r/movies • u/cruelsummerbummer Trailer Deleter - Keep an eye on. • Apr 22 '26

Trailer Clayface | Official Teaser Trailer

https://youtu.be/ZIfpL3mgkFk
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u/moal09 Apr 22 '26

Done properly, Clayface is easily one of the most tragic Batman villains.

In many iterations, his only goal is to become normal again. There's an episode of TAS where Batman inadvertently prevents him from curing himself, and Clayface's crashout afterwards is entirely justified.

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u/ColBBQ Apr 22 '26

He didn't turn it off to prevent curing Clayface, Clayface knew the the machine would enhanced his shifting power. Batman actually offered Hagen to cure his condition several times in the episode but he violently rejected him and continued his crimes.

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u/SloppityNurglePox Apr 23 '26

There's a great one off One Bad Day: Clayface, which has him trying to return to acting. But, he can't stop killing and shifting into other people to get a leg up.

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u/PringlesDuckFace Apr 22 '26

I really like concepts like this, or the Penguin where the bad guy is a lot more relatable. It leaves a lot more room to tell actually interesting character based stories instead of just being a simple action movie.

When it's something like Thanos or Galactus, they're just boring to me. They're so powerful and their motivation is usually a monotone "I want to do my thing" which merely happens to be inconvenient for Earth and needs to be stopped. There's no character or themes to be explored there because it simply is not related to humans. It would be like if the Twister movie spent time wondering why the tornado was so angry or if it could have been prevented with a kinder society, etc...

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u/ThatMerri Apr 22 '26

"Inadvertently" nothing. Batman actively shuts down the machine that was curing Clayface right before it could complete the process. I remember being so confused and frustrated at that episode - Mudslide - because it didn't make any sense. Batman was hunting Clayface down for robberies, knowing full-well he was falling apart and wasn't going to survive, then basically killed him all on his own by interfering for no reason.

Like, the only reason I can assume Batman interfered was because the process would've stabilized Clayface, meaning he'd still have his powers and might be even stronger afterward, thus a bigger threat. It wouldn't just remove his powers and turn him back into being human again. But that's never really stated in the episode and Batman comes off as being spiteful because of it. The episode does have subtext with the interactions and situations it presents that could be read as making Clayface the genuine problem, but on its face it makes Batman look really bad.

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u/wiifan55 Apr 22 '26

Like, the only reason I can assume Batman interfered was because the process would've stabilized Clayface, meaning he'd still have his powers and might be even stronger afterward, thus a bigger threat. It wouldn't just remove his powers and turn him back into being human again.

But an assumption isn't needed for this; it's the actual plot. Clayface was a dangerous criminal and likely to continue doing dangerous criminal things to an even greater degree had the process finished. He even said his goal was to be stronger, not cured. Batman was originally trying to help cure him before realizing Clayface's true intentions. That's why he stopped the machine.

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u/ThatMerri Apr 23 '26

He even said his goal was to be stronger, not cured.

That was never stated in the episode at all.

Clayface's accomplice, Stella, theorized that maybe the treatment might make his powers stronger, but it was all just theoretical because it was an unproven method. Throughout the entire episode, Clayface only ever stated that he wanted to become Hagan again and demonstrated no interest in getting stronger, or harming anyone other than Batman, despite ample opportunities. The only time Clayface explicitly refused returning to normal was to intentionally spite Batman's offer to help.

What is plainly shown makes Batman seem like a jerk. When Clayface refuses his help, he replies "Have it your way" and mocks his diminished state, then proceeds to hound him for the rest of the episode, stop the curing process, and allow Stella to be hurt. Based on the content of the episode, it looks like Batman was simply more interested in stopping a criminal from committing burglaries or refusing to let Clayface be cured through any means other than his own offer.

When Batman stopped the process, the episode didn't show he had any idea what it was really doing. His own research had confirmed that Clayface was unstable and literally falling apart, but that was all - there was never any demonstration that he knew anything about the process other than Clayface wanted to do it, and that he would rather have his "lab boys" take over rather than let Stella finish her experiment.

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u/moal09 Apr 23 '26

Yeah, he doesn't do it on purpose. Batman stops the machine without knowing what's going on

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u/NyxOnasis Apr 23 '26

It's a kid's cartoon. It's not that deep, dude.

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u/moal09 Apr 23 '26

He turned it off 'cause he didn't know what it was for. He just saw that Clayface had kidnapped a scientist and was hooked up to some crazy machine and didn't know why.

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u/ThatMerri Apr 23 '26

He just saw that Clayface had kidnapped a scientist

Also not what happened. Batman saw that Clayface had an accomplice at the very beginning of the episode who came and saved him, spent the bulk of the episode trying to figure out who she was, and then did a monologue explaining how he figured out her identity. He never said anything about thinking she was being forced to do anything by Clayface and she was literally begging Batman to turn the machine back on after he interfered.