Centurii-chan is a series of Webcomics which portrays various historical figures as cute anime girls. While the comics focus heavily on the Ancient Rome (thus the title), it also portrays other parts of history from Ancient Egypt to The Middle Ages and Victorian Britain or beyond.
Can be read on Facebook here
and Twitter (with occasional extra comics here. Comic dubs are hosted by Solus Astorias.
Tropes include:
- Anachronism Stew: Mostly due to Rule of Funny. Among others, the cast had reacted on Caesar's death scene◊ on HBO Rome and took a selfie in Germanian forest◊.
- Author Appeal: Ancient Rome, Yuri Genre, and Historical European Martial Arts, in no particular order.
- Black Comedy: Praetorian performs this very frequently due to clearly demonstrating a casual disregard for others. There probably wasn't anywhere else for her to go due to the Praetorian Guard's infamy for slaying their own charges.
- Cast Full of Gay: As the Twitter account says:all my characters are very gay
- Cat Girl: Some of the Egyptian characters turn up with feline ears.
- Character’s Most Hated Song: Centurii hates the Mariah Carey song "All I Want for Christmas is You" with a passion. This strip has Centurii about to shoot either herself or Mariah. The second strip has Centurii enjoying a sunny day out on the porch when the song plays on the radio… in September.
- Combat Medic: This strip has a Hospitaller in the middle of performing surgery until a Templar barges in and states that the Pope has declared a crusade. The Hospitaller looks like she's going to protest, but is just as ready to join in.Hospitaller: I am a doctor you know. (is now holding a sword and shield) But...
- Combat Sadomasochist: Praetorian Guard so, so much, to the point that it crosses over to Interplay of Sex and Violence where she gets turned on while being choked by Legate and has occasionally stabbed Legate while in the middle of...passion.
- Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: The Praetorian Guard, who regularly betray and kill the Emperor for various and often banal reasons.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: Males used to appear in some of the earlier comics before vanishing completely since the artist found them hard to draw.
- Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": If Centurii isn't portraying an actual individual or character from somewhere else, then the character's name will probably be a profession (or in the case of a variety of swordswomen, named after the sword she uses).
- Exactly What I Aimed At: One strip has a British World War II veteran bragging to a German that "your bombers missed! Our people are safe!" "But I wasn't aiming at them", the German casually replies, whereupon the Brit turns round to find that their chef's academy and culinary archives were destroyed instead.British cuisine was never the same afterwards.
- Full-Frontal Assault: The Celts' specialty◊
- Gyaru Girl: Centurii portrays the Landsknecht as a ditzy Gyaru Valley Girl thanks to their loud and flashy attires.
- Historical Gender Flip: Needless to say, female soldiers, generals, and politicians are rarities in the ancient world compared to their ubiquitousness in the Centurii-verse.
- Left Stuck After Attack: This strip artfully demonstrates how Vikings would invoke and exploit the trope by making their shields soft enough to be penetrated by swords; with a simple twist, they could then throw the enemy off-guard, leaving them helpless.
- Lethal Chef: In this strip, OSHA-chan is reading instructions on how to cook an egg. Step 1 is to heat the pan with any kind of oil. Instead of using food grade oil, she uses crude oil.
- The Masochism Tango: In this comic, Praetorian and Legate are asked "What's the best thing about your relationship?"Praetorian: That we aren't equals. Equals means she has a say, and I can't have her saying anything besides "I love you."
Legate: She fucks like a total psychopath. It's genuinely the hottest thing I've ever seen. - National Stereotypes: Owing to StarCraft being a national sport in South Korea, Admiral Yi is represented as a pro RTS player with micromanaging skill to repel an entire Japanese fleet with 13 ships, much to Hideyoshi's bewilderment.
- No Name Given: While specific historical figures are called by name, others meant to represent groups are referred to by their profession or role (e.g. Legate and Praetorian).
- Running Gag: If Carthage makes an appearance, expect a reference to their infamous salting.
- Shout-Out:
- Emperor Nero is always consistently portrayed as his Red Saber incarnation.
- The portrayal of Victorian Britain takes a lot of cues from Yharnam, what with monsters roaming the world at night.
- Sitcom Archnemesis: The rivalries between Romans and their historical enemies such as Carthage, Gauls, or Germans are usually portrayed humorously.
- Straight Man and Wise Guy: The Engineer and Architect, generally. Architect is usually doing something strange or designing something insane for creativity's sake while Engineer naturally realizes how that's not going to work by contrast. Engineer, however, is not immune to silliness or disregarding safety, though she remains as having been portrayed as sensible unlike Architect.
- That One Sidequest: In this strip, the Dragonborn in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is loading up game mods, unaware that her partner Cent has started "No Stone Unturned" for the Thieves Guild until the text pops up.
- Wide Eyes and Shrunken Irises: This strip has Centurii reacting in horror that "All I Want for Christmas" is being played in September.
- World of Action Girls: Since every historical soldier, general, and king is portrayed as a girl, this is a given.
- You Are Already Dead: In this strip, after a monk watches a samurai kill someone in a Single-Stroke Battle, she attempts the same thing with her fists on a mannequin dressed like a chef. She wonders why nothing happened before it explodes.
