Roger Smith

"God, who do you have to probe around here to get a Chardonnay?"

- Roger

Roger Smith, also known as Roger, is the tritagonist in the animated comedy series American Dad!.

He was voiced by Seth MacFarlane.

Appearance
He is a gray alien living with the Smith family, Roger is sarcastic, vituperative, irritable, bad-tempered, curmudgeonly, argumentative, uncompromising, disrespectful, obnoxious, surly, and impolite, so he speaks in swish. Speculation exists regarding Roger's sexuality, but the discussion might be moot, as he is, after all, an alien. Roger (his name may come from the word Andrognous which means having both male and female traits) came to live with the Smith family after saving Stan Smith's life in Area 51. He has lived with the Smiths for four years. He is possibly based on Dr. Roger Adelson, one of MacFarlane's former professors.

Personality
Roger describes himself as a "fey pansexual alcoholic non-human". Roger is obnoxious, destructive, lackadaisical, unpropitious, negligent, childish, greedy, petty, rude, and cruel. He is also a violent, homicidal, slaughterous, and unpleasant sociopath with a love for character role-playing. He once convinced Steve he was adopted as his revenge for Steve eating the last cookie.

Roger also has a history of holding grudges as he tried to kill the Smith family for insulting him at his Comedy roast, by starting a gas leak causing an explosion, hiring a hitman to kill them, removing the brakes from Stan's vehicle, and writing death threats to Merlin Olsen for seven years after Father Murphy was canceled.

Roger is also shown to be a dangerous and scatterbrained sociopath committing theft, various drug offenses and many counts of murder throughout the series. He also killed five people plus a planeload of innocent victims for $20 and mentions killing six others for $19.

History
Roger's flamboyant speech pattern is a parody of Paul Lynde, although many thought it was akin to Family Guy's Cleveland Brown. He can speak Spanish (though not very well). On his home planet, he was a greeter at a Wal-Mart-analogue store called Philaxido. His favorite baseball team is the San Diego Padres. His favorite movie is Miller's Crossing.

Little is known about Roger's past; his planet is never seen or described in-depth, though according to him, it sounds fairly similar to Earth, although Roger claims the climate of his home world is 400 degrees colder than most ecosystems of Earth, with the possible exception of Antarctica. In "The Best Christmas Story Never", he says he landed on Earth 60 years ago at Roswell. In "Of Ice and Men" he mentions that snow reminds him of his home planet, and figure skating apparently exists there; he has also commented that the planet has stores like Wal-Mart (he was once a greeter at one of these places) and colleges. Likewise why he came to Earth is never explained: he does state that the reason he came was to collect a sample of hepatitis, although since arriving he seems to mostly be mooching, and seems in no hurry to go back home (in the pilot he was supposed to try to contact his home world, but got distracted by an "I Love The 80s" marathon). This led to the possibility that Roger is marooned on Earth and his homeworld does not know of his whereabouts. Though it was finally revealed in the episode "the Weiner of Our Discontent" that he believes he came to earth to be "The Decider", seeing of the planet was worth saving or to destroy it. This belief was crushed horribly when he discovered in his spaceship a note that stated that the ship was a test model and he was in it as a "crash test dummy", meaning his own species abandon him on the planet. It is also known that Roger "invented" disco and became a millionaire in the 1970s after he discovered a cassette tape from the future, thereby creating a time paradox, but he lost his fortune after disco died.

Four years prior to the series, he was incarcerated by the CIA in Area 51, when Stan Smith, then an intelligence officer, was on duty at the base. Tired of living in a laboratory, he escaped his holding cell, thus triggering a lockdown investigation. Stan tracked him down in a kitchen and was about to kill him before Roger pleaded for mercy, but the security team riddled the room with gunfire, from which Roger pulled Stan to safety. They slid down a laundry chute into a waiting truck just as a thrown grenade blew up where they previously had been standing. Grateful to Roger for saving his life, Stan offered to repay him in any way at all, obviously leading to his being added to the family. As a means of convincing the family to let him stay, Stan presented him as a birthday present to Steve for his tenth birthday. Hayley and Francine were horrified of him at first sight, as was Klaus, but Steve was delighted to have his own alien. By the start of the series, however, the family seems to have come to terms with him.

In earlier episodes, Roger was unable to leave the house because he was an alien but after putting on a disguises in later episodes, he is able to leave the house anytime he wants. Roger loves disguises, but some disguises change his personality, creating various personas that Roger is sometime unable to control until he takes off the disguise. Some of these personas are sometimes the reason Roger acts as a villain in some episodes, a notable persona being Ricky Spanish.

In one episode, it was shown that Roger's species need to be mean to others or it would slowly kill them...though it doesn't always excuse what he does.

Villainous Acts

 * In the episode Stannie Get Your Gun, Steve eats Roger's cookie, so he decides to take revenge on him by tricking him into believing Stan and Francine kidnapped him. He even goes so far as to take him to a family who actually lost their son. When Roger reveals the truth, the family is humiliated.
 * In the episode Tears of a Clooney, he adopts several foster kids and forces them do to hard labor without caring about them at all. Haley eventually came with Child Protection Services and took the kids away from him.
 * In the episode Four Little Words, he impersonates Kevin Bacon when out in public, and abuses Kevin Bacon's identity and acts like a complete jerk to everyone. He ruins the real Kevin Bacon's name without the slightest bit of remorse.
 * In the episode I Can't Stan You, Steve and Roger decide to team up and scam people out of their money by threatening to file law suits.
 * In the episode Widowmaker, Roger becomes a psychiatrist to help Stan open up more to Francine and Stan ends up telling Francine that he killed her friend's husband. But, when her friend learns of this she tries to run to the police but, Francine Knocks her unconscious. She then asks Roger to convince her to stay quiet but, he decides to convince her to kill herself.
 * In the episode Spring Break-Up, he knocks out a guest and was even excited when someone died.
 * In the episode The Phantom of the Telethon, he sabotages Stan's telethon just because he stole his idea. However, this villainous act can be justified since Stan didn't give Roger credit for coming up with the telethon idea.
 * In the episode Roy Rogers McFreely, he takes on this persona of the same name has himself elected president of the neighborhood society, introduces mass corruption and backroom deals to the council, and then abuses his position to institute proposals for no purpose other than angering Stan all to get back at Stan just for not picking up grenadine at the store for Roger's Roy Rogers drink.
 * In the episode Moon Over Isla Island, Stan tricks Roger into disguising himself as the dictator of a small island. When Roger learns that Stan was just using him he decides to stay on the island ends up turning into a tyrant.
 * In the episode Shallow Vows, one of his alter-egos Valik cuts Steve on the chest and even hunts Steve and Haley down to Argentina.
 * In the episode Cops and Roger, Roger asks Stan to train him so he can join the police and be a cop. After just a few hours on the force Roger becomes a crooked cop, like Chaz Migliaco and starts working for him, but Roger changes when he tries to save Stan and kills Chaz.
 * In the episode Bully For Steve, he decides to become a crime scene photographer and removes a stop sign to create a car crash so he can photograph it.
 * In the episode Great Space Roaster, Roger goes on a killing spree after being roasted by the Smith family and eventually traps them in space. Roger then forces the family to roast each other but it was then revealed Roger felt that way because he didn't consider himself part of the family.
 * In the episode Best Little Horror House in Langley Falls, Stan tries to make a better horror house than buckle, whose horror house is extremely realistic. So he brings in actual serial killers and puts them on display. Roger then releases the serial killers to make things more interesting.
 * In the episode Stan's Food Restaurant, Roger helps Stan fulfill his dream of opening a restaurant but, it is later revealed that he was only using Stan to create his own restaurant. When Stan learns this he creates another restaurant and Roger tries to sabotage his restaurant. In the end he burns down both restaurants in order to collect the insurance money.
 * In the episode School Lies, Roger is asked by Stan to pretend to be Steve in order to get close to this U.S. Senator's daughter. The two of them go to get drugs from a drug dealer but, when Roger doesn't have the money to pay them he sells them the girl and doesn't feel any remorse for it.
 * In the episode Hurricane!, Roger drowns an annoying and troublesome girl during a hurricane when she becomes overly romantically attached to him.
 * In the episode The Worst Stan, Roger attends a funeral for one of his ex-wives. It is later revealed that he never loved her and only married her so that when she died he could steal her beautiful red hair and make it into his new wig.
 * In the episode Virtual In-Sanity, Roger ran over and killed five innocent people just because they didn't pay him $20. It was also revealed he killed six other people just for $18. Many would say that Roger crossed the Moral Event Horizon because of this.
 * In the episode The Unbrave One, Roger helps Steve become more brave by turning him into a superhero. Roger then screws Steve over by lying about being the superhero and taking all the glory for himself.
 * In the episode Stan's Best Friend, Roger showed no sympathy for Steve's dog "Kisses" and was even excited to see the dog dying. When Stan showed everyone the "new" Kisses, Roger laughed and even liked the now monstrous-like Kisses.
 * In the episode Ricky Spanish, possibly his most evil alter-ego, Ricky Spanish, was seen for doing numerous of things. Nere the end of the episode, just as it appears he has redeemed himself, he frames Steve for a crime and even gets away from it while Steve goes to prison for it. It has been stated that even Roger hates Ricky Spanish.
 * In the episode Love AD Style, Roger falls in love with Hayley, kidnaps her and crosses the Moral Event Horizon by trying to flay her in order to wear her skin. At the end, Roger unsuccessfully attempted to become like Jeff so Hayley would love him, by flaying Jeff and wearing his skin and acting like him.
 * In the episode Why Can't We Be Friends?, Roger hires Jeff to clean his attic but, when he goes home he mugs him and he continues to do this many more times. Jeff also has no idea that Roger is mugging him. However, Roger does get his comeuppance when Jeff finally shoots him.
 * In the episode Bahama Mama he murders a lifeguard and stole his identity just so he could be like a lifeguard that he saw on TV.
 * In the episode Naked to the Limit, One More Time, Roger commits one of his most vile, repercussive acts of villainy when he throws Jeff into the tractor beam of an alien spaceship meant to take Roger back to his home planet, just so Roger wouldn't have to be the one to leave Earth. This is when the majority of American Dad! fans believe that Roger truly crossed the Moral Event Horizon, and this time, irredeemably so. His actions would lead to Jeff becoming a slave on alien ship and then lost in space from Lost in Space onwards, and then to Hayley wasting her entire life waiting for Jeff's return in an alternate timeline in The Longest Distance Relationship.
 * In the episode Lost in Space, it is revealed that Roger slept with Emperor Zing's (his alien species' ruler) human lover in the past, which is what drove Zing to become a slavedriving tyrant who enslaved and captured aliens aboard his ship and had their genitals removed. It is also speculated by some fans that this, possibly among other vile things that he did to others of his race, led to Roger's eventual exile to Earth under the guise of being "The Decider," but in reality, being a sacrificial crash test dummy for his people, as seen in Weiner of Discontent.
 * In the episode Permanent Record Wrecker, a hipster musician pisses off Roger so he challenges him to a contest. He decides to sell his soul to the Demon in exchange for a guitar that will make whoever plays it into an amazing guitarist. When he wins the contest he gives the hipster the guitar and tricks him into taking on the deal in his place.
 * In the episode News Glance With Genevieve Vavance, Roger takes on the the persona of a news reporter and when Steve disappears he takes advantage of it and turns it into a story. He then does whatever it takes to keep the story going. He even frames Hayley for kidnapping as well as getting Stan and Francine arrested.
 * In the episode A Boy Named Michael, Roger moves into Greg and Terry's home by impersonating their newly-adopted Russian son Michael, whom he threw out of a plane. He later attempts to murder Terry when he becomes unsatisfied with his new lifestyle.
 * In the episode Blagsnarst, a Love story, Roger meets another alien and has a one night stand with her. He then tries to get rid of her when she won't leave, so he turns her over to the CIA. But then he feels bad about it so he goes back to save her, he soon regrets this decision when she begins to annoy him again, so he jumps out of the car and lets the car go off a cliff.
 * In the episode My Affair Lady, Roger helps Hayley get a job at a company. When she falls for her new co-worker she starts flirting with him, but when she realizes he is married, she stops. Roger then tries to convince her to sleep with him. It is later revealed that everything, even getting Haley her new job was all apart of Roger's plan, because his wife is actually Roger and if he sleeps with another woman, Roger will receive a lot of money.
 * In the episode A Star is Reborn, Steve and Hayley delete Roger's episodes of Bones, so he decides to put them in dog cages and train them to love Bones.

Trivia

 * In All About Steve it is shown that Roger can sleep in a state of suicidal hanging.
 * The original idea for Roger was that he was like the T.V. character ALF, where he spent all day in the Smith residence and comments on the world, but the staff thought it would be funnier to have him wear disguises and have his own stories out in the real world.
 * He is an accomplished drummer in American Dream Factory, due to the fact that he has no bones in his arms.
 * Roger is also shown to be fireproof, although he still feels the pain of being burned.
 * He claims never to have eaten a vegetable in his life, but in Fartbreak Hotel, he not only eats okra, he knows what eating it will do to him - namely, cause him to fart toxic gas.
 * He was a member of the 1980 US Olympic hockey team.
 * When under the influence of cocaine in Dope & Faith, he becomes incredibly focused and displays Matrix-like fighting moves. And while under the influence of marijuana in "Joint Custody", he has been known to become as light as air. The former's effects are very brief.
 * He can survive in the vacuum of space.
 * Roger is capable of crapping out gold and jewel encrusted turds.
 * Roger's legs are powerful enough to push a tree out of the ground and clear across the yard.
 * While trying to fake his personas death, he is shown being able to move at superhuman speed.
 * When Roger faked his death, he was severely injured and his limbs were blown off. But a year later, he suggested to a bike store owner that his regenerative healing allowed him to recover and regrow his arms.
 * He is very similar to the Red Guy in personality, behavior, and mannerisms.