Mike Flanagan is working on a Clayface movie for DC
The Batman villain is finally to get a proper live action adaptation
The future of the DC cinematic universe is likely bring us a movie starring Batman villain Clayface, with a script by Mike Flanagan.
A movie based around Clayface is in the works according to movie industry leaker Daniel Richtman, as reported by CBM.
Flanagan pitched the idea of the movie to DC, as reported by Deadline last year, the concept being a full Clayface film, not just a Batman flick where he is the villain.
This may not be quite the outcome Mike Flanagan dreamed of, though, as he will not direct the movie. He’s not been snubbed, but next year he’ll be busy directing his The Exorcist project. We're praying for him on that one — the hit rate for Exorcist sequels is currently zero.
Flanagan has had a great run over the last few years, though, with a whole slew of great horror TV series including Midnight Mass, The Fall of the House of Usher and — heading back a little further — 2018’s The Haunting of Hill House
He’s a horror icon, but has no superhero credits to his name. However, this is one DC villain with a definite horror bent.
Moulding the Clayface story
While there are a handful of Clayface characters throughout Batman lore, the original is Basil Karlo, a horror film actor who uses his DNA-spliced super powers to take revenge on Hollywood for remaking one of his movies.
You don’t have to be too much of a movie buff to guess the inspiration for the name: Boris Karloff, who played Frankenstein’s monster in multiple movies of the 1930s, among many other classic horror roles.
Clayface can alter his body shape and mimic other people’s voices, a gloopy monster who can become as small or big as he likes. The first appearance of Clayface was in issue 40 of Detective Comics, from 1940.
He’s featured in a bunch of animated series, including Batman: The Animated Series from the 1990s. But his live action representations are scant. Most notably, he was represented in season 2 of Gotham from 2016.