‘Clayface’ Ending, Explained
Clayface (2026) isn’t your average comic book movie. It’s a twisted tale of vengeance that has more in common with The Crow (2024) than it does with your standard superhero fare. Witnessing Matt Hagen’s fall from grace was always going to be hard to watch, but the tinges of horror that litter the film show that maybe he was always destined to become a villain and not an adored Hollywood actor.
But now that the DCU’s first major horror movie is out, plenty of questions are cropping up about how Clayface will connect to future DCU films. It comes with the territory of being a superhero movie these days. Everything has to connect, so how does Clayface fit into the large scope of James Gunn’s burgeoning cinematic universe? Is it entirely self-contained, do other major DC characters appear in it, and what are the odds of the character appearing in other films?
What Happens at the End of ‘Clayface’?
As a tale of revenge, Matt Hagen’s descent into villainy goes about as well as you would expect it to. Sure, he’s able to kill the people ultimately responsible for ruining his life, but it’s at the cost of his soul.
Once Hagen kills everyone who wronged him, he pays a visit to Dr. Caitlin, the scientist who cured his disfigurement with the help of nanomachines. He’s been crushing on her for most of the film, but has slowly become more and more obsessed with her to the point where he murders her husband and impersonates him just so that she can look at him with love in her eyes. Obviously disturbed by this, she activates the kill switch on the nanomachines in his body, which, combined with being tased, causes Hagen to mutate wildly out of control, almost like a monster out of a Resident Evil game. He dissolves into a sewer grate, and Caitlin assumes that he’s dead.
Except, he isn’t. Some time later, as Caitlin walks the streets of Gotham, she encounters a homeless man who briefly takes on the mannerisms of Hagen, mirroring the same bow he gave her upon their first meeting, and even speaks like him, albeit briefly. Of course, this unassuming homeless man is Hagen, who has mastered his shapeshifting abilities to perfectly assume the form of any person, and now lives alone in the sewers. He deludes himself into thinking that Caitlin loves him, but it’s revealed that he can barely maintain his original form, now taking on the lumpy and malformed appearance of his comic namesake, screaming in agony at what he’s become.
How Does ‘Clayface’ Fit Into James Gunn’s DCU?
By all accounts, Clayface is a dark turn for Gunn’s DCU. It’s not as bleak as something like Joker (2019), but unlike Todd Phillips’ self-contained ode to nihilism, Clayface can actually connect to other DCU movies. But how?
The biggest connection to the broader DCU is that Clayface is set in two cities: Gotham and Coast City. The importance of Gotham is obvious. It’s the city Batman calls home and, according to Peter Safran, the head of DC Studios, Batman is already operating in Gotham at the time of Clayface. He never appears in the film, and no mention is made of him or Bruce Wayne, but this is the first time we’ve seen the DCU’s version of Gotham City. So that’s something!
As for Coast City, while it’s clearly a stand-in for Hollywood, it also serves as the primary city of Hal Jordan, who featured prominently in Lanterns (2026). Again, no mention of Green Lantern or Hal Jordan is made in Clayface, but that lends credence to the idea that Gunn’s DCU is meant to be composed of several standalone films instead of one gigantic, sprawling narrative like the MCU. Outside of those locations, no characters from other DCU films or shows like Superman (2025) or Creature Commandos (2024) make an appearance here, making the film entirely standalone from anything else happening in this growing universe.
Will Clayface Appear in ‘The Brave And the Bold’?
That doesn’t mean that Clayface can’t appear in future DCU projects like The Brave and the Bold, which is slated to contain the debut of the DCU’s Batman, but how likely is that?
At first glance, it does seem likely that Clayface can appear in future movies set in Gotham. He’s not dead; plus, with his ability to perfectly camouflage himself, he can easily sneak around and be used by big-name Gotham criminals as a spy of sorts to get information or assassinate targets. However, if we’re being honest, fans really shouldn’t be holding their breath to see Hagen again.
First of all, Clayface really doesn’t have a reason to get into conflict with Batman. If the film went the route of how Clayface was introduced in Batman: The Animated Series (1992), Batman tried to stop Hagen from enacting his vengeance, but that’s already passed. Why would Hagen want to go up against the Caped Crusader? If Clayface were to fight Batman, then he would probably be portrayed as a random villain with no great ambition other than stealing money so he could rent an apartment.
But a greater reason as to why he won’t appear in future DCU movies is because the character’s ending here is perfect. He lost it all, and his desire for revenge turned him into a literal monster. He pushed aside, or killed, the only people who cared about him, and now he’s a societal outcast. All he can do is scream and cry alone in the sewers. Taking a man like that, who we’re meant to sympathize with, and turning him into a criminal for Batman to fight just feels wrong and undermines the character’s resolution. It’s certainly possible for him to reappear—anything is possible in the world of comic book movies—but if James Gunn and Peter Safran want to preserve the power of their films, it would be in their best interest to keep Clayface in the gutter where he belongs.
