#centauri republic

[alphamecha-mkii]

Centauri Primus Battlecruiser by Corvin Lee Hiller

[orionlodubyal]

I forgot I never shared my Londo Mollari commission! It was so hard to capture that scowl! Final artwork on Redbubble and Teepublic.

[silveragelovechild]

Evidence that the Centauri Republic visited Earth in the 19th Century.

[jbk405]

I think Londo and G’Kar rescuing Na’Toth from a Centauri dungeon in “A Tragedy of Telepaths” is a microcosm for the entire Centauri problem.

We see the inertia of the Centauri Republic, that a person has literally been left imprisoned for years simply out of bureaucratic obstinacy.  She wasn’t ordered put to death, she wasn’t even specifically sentenced to life imprisonment, she was just locked away and then forgotten.  Nearly forgotten to death.  Because the man who ordered her imprisoned didn’t think about her afterwards, and everybody who did think about her afterwards -- only the guards on her cell -- didn’t think to question why they were there or what the point was.  They just kept following their assigned roles because that’s what Centauri do.

Just like Londo himself at the start of the series.  Going through the motions and acting out his role as “proper” Centauri.  Scheming and politicking and starting war for glory and arrogance because it is expected of him and because once he sets the first of it in motion, others continue it beyond even what he expected or wanted.

And when Londo discovers Na’Toth in her cell, despite being Prime Minister and the second most powerful person in the republic, he is still powerless to save her.  Because the word of a mad emperor, dead now for more than a year at the hands of his own subjects, is still more powerful than his.  It doesn’t matter that Cartagia is dead, or that if he was alive he wouldn’t care because he would have long since forgotten about her, all that matters is that he gave an order and that order will be followed.  No matter the consequences.

Just like the Centauri Republic as a whole.  Londo has long since stopped trying to restore the republic to glory, he has learned that it is not what he wants and it is not good for his people, but despite his star being in ascendance for years, despite being the Prime Minister now and despite being the next Emperor, he can’t stop it.  The inertia of the politicking and backstabbing royal court who all have their own motives, and the outside conspiracies, mean that even though he is soon to become the most powerful man in the republic he still can’t stop it.

So, since Londo can’t countermand the order keeping Na’Toth in chains, he cheats.  He sneaks her out with the help of G’Kar because it is one tiny good deed that he can do, because he knows that G’Kar will take revenge if he doesn’t.  And after he does it, he revels in it, that this is at last something he can be happy he did with no regrets.

Just like his larger work with G’Kar.  They assassinated Cartagia together, they conspired to free Narn from Centauri occupation, and now they’re trying to build a real peace between their peoples.  And Londo doesn’t do all of out of the goodness of his heart, some he does only because G’kar extorts it out of him when he needs G’kar’s help, but at the end of it he sees that they were good (or at least necessary) actions.

Saving this one imprisoned woman is how he endeavors to save his entire people.

[spockvarietyhour]

In thirty years he will decide that his plan to bring the Republic back to its former glory requires the elimination of the one power that could stop him.

[spockvarietyhour]

... and you, Londo Mollari, will be the architect of our victory.

[willyzonka]

National anthem of the Centauri Republic

and if you don’t want to hear Peter Jurasik singing this then you’re a fragging liar.

[steal-this-idea]

Just woke up to see that Donald Trump has taken the U.S. Presidency and the Republicans control, however narrowly, both the House and the Senate (and perhaps soon also, the Supreme Court).

My immediate thoughts were that white people seem very much to me like the Centauri Republic. The Centauri are presented to us as a fading empire throughout the run of Babylon 5 whose glory days are long since behind them and while presented, at first at least, as a kind of joke, we forget that while their empire and influence is most definitely shrinking, they still have a lot of their weapons and infrastructure in place making them quite dangerous despite the changing times as we would go on to see.

I suppose last night was a reminder to all those who were starting to believe that the time of heterosexual white male Protestant power has come and gone and that it was their turn now, that they had forgotten that their infrastructure and tools for domination are still very much in place. White people may be a fading power, but they still have teeth and claws and cunning and a will to use them...