Clayface is going to be taking the new DCU franchise to the one place that has been referenced in nearly every project in the franchise: Gotham City. But don’t expect to see the lights of Gotham or its towering Gothic architecture; Clayface will instead be taking viewers into Gotham’s underbelly, where an up-and-coming actor like Matt Hagen (Tom Rhys Harries) gets dragged into a tragic fate by the criminals that stalk and prey on the city and its people.
Once he’s at the bottom, Matt steps into a whole new world: Gotham’s strange world of fringe science, where a scientist named Caitlyn Corr (Naomi Ackie) gives Matt a revolutionary treatment that changes him into a monster. And there won’t be any Batman around to stop that dark origin story.
When ComicBook’s Chris Killian attended the press day for Clayface, star Tom Hrys Harries revealed that there had not only been discussions, “at length,” about Matt Hagen and Dr. Caitlyn Corr’s knowledge of Batman, but that, “We have footage” of something related to that, which he couldn’t discuss. Hey did say that Gotham City is “analogous” to New York,” in that it’s big enough for things to happen that are off of The Dark Knight’s radar: “You can have these different characters and different stories play out, whilst Batman also exists in that universe.”
Director Tom Watkins seized upon the idea of Gotham being a big enough playground that a villain origin story can still unfold, even if Batman isn’t involved. “One of the things that appealed to me, really, was that it was a standalone story. It’s a different story, you know, like Joker. It’s just one man’s story within the sort of world of Gotham. And I thought of the fact that you could come to this film, and you don’t need to bring any knowledge; you don’t have to have any of that deep background. And that really appealed to me, as well.”
He went on to explain that DC Studios gave him “a lot of freedom” to make his own version of Gotham for the DCU. “They gave me a lot of freedom. And it was like, ‘Create your version of Gotham,’ you know? And, so, there’s a lot of James in this process: James Price, who’s the brilliant production designer, and I worked hard to create a Gotham.”
Watkins cited things like the UK city of Liverpool and German realism as the architectural basis for his Gotham. “We wanted it to feel kind of real and grounded. But we also wanted to have this sense of this kind of oppressive city. We looked at a lot of German realism, these cities, these canyons looming over you, this kind of corruption of the streets… the tungsten light; the sort of light of the streets, the neons, the reflections. The wetness of the streets, you know? I love the way that it looked. And it was also a little bit of I felt like some Darkman and stuff like that in there. Yeah.”
One of the fun things about the DCU franchise has been the way its different projects all clearly have different styles and tones, yet they all have been able to cross over and blend seamlessly (see: Superman and Lanterns), without compromising themselves, respectively. So while Clayface may take us on an R-rated odyssey through the criminal world of Gotham, The Brave and the Bold can place Batman and his son Damian/Robin in parts of Gotham that are much lighter and family-friendly, and have it all feel like the same city.
Clayface will be in theaters on October 23rd. Check out our interviews with the cast and crew! Are you hyped for this film? Let us know in the coments!
