Matt Hagen

Matt Hagen is the second character to use the name Clayface in DC Comics. He debuted in *Detective Comics* #298, published in 1961, after the original Clayface, Basil Karlo. Their origins differ sharply: Karlo was an actor who committed murders while wearing a costume, whereas Hagen gained the ability to transform his body.

In the comics, Hagen is an adventurer who discovers a pool of mysterious protoplasm in a cave. Contact with it turns him into a malleable, claylike being. He can change his appearance, impersonate other people, and reshape his limbs, abilities he uses in crimes that bring him into conflict with Batman and Robin. The transformation has a limit: its effects wear off, forcing Hagen to return to the pool to renew his powers. That dependence gives his early stories a problem distinct from the usual challenge of catching a disguised criminal. Batman must contend not only with Hagen’s disguises but also with the source that makes them possible.

*Batman: The Animated Series* reinvented Hagen while keeping his name and shapeshifting powers. Voiced by Ron Perlman, this version is a film actor whose face has been badly damaged. He becomes dependent on Renuyu, an experimental cosmetic product supplied by businessman Roland Daggett. In the two-part episode “Feat of Clay,” Daggett’s men force a large quantity of the substance into Hagen. Rather than repairing his face, it transforms his entire body. Hagen can now assume convincing human appearances, but he can no longer simply return to the life and career he wanted to preserve.

The animated series uses his acting history to make those powers especially painful. Taking on a role was once Hagen’s profession; after his transformation, changing faces becomes a way to hide what has happened to him. In “Mudslide,” his condition is deteriorating, and he seeks a treatment that he hopes will make his body stable again. His pursuit of a cure puts others in danger and draws Batman back into conflict with him.

Hagen also appears in “Growing Pains,” an episode of *The New Batman Adventures*. There, a young girl named Annie, whom Robin befriends, is revealed to be a separated part of Clayface. Hagen reabsorbs her, making the encounter one of the character’s cruelest animated stories.

Across these versions, Matt Hagen is identifiable by specific origins and conflicts: a comics adventurer dependent on a transforming pool, and an animated actor whose attempt to recover his face costs him control of his body.