Summary
- Clayface's shapeshifting powers are a living hell, requiring a terrifying focus on every detail of his body to avoid falling apart.
- Batman: The Brave and the Bold #10 depicts Clayface's abilities as an existential nightmare, adding depth to this Gotham villain.
- Making this story even worse, fans also know that the less human he gets, the more Clayface loses the ability to tell right from wrong, setting up a Catch-22.
Warning: spoilers for Batman: The Brave and the Bold #10 ahead!Clayface, the monstrous shapeshifter made of living mud, is undoubtedly one of Clayface provides a unique twist that adds a huge dose of existential horror to this already nightmarish nemesis.
Batman: The Brave and the Bold #10 concludes with Dan Watters, Ricardo López Ortiz, and Troy Peteri's 'Batman: The Cheeseburger', in which Batman's normal routine is interrupted when Clayface rampages through a fast-food t. In a heartbreaking and horrifying moment, Clayface rages to Batman about how he has to constantly sculpt and form every part of his body lest he fall apart.
"Can you imagine what it's like to have to how much your arms are meant to weigh?" Clayface hisses. "I can't hold it together. Not all the time." He makes it clear that while he may be able to shapeshift, he's constantly falling apart, and even the simplest human experiences are now impossible.
Clayface's powers are a living hell that recontextualize this Gotham villain as existing in a constant, existential nightmare.
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Clayface Has to Shapeshift By Focusing on the Smallest Details
The Gotham Villain its His Life Is Hell
On the surface, Clayface's powers seem like a gift: as one of DC's most powerful metamorphs, he is capable of adjusting his body to any shape, density, or form he desires, and has even been known to split apart into separate clones - some of which are capable of exhibiting their own consciousness. Coupled with his acting skills from his former life as actor Basil Karlo, Clayface's powers make him a serious threat.
Batman: The Brave and the Bold #10 recontextualizes all that power as an existential nightmare. Clayface must constantly retain focus on his shape to a terrifying degree, with the simple act of eating a cheeseburger requiring him to "make [himself] a tongue, and force every taste bud to appear on it...to create [himself] a digestive system and a throat to feed it." And all of this must be done concurrently with maintaining normal mass and proportions, walking, talking, etc. Clayface constantly maintains an agonizing focus on his body or else reverts to a mass of mud.
At the same time, fans know from the brief stint where Clayface ed the Bat-Family in James Tynion IV, Eddy Barrows and Eber Ferreira's Detective Comics #934 that his shapeshifting also causes unintended issues with his cognition - growing to a large size removes Clayface's ability to tell right from wrong, meaning he's not even responsible for many of his darkest actions. Forced to focus beyond reason to be anywhere near human, and prone to turning into a monster when he doesn't, Clayface's powers are a living hell that recontextualize this Batman villain as existing in a constant, existential nightmare.
BATMAN: THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD #10 |
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Batman: The Brave and the Bold #10 is available now from DC Comics.
