with my limited knowledge of Babylon 5 I always thought the hair thing was just a style a few characters enjoyed so I'm kind of :D to find out it's a species thing. I'm kind of picturing designers sitting in a room wondering how to this alien species will look until a person stands up and goes to a chalk board and says "what if we draw their hair like this" and the rest of the room breaks out in wild applause. Does their hair grow like that or is it a style? I'm way curious about this now.

First:  OMG WATCH THE THING, THE THING IS SO GOOD, WATCH THE THING FEEL MY PAIN FEEL MY JOY

Second: It’s so great to me? I want to try to tell like four stories at once and they are gumming up the works, but okay, like,

I love the idea that a species that presents with generally the same outward shape as humans (when clothed, anyway), decided on a different idea of what the ideal of that form is.  And they decided on bald ladies (with variation) and Fan Hair.   

The best thing, though, is that it is definitely a style.  You begin to see differing hair fan sizes throughout the show’s run and later, Londo makes explicit mention of it to the current Emperor, stating he’s surprised by how short the Emperor’s hair is, and that it’s not a usual look for someone of his status.   The Emperor is fucking bonkers, but he says he’s looking to start a trend, and then we pan around the room and it’s all these nobles with much smaller hair than we’re using to seeing on Centauri and suddenly Londo kind of sticks out a bit, it’s great.   So the hair size is related to your age and your status as well as your values, it’s kind of Fab. 

Meanwhile, the hair was a joke.  Peter Jurasik (the actor who played Londo) tells a story about getting into makeup the first time and the makeup people have this picture of how Londo should look with a much smaller crest of hair on his head to guide them.   In order to start the look, though, they make this massive fan out of long wig, with the anticipation that they’ll cut it down.   Annnd then it was hilarious, so they showed it to the show’s creator, who was like ,’Yeah, that’s great, go with that,’ and everyone involved was super dismayed. 

BUT NOW WE HAVE THIS FABULOUS HAIR THING.  

Honestly, one of the things I wish we’d seen at some point was Londo’s hair not aggressively styled.  Like, someone show me what this dude’s hair looks like first thing in the morning or after a shower.  Though, honestly, if I had to choose between seeing all the wet hair, or that we actually got to see tentacles, I think I weirdly prefer the tentacles, haha.  

BUT STILL, WHAT DO CENTAURI LOOK LIKE DOUSED WITH BUCKETS OF WATER. THESE ARE THE QUESTIONS WE MUST ASK OURSELVES.