I’m So Worried DC Is Setting Up To Repeat A Major Joker Problem With 1 Other Iconic Batman Villain

The DCU is moving forward with a hard reboot, but I'm concerned about one character who appears to be getting a little too much spotlight in 2025. After the wild and stunted rollercoaster that was the DCEU, Warner Bros. has made a big effort to reboot their DC multimedia offerings, with the establishment of DC Studios. And in order to get the new and improved DCU off to a flying start, WB hired Peter Safran and James Gunn to stand at the head of DC Studios as Co-Heads of the business. Between them, Safran and Gunn have a lot of experience and solid track records, but they still need to be careful with how they approach the DCU's first few projects.

For the most part, things appear to be moving along at a good pace, with the appointment announced at the end of 2022, and now just a few years later, there is a whole slate of exciting projects coming in 2025 and beyond. However, there does appear to be an abnormal amount of exposure for one unusual villain that could threaten to repeat a fatal flaw from previous DC projects around their overusage of the character, Joker. It remains to be seen how all of these iterations will be seen, but DC will need to be careful about how it handles the character going forward.

Clayface Has Gotten Some Real Spotlight In 2025

Clayface Went From Obscurity To Frequent Appearances

Clayface is a relatively minor antagonist from Batman Comics. That is not to say that he doesn't have plenty of storylines, and has been able to pose a significant threat to various legendary heroes, but not to the extent that he would be considered a very notable character. Despite this, Clayface has already appeared in the DCU's first official outing, Creature Commandos, as part of the animated series when he plays a side antagonist who causes trouble for the group of unruly anti-heroes. And already, the character has also shown up in the animated Harley Quinn TV show as a part of its fifth season.

a close up of a drawing of the batman villain clayface

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Clayface has also been announced to lead a movie of his own in the years to come, though the timeline for when it will release has yet to be confirmed. While Harley Quinn is not officially integrated as a canonical DCU show, the others are all set to be within the same universe of stories. This means that Clayface, right out of the gate of the DCU, is getting a lot of prominent coverage. However, when other characters got a lot of coverage in days gone by in DC projects, it didn't always work out very well.

Clayface's Sudden Focus Does Present Some Risks That Mirror DC's Previous Joker Uses

The Joker Had Too Many Outings In The DCEU And Beyond

There is no denying that Joker has long been established as one of the most entertaining, intimidating, and exciting villains in all of DC. For almost as long as Batman has existed, Joker has been around to cause havoc. This has been reflected in adaptations, with most of the projects that feature Batman including his arch-nemesis close at hand. But even for a major antagonist of the Joker's scale and popularity, there have been times when the character has been overused, making them feel somewhat redundant and overall less threatening.

If that can happen to a villain as big as the Joker, then it doesn't bode well for Clayface if the character ends up being overused. When the Joker appeared in Suicide Squad, played by Jared Leto, The Batman, played by Barry Keoghan, and Joker, played by Joaquin Phoenix, it didn't matter that some of these iterations were great, the over-saturation worked against each version getting an opportunity to truly shine. And if Clayface follows the same path, it's likely to be a problem for the DCU before it really gets into the full swing of things.

Why Having Clayface Appear So Often Is A Potentially Dangerous Move For The Character

Clayface Needs To Be Handled Correctly In The DCU

When it comes to superhero movies, there is a fine balance that needs to be adhered to. Audiences love to see heroes, and even anti-heroes appear as often as possible. In this way, the protagonists of the stories get time to develop and fully explore a character. However, it needs to be the same version of the character, progressing along their own character arc for this to actually work. But villains don't get the same reception. Villains are there to be the antagonist, and to cause trouble, which means they need to have a motive, and develop to some extent, but nothing like the hero that the story is actually about.

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DC has officially set up a director who helmed one of the most haunting episodes of TV in history to take the wheel for a major DCU movie.

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However, if one villain is constantly popping up, and even worse, if that villain is repeatedly being delivered in various formats, with different actors, and new takes on the character, things get messy. Jared Leto's Joker was a footnote in Suicide Squad, but his appearance was enough to get people talking. Then, when the character was brought to two more films, each time with a new performer, audiences got tired quickly of seeing such a popular character used in minor teases, and wasted roles. Clayface may not be as widely loved, but featuring this villain repeatedly in different ways will get old fast.

I Need Clayface's Rise To Prominence To Not End Up Hurting The Character

Clayface Has A Lot Of Potential To Tap Into If Handled Correctly

The thing that I find the most heartbreaking about all of this, though, is the potential the character actually has. Clayface is an intimidating and menacing Batman villain whose ability to transform and shapeshift makes him incredibly versatile. As such, the character has actually appeared in comics over the decades as various different people who ended up getting these unusual abilities after being experimented on in Arkham Asylum. Already criminals, these characters became supervillains, disrupting life in Gotham and generally working with other villains.

If Clayface is put out in a way that wastes the character, it would be a huge disappointment, and a terrible loss for the DCU.

In Harley Quinn, the character is established as a somewhat humorous figure, which is fitting with the rest of the series. And in Creature Commandos, the first glimpse of Clayface proves they are a slob and a criminal, but also a genuine monster. The upcoming movie intends to feature the character in a straight-up body horror setting. All of these tones are significantly different. Even in the DCU, where the universe is intended to have one continuity, there are major discrepancies. And if Clayface is put out in a way that wastes the character, it would be a huge disappointment, and a terrible loss for the DCU before the new universe is even established.