| abstract | - A common trope in Science Fiction, the Heavyworlder is someone who is adapted to life in a high-gravity environment - either a human being who has been altered to survive through Genetic Engineering or Hollywood Evolution, or an alien who evolved on such a world in the first place. One factor common to nearly all Heavyworlders is prodigious physical strength (even though logically, physical stamina would be more important when carrying around twice your weight every day). Another common element (one could even call it a fallacy) is that many Heavyworlders are described as being far larger and more massive that normal humans, despite this adding even more weight for them to carry around -- in fact, basic mechanical considerations and Square-Cube Law shows that it's much more advantageous for heavyworlder to have a compact, stout, but short body, not unlike common portrayal of Dwarves in fantasy. Usually they have personalities to match (imagine an entire race as The Big Guy). A few exceptions are noted below. In fights, a Heavyworlder is usually a One-Man Army. "Lightworlders" -- skinny, delicate humans from low-gravity habitats, or orbital colonies without artificial gravity -- aren't nearly as common as straight treatments, as it's harder to portray your Big Damn Heroes as Badass if they're built like toothpicks. Low-gravity characters are often female, fragility being more forgivable in women to most writers. Truth in Television here - astronauts on extended missions have been known to undergo growth spurts, long bones lengthening and the resultant bone is very, very brittle. Ordinary humans who visit low-gravity planets, and seem much stronger there than on Earth, are a Humanity Is Superior variant. While this variant is common in vintage scifi, the natives of such worlds are seldom portrayed as skinny, fragile inversions of this trope. That's probably because it makes for poor Fan Service if the Distressed Damsel rescued by the "incredibly strong" human hero makes Olive Oyl look like Pamela Anderson. In reality, it is unlikely that any of these tropes would work; species generally survive best in the environment they're adapted to, and, as noted above, real-life astronauts who spend significant time in low-gravity situations rapidly suffer health problems, especially muscular and bone degeneration.
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