Several characters have worn the mantle of the villain Clayface in DC comics across eight decades – but the two most prominent must surely be Basil Karlo and Matt Hagen.

Karlo, the first Clayface, who debuted in June 1940, was a B-movie actor who had no superpowers but did have a thirst for blood and a penchant for crime. In the 1950s Batman adventures, Clayface reappeared in the shape of Matt Hagen, a treasure hunter whose accidental encounter with radioactive material gave him the power to transform into a lumbering mass of muddy goo with superhuman strength and the ability to shapeshift into any likeness.

Other comic book versions of Clayface have come and gone over the decades, but for his big screen debut DC has opted to bring back Matt Hagen once again. This time Clayface is centre stage in a supervillain origin story, with a generous helping of body horror – a sub genre that has enjoyed renewed popularity in recent years.

In the film’s contemporary reimagining, Hagen is a Hollywood actor whose career high is ended when his face is brutally disfigured by mobsters in revenge for sleeping with their gang boss’s girlfriend. A desperate Hagen decides to put himself forward as a human guinea pig for the testing of an experimental formula containing microscopic AI.

This treatment promises to regrow damaged cells and repair the body to its original form. At first the results are promising, but then, in response to emotional excitement – especially anger – his flesh begins to warp and take on an........

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