Babylon 5: Cultures: Centauri

The Centauri are, in almost every sense, ‘cool dudes’. In battle they could been seen as ruthless and yet socially they really know how to party (especially with the opposite sex).

Londo is cunning and ruthless and yet, you just can’t help but like the bloke.

Centauri humour: Q. What do you call a swimming pool full of Narns?
A. Vegetable soup.

They are thought of as decadent, pompous and aloof by the other races. Like us Brits, it seems they dream of an empire long gone. Although, to be honest, there are some races who are good at conquering and some that are good at being conquered. The fact is, the Centauri still have one of the largest empires and they are fairly intent on keeping hold of it. Not afraid to use the odd banned weapon to show people whose boss, their alliance with the Shadows is more than a little scary.

Picture of 'Cool Geezer' Londo Mollari
Londo MollariAmbassador to Babylon 5

They like to ‘get in touch with their inner self’ by occasionally drinking themselves into a stupor. Their humour can be said to be dark, especially when talking about races they have just conquered, the Narns for example…

Picture of Catagia
Catagia {cart-arsha}Ex-emperor of Centauri PrimeThis psychotic git was killed by Vir.

They have ‘had it in for the Narns’ for a long time, conquering them twice and treating them very badly indeed.  If this wasn’t fiction you would hate them for it, but I must confess to being mildly amused and somewhat skeptical of the ineptitude of the Narns who were just begging for it!

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Aside from the wacky haircuts and bald women they look very similar to us humans. They enjoy more than the odd beer or wine or something, their fashion sense is a little extrovert but hey, we all have our little eccentricities. Oh yes, I almost forgot, they also have a very peculiar way of bonking.

You may think to look at a Centauri, that he is just a normal geezer who used too much hair mouse. But by human standards, these guys are into sex – big time. When we talk of sexual organs we usually think in terms of the ‘singular’. The Centauri male has SIX. Nope, he doesn’t have one and five spares, he can use all six – at once (no wonder Centauri women are bald). They are called ‘tentesticles’. I’m afraid, having not seen one (or six) myself; I can’t describe them to you. The name though, suggests that each one is a tentacle shaped testicle (or should that be a testicle shaped tentacle). Apparently, they can be manipulated individually.

What do you think girls? How would  you like to make out with an epileptic human spider?

Centauri humour:

Q. How many centauri does it take to screw in a lightbulb
A.  Just one, but in the days of the old republic there were thousands of servants changing thousands of lightbulbs at the single inclination of the emperor.  

Submitted by Dalek311
(told by Londo in one of the episodes)

In one of the episodes, Londo cheats at cards when one of his ‘latissibles‘ picks up a card – apparently it looks like a squid-pad. (I wish mine could do that! – hell, I wish it was long enough).

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The Centauri women aren’t much better, they have six ‘places’ to put them. The more ‘tentesticles’ used when lovemaking, the more satisfying the encounter, although fertilization can happen even if only one is used. Good grief! You can just imagine the woman, sat on the bed, arms crossed waiting impatiently for her partner to place six plastic jackets on six excited ‘tentesticles’.

Social tip: If you’re drinking in a pub with a Centauri geezer and pointy bits start sticking out in all directions, ask your girlfriend to put her coat back on.

The Centauri also have two hearts. Yeah, I’m sure you’re surprised – if you’d got six ‘tentesticles’ you would probably need at least two hearts.

Social tip: If you take out a Centauri girl, don’t be upset if five other geezers accompany her.

I suddenly feel very inadequate. There is a lot of other interesting stuff about Centauri history but, to be honest, I can’t get past the sex bit.

Race Rating – Centauri
Personality 1 (rancid butter) – 5 (cool dude) 4
Attractiveness 1 (requires paper bag) – 5 (Drop-dead-gorgeous) 4
Humour 1 (stomach-turning) – 5 (sidesplitting) 4
Dress Sense 1 (laughable) – 5 (hip) 3
Aggression 1 (big/little softy) – 5 (hard as nails) 5
Social Standing 1 (scumbag) – 5 (god) 3

Sad Geezer Race Rating   (out of 30)  =  23                         

This Culture review is © 1999 – 2019 Tony Fawl.
Not for reproduction without the authors express permission

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The BABYLON 5 names, characters and everything else associated with the series are the property of J. Michael Straczynski, TNT and Warner Brothers, a division of Time Warner Entertainment Company. All rights reserved.

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