Apu is a stereotype. Now granted, he's on a show filled with stereotypes, and he's not always portrayed negatively, but he is still a stereotype. (In all honest

Apu is a stereotype. Now granted, he's on a show filled with stereotypes, and he's not always portrayed negatively, but he is still a stereotype. (In all honesty, sitcoms are all filled with stereotypes.) Smithers in the archetypical yes-man. Dr. Hibbert isn't so much a stereotype as much as a parody of Dr Huxtable.