American Dad! is an animated sitcom created by Seth Macfarlane (who also created Family Guy and The Cleveland Show) for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series focuses on the conservative republican CIA representative, Stan Smith, fathering his two kids, the nerdy and unpopular Steve, and the rebellious ultra-liberal Hayley, with the help of his wife Francine. Their household residents also include Roger, a rogue alien, wanted by Stan's own CIA superiors, but who's generously being hidden in the house's attic for safety, and Klaus Heisler, a German megalomaniac, who was captured by Stan and some other CIA comrades, who tested out a brain transfusion device of him, implanting his brain into the body of a goldfish, and giving him the abnormal imprisonment of living in a fishbowl as the Smith family pet for life. Originally, new episodes and reruns were on FOX, but as of 2014, new episodes have been moved to TBS. Despite the move, 20th Century Fox Television still owns and produces the show and licenses it to TBS. In addition to syndicated reruns on TBS, syndicated reruns are also on local television stations. TBS and sister channel Adult Swim hold the rights for cable syndication for the show and have been rerunning American Dad! since 2005.
Main Characters[]
Stan Smith[]
The main character of American Dad!: a CIA agent and staunch. With a very masculine attitude, Stan is Francine's husband and Hayley and Steve's father. He is voiced by Seth Macfarlane.
Francine Smith[]
Stan's wife and mother of Steve and Hayley. Francine is an enabler, usually going along with the actions of the family, though she occasionally serves as the voice of reason. Despite her ditzy personality, she demonstrates a keen wild streak and a flirty nature. She is voiced by Wendy Schaal.
Hayley Smith[]
Stan and Francine's daughter. She is eighteen and attends a college. She is portrayed as ultra-liberal, which often brings her into conflict with her father. She is voiced by Rachel MacFarlane.
Steve Smith[]
Stan and Francine's fourteen-year-old son. He is a geek, which Stan does not like. He has also come into conflict with Stan, who wants Steve to follow in his footsteps. He is voiced by Scott Grimes.
Roger Smith[]
Roger is an alien who lives in the Smith family's attic. Stan feels he "owes Roger his life" after being saved by the alien at Area 51 four years prior to the show beginning and took him in his house. Roger lives in the attic of Stan's house. Roger is a hedonistic alcoholic who takes on make believe personas and makes the Smith family's life extremely difficult with his vices, but since exposing Roger as an alien would endanger Stan and the rest of the family, those personas are Roger's only way of communicating with the outside world. He also has a strong addiction to junk food and can also hold long-standing grudges. Only the Smith family, Klaus, and Jeff know that Roger is an alien. He is voiced by Seth MacFarlane.
Klaus Heisler[]
Klaus was once an East German Olympic ski-jumper until his mind was transferred into the body of a goldfish during the 1986 Winter Olympics by the CIA to prevent him from winning the gold medal, leaving him permanently trapped in the goldfish's body. Despite this, Klaus still hasn't come to terms with what happened and is very bitter. He stays in a fishbowl in the Smiths' home and has something of an obsessive crush on Francine. He is voiced by Dee Bradley Baker.
Jeff Fischer[]
Jeff Fischer is introduced as Hayley's loser, stoner, hippie boyfriend. He is an unemployed high school drop out, and is frequently naive or stupid, irritating other characters. His mother abandoned him early on, giving birth to him in his van, within which he lives until Season 6. His relationship with his father Henry is poor, as his father also views him as a failure. Throughout the series, Hayley repeatedly dumps him for being needy, clingy and overly agreeable, leaving Jeff crushed until their inevitable reconciliations, though Jeff also dumps Hayley once in the episode "Pulling Double Booty". However, he marries Hayley in the show's 100th episode after swindling Stan out of $50,000. He then moves into the house with Hayley in the episode "There Will Be Bad Blood". In "For Whom the Sleigh Bell Tolls", Stan ends up accepting Jeff when Jeff demonstrates his loyalty toward Hayley by saving Stan's life despite disliking him. Jeff is based on Seth MacFarlane's friend of the same name, who also voices him.
American Dad! references in The Simpsons[]
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In The Italian Bob, Stan appears in the criminal book, guilty of plagiarism of plagiarism (Suggesting American Dad! copied Family Guy, which had already copied The Simpsons). |
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In the ending credits of Homerland, the cast of American Dad!, along with characters from other FOX cartoons, such as Family Guy, The Cleveland Show, and Bob's Burgers, all go to a 25th season premiere of The Simpsons. |
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American Dad! was one of the many shows, that was so popular that everybody's heard of, but doesn't actually exist. Everybody thinks it's real, because of how widespread it's name is. However, they never bother to watch it, and just assume everyone else around them watches it. |
The Simpsons references in American Dad![]
| In 100 A.D., Roger announced what the special episode was going to be about. He said that in this episode, they'll be finding out Who Shot Mr. Burns?, only to find out that the special event he's actually talking about happened 15 years ago and learns that Maggie is the one who shot him. | |
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In Faking Bad, Steve starts a business, selling fake IDs to people. He calls out the names on the fake IDs as he gives them out. One of them he reads is "Mike Rotch". Bart Simpson then appears, laughing revealing himself to have bought that ID, and chosen that name specifically to get Steve to sound like he was saying "My crotch" in a similar fashion to how he makes his infamous prank calls to Moe. |
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Jeff and the ghost of Sinbad were traveling through a wormhole and they were transforming into a bunch of different versions of themselves. One of them was a Simpsonized version of themselves. |