He and his family were killed during a major magical war decades ago, and his grief and rage drove him to come back from the dead and commit terrible crimes against humanity. Skulduggery has over four centuries' worth of Tragic Backstory(TM) to be sad about. His sheer power level combined with a snarky-yet-gentlemanly attitude and dapper appearance make him an extremely popular character. Throughout the course of the books he serves as a mentor and friend to Valkyrie Cain, the main character, as they team up to save the world from magical threats. He's a brilliant detective, a powerful sorcerer, and a living skeleton.

Skulduggery Pleasant is one of the major characters in the book series of the same name. Suffice to say, the author managed to get the film rights back and was working on an adaption of the first film. A film adaption was considered under Warner Brothers but the author considered their script 'the worst thing he had ever read' and would've had Skulduggery be a skeleton body who retained his head and face and the film would've had a musical number where he'd dance to Micheal Jackson's Man in the Mirror. Though popular in his native country of Ireland, as well as the United Kingdom, he sadly wasn't as popular in the US, with the publisher ceasing to release the series in that country after the third book. Although he's responsible for a lot of thirst in his fandom, he's relatively unknown outside of it. Skulduggery Pleasant is (unsurprisingly) one of the main characters in Derek Landy's Skulduggery Pleasant series.

Skulduggery pleasant the faceless ones