Skipper Matthews

Bradley "Skipper" Matthews is the protagonist of the twenty-fifth Goosebumps book, Attack of the Mutant, as well as its television adaptation.

History
Skipper Matthews is an overweight twelve-year-old comic-book collector. He loves collecting many comics, yet only reads one: the Masked Mutant. The Masked Mutant is an evil super-villain who can change his molecular form into any solid material. He is constantly opposed by a league of superheroes, who are led by the Galloping Gazelle, the world's fastest man. Skipper has a friend named Wilson; Wilson is into collecting rubber stamps, and attempts at various times throughout the novel to share his passion with Skipper, but to no avail. Skipper also has a little nine-year-old sister Mitzi, who always likes to mess around with him.

One day while riding the bus to the dentist, he meets a pretty redhead girl named Libby Zacks (not knowing that she was actually the Masked Mutant in disguise), who strikes up a conversation with him about comic books. He gets so caught up talking to her that he gets off on the wrong stop and spots a building that looks exactly like the Masked Mutant's headquarters! He almost goes inside the building, but he is late for his dentist appointment and decides to come back. The next day he comes back to see the building but it has disappeared. Later that night, he goes home and reads the newest issue of the Masked Mutant that has arrived in the mail for him, and sees that, in the comic book, the Masked Mutant has put an invisibility cloak on the building.

Going back the next day, Skipper runs into Libby for a third time. The two decide to see if they can access the invisible building and sure enough they enter successfully. When they arrive, a yellow light ray scans over Skipper's body but has no apparent effect on him. The two ventures into one of the building's elevators and are whisked down to the basement of the building. The two get separated and while alone Skipper finds a large printing press and layouts for the last issue of the Masked Mutant. Skipper concludes that the building is likely the headquarters for the comic book publisher. While leafing through the layouts Skipper notices a series of panels for the next issue, and the new character drawn within looks exactly like Skipper. At this point, Libby reappears and makes Skipper leave with her. That night, Skipper gets home and there is another new issue of the comic waiting for him.

Inside the issue Skipper spies drawings of himself walking around the headquarters with the words "A New Foe" written about him. Skipper also finds out that the Galloping Gazelle has been held hostage in the Masked Mutant's headquarters, and that only "the Boy" can save him.

So Skipper returns again to the headquarters and makes his way up the elevator to rescue the Galloping Gazelle! He finds the bound superhero tied to a chair in an unlocked room, unties him, and the two leave the room to confront the Masked Mutant.The Galloping Gazelle is convinced that Skipper is a superhero and keeps drilling him for his secret power as they make their way to the Mutant's private offices. The Galloping Gazelle informs Skipper that his plan is to run around and around the Mutant at such a fast speed that he becomes a cyclone and sucks the Masked Mutant into submission. Suddenly the Masked Mutant morphs out of hiding (he was disguised as office furniture) and the Gazelle makes good on his plan. However the Mutant outsmarts him and sticks his foot out, tripping the Gazelle. The Masked Mutant then transforms into the form of a leopard and tries to eat the Galloping Gazelle.

The Galloping Gazelle proves himself to be a coward as he escapes the Masked Mutant's leopard clutches and abandons Skipper with the Masked Mutant as he makes his escape. The Masked Mutant returns to his normal form and he too starts to drill Skipper about his secret mutant-power. The Mutant lifts Skipper all the way up to the ceiling of his private office and is about to drop him to his death when Libby appears in the doorway.

The Masked Mutant safely sets Skipper down as he goes to confront Libby. Libby removes a yellow toy gun from her satchel and tells Skipper that if this is really a comic book then anything can happen, so she tells the Masked Mutant that the toy gun is a Molecule-Melter. The Masked Mutant doubts her and he advances as she pulls the trigger. The gun fires at the Masked Mutant and the Mutant melts down into nothing. Skipper is overjoyed and Libby tells him of course it worked, after all, it is a Molecule-Melter, and Skipper is the next victim and target.

Skipper then watches as Libby transforms into the real Masked Mutant. It turns out that the previous Masked Mutant was actually the Magnificent Molecule Man, who worked for the Masked Mutant. What else matters is that, there is no girl named Libby at all after the Masked Mutant himself ditches his female disguise. The Masked Mutant also informs Skipper of another dastardly deed. He has turned Skipper into a comic book character, which turned into a big shock! The mysterious yellow ray when he first entered the building was a scanner and it scanned him into the comic book! With no hope of escape the Masked Mutant prepares to destroy Skipper until Skipper stops him by announcing that he is not actually Skipper! No, he is the Colossal Elastic Boy in disguise. The Masked Mutant shakes his head and says, "I knew it!" Skipper reveals that nothing can harm him, but sulfuric acid. The Mutant transforms into a wave of acid, but Skipper barely misses the wave and the acid eats into the carpet.

Skipper made up the whole thing about being the Elastic Boy. Since the Masked Mutant could only transform himself into solids, Skipper had tricked him into transforming into a liquid and thus the Masked Mutant was unable to return to his original form. Skipper was very happy to be alive and performed a little victory dance, on the carpet.

He could not wait to return home and see his family again. It seemed like the bus ride home took hours, but as soon as he got home and walked into the front door, he was glad to be back. He decides he has had enough adventure for one day, and decides not to read the new comic that has arrived for him in the mail. "Who needs it?" he asked himself about the comic. He then celebrates his victory later on that night by playing Frisbee with Mitzi for a half an hour, and they had a great time. Then Skipper asked his little sister Mitzi if they wanted a snack. She said yes, and they decided to have some chocolate cake together.

As Skipper is cutting the cake with a big cake knife, he accidentally cuts the back of his hand. But he discovers that it was not blood coming out, but red, blue, yellow and black ink. Looks like Skipper's comic book career is not over yet, and now he must read the next issue of the Masked Mutant comic series in order to continue.

In the TV ending, Skipper actually became the Colossal Elastic Boy.

Physical appearance
Skipper is twelve years old, Caucasian, short and chubby with straight dark brown hair.

Personality
Skipper has always been addicted to comic books as it was all that he thought about and he always made sure that his collection still has its value and that none of his comics are opened, except for The Masked Mutant.

Sometimes this deteriorated him away from some important activities, such as his homework, which does annoy his parents — mainly his father, who disapproved of comics. As a result, Skipper does his best not to be on his father's bad side. He doesn't always get along with his younger sister named Mitzi as she liked to cause trouble and snitch on Skipper every chance she got. He is good friends with Wilson, but sometimes Skipper thought his friend had dropped down from the planet Mars, as Wilson is always confused and doesn't know anything.

Skipper also thought that Wilson was weird for collecting rubber stamps. Skipper was always in a hurry when he was younger, and that he used to skip a lot, which was how he earned his nickname and he thought it was better than his real name, Bradley.

Skipper also has a fear of getting lost, which had started from he got lost at a Pic and Pay when he was two years old. He always felt like a dark chubby mole next to Wilson and thought that if they were in a comic book, Wilson would be the superhero while Skipper was the pudgy, funny one who always messes up. Given the close call he had with the Masked Mutant, it is unknown if Skipper is still into comic books or not.

Books

 * Goosebumps
 * Attack of the Mutant
 * Goosebumps Presents
 * Attack of the Mutant

Television and film

 * Goosebumps (television series)
 * Season 2 - "Attack of the Mutant"

Trivia

 * Skipper has the same surname as another character in the original Goosebumps series, Zeke Matthews, from Phantom of the Auditorium.
 * Skipper's actor, Dan Warry-Smith, also played Seth Gold in "Click".
 * It is unknown if Skipper was the hero that appeared at the beginning of the video game version, who went to the Masked Mutant's secret headquarters.