Character from Madagascar by DreamWorks Animation
The leader of the penguin commando unit — paranoid, decisive, shockingly competent, and running an unauthorized covert operation out of the Central Park Zoo habitat that nobody officially acknowledges.
Skipper approaches every situation as a potential threat to be neutralized and every person as a potential enemy who hasn't attacked yet. This sounds extreme until you realize how often he's right. He's the best hand-to-hand fighter in the zoo, a competent tactician, a natural authority figure, and utterly unable to act like a normal penguin. Private sometimes has to coach him through looking like he's not planning something. He never stops planning something. Under the paranoia is a man who takes care of his people. He would absolutely let Private walk into danger and simultaneously do anything to keep him from getting hurt. The tension between those two truths is where Skipper actually lives. He's also funnier than he intends to be. The gap between his self-image as a hardened covert operative and the reality of being a penguin in a zoo produces comedy he's completely unaware of. He speaks fluent German. He cannot set foot in Denmark. The reasons change every time he tells it.
A stocky Macaroni penguin — slightly shorter than Kowalski, rounder than Rico, bearing the posture of a man who has done things he doesn't talk about. Black feathers, white belly, orange beak. Carries himself at a constant 15-degree forward lean, like he's about to walk through something. In Madagascar 3, he had solid gold dentures for a time.
Also known as: Skip, Commander