CONFIRMED
Warner Bros. and DC Studios have put out a new standalone clip called “Clayface | The Plane,” and it does nothing to soften the film’s reputation. Matt Hagen (Tom Rhys Harries) is mid-flight and clearly losing a fight with the side effects of an experimental treatment. The same day, DC Studios co-CEO Peter Safran told IGN that this grimier Gotham is meant to stick around for whoever handles the city next.
What we know
The hard facts come from Warner Bros. Pictures press materials, as reproduced by Bloody Disgusting and Tom & Lorenzo. James Watkins directs from a screenplay by Mike Flanagan and Hossein Amini, with story by Flanagan. Producers are Matt Reeves, Lynn Harris, James Gunn and Peter Safran. Volker Bertelmann scores. North American theaters get it October 23, 2026, with international rollout starting October 21.
The new clip is the thing fans are passing around today. Bloody Disgusting describes Clayface as a full-blown R-rated horror movie and frames the plane sequence as Hagen suffering the fallout of that treatment. Fangoria ran an exclusive behind-the-scenes look and calls the film “pure body horror” despite the superhero connection, with more in Fangoria Vol. 2 Issue #33. When those two outlets agree on the genre label, that tells you where the film sits.
The Gotham news is the more interesting long-term piece. In an IGN interview, as reported by Screen Rant, Safran said Gotham will keep a consistent grittier, darker look, and that the next filmmaker to tackle the city can use it as a starting point. He added that each film should still reflect its own director’s vision, and he credited Watkins with layering in that darker feel. One honest caveat: we have not yet read the original IGN piece, so treat the exact phrasing as secondhand until we do.
For context, Fangoria’s trailer coverage earlier this year noted that Gunn had already called Clayface a “complete horror film.” The first trailer landed in April, the final trailer in late September, and the LA premiere happened October 13.
What is rumored
Back in June, Daniel Richtman claimed, via @ClayfaceDaily on X and GeekTyrant, that the film includes a scene where Matt turns scissors on himself during a turbulent flight, and that test screenings called the movie “insane.” Richtman has a mixed track record. The plane scene itself now lines up with official trailer and clip footage, so that half is no longer a rumor. The “insane” test-screening reaction remains unverified, and we are not treating it as fact.
A Gizmodo related-article teaser from around October 8 says Flanagan “appears to distance himself” from Clayface. We only have the headline snippet. We have not read the underlying article and we found no direct Flanagan quote. File that firmly under rumor.
Early social-media reactions, from Collider’s Steve Weintraub and critic Chris Killian as aggregated by Creepy Catalog and JoBlo, describe the film as “hard R” and compare it to The Fly and Darkman. Post-premiere social posts tend to run warm, so they are a mood reading, not a review.
What we don’t know yet
The biggest open question is how directly Clayface plugs into the DCU’s Batman. ComicBookMovie.com reports that in a DC Studios extended clip, Gunn said a crossover with Robert Pattinson’s Batman is “probably not… not in the near future,” while saying this isn’t the last of Clayface in the DCU. That outlet is not on our source list, and we have not checked the comments against the video.
The Brave and the Bold, the DCU Batman film Safran is presumably gesturing toward, has no release date. MovieWeb’s estimate of 2028 or later is unofficial. Reviews are also not in, but the full critics’ review embargo has been publicly confirmed to lift October 21, 2026, two days before the wide release, as reported by Yahoo Entertainment and other outlets.
What it means
Taken together, the picture is fairly clear. Every confirmed source points the same direction: Clayface is a horror movie first, a DC movie second, and the studio is comfortable saying so. The clip, the Fangoria framing and the R rating all agree.
Safran’s Gotham comments suggest DC Studios wants Watkins’ version of the city to carry forward rather than get reset for the next Batman. That is a meaningful signal for anyone hoping the DCU’s Gotham stays ugly. What it does not do is tell us when that next Batman film arrives, or whether Clayface himself shows up in it. For now, the confirmed next steps are October 21, when the review embargo lifts and international release begins, and October 23.