really great. The dark alleyways and neon lights give this a lot of character, the kind of place where monsters and freaks lurk at every corner, which is exactly how it should be.
2026 is shaping up to be a very strong year for the DCU. Before Clayface hits, Supergirl is coming to the big screen, which has also had a couple of excellent trailers, while the small screen will bring us Lanterns. Clayface might be focused on a lesser-known character than those two, but as a gory, inventive horror movie, with a reported budget of just $40 million, it should be another hit. DC also unveiled the first poster for the movie, which you can see below:
Clayface hits theaters on October 23rd, 2026.
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