His first appearance was in the episode of "Homer's Odyssey", although his voice could be heard in the series premiere "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire".

He is the consummate executive and personal assistant of Springfield Nuclear Power Plant's owner Mr. Burns, and is usually treated unfairly.

Smithers's loyalty and devotion to Mr. Burns was inspired from how numerous Fox executives and staff members acted towards Barry Diller.

Numerous allusions and double entendres about his homosexuality are made, though some of the show's producers instead interpret him as a "Burns-sexual".

[7] Smithers is shown to have a passionate and deep love for Mr. Burns, and his sexual orientation has been characterized by the writers of the show as "Burns-sexual".

[13] Smithers does appear to be one of the few people at the power plant who is seemingly competent at their job as opposed to the lazy, oafish underlings such as Homer Simpson and the senile Mr. Burns, who is often out of touch with the modern times.

While some of his early appearances showed him to have a malicious side (he tried to get Homer fired over his insurance claim for a hair-growing product, and the only reason this failed is that Mr. Burns had sympathy for Homer due to his own incurable baldness and gave him his old job back), his overall characterization is fairly benevolent and he ultimately just wants the SNPP to run well.

[15] In "Werking Mom", Smithers makes a silent cameo as a drag queen named 'The Mysterious Waylon'.

[16] Mr. Smithers was partly based on how numerous Fox executives and staff members acted towards Barry Diller.

"[19][2] The script for "Blood Feud" originally featured Smithers saying "Just leave me enough to get home to my wife and kids", but the line had to be cut for time.

[21] The name Waylon, coined by Mike Reiss, was first used in "I Married Marge" and comes from the puppeteer Wayland Flowers.

There have often been strong hints about Smithers's true feelings for his boss, with one of the earliest references being in the season one episode "The Telltale Head".

[18] Smithers's sexual orientation has often come into question, with some fans claiming he is a "Burns-sexual" and only attracted to his boss, while others maintain that he is gay.

[33] Mostly in the early seasons, Smithers had a catchphrase, which comes from a recurring joke that Mr. Burns never remembers who Homer Simpson is.

", to which Smithers would reply, "That's Homer Simpson, sir, one of your [drones, organ banks, carbon blobs, etc.]

[36] A writer for British progressive magazine the New Statesman felt that the episode was a retcon, making a serious story about the character's homosexuality instead of the previous jokes and innuendo that were now considered homophobic.

[43] Despite Matt Groening joking that it would be Homer, the Boston Herald calculated the odds of several characters being gay, with Smithers at a million to one.

[44] PlanetOut Inc. hosted an online poll in the weeks prior to the episode to determine based on "cartoon gaydar" who was gay on the Simpsons, with 97% of the respondents choosing Smithers.

[48] Star News Online named "Smithers' fey way" as one of the 400 reasons why they loved The Simpsons.

[50] Smithers was made into an action figure, and four different versions were included as part of the World of Springfield toy line.