Keeps getting misused for just having a large upper body.: Top Heavy Guy

I keep having to correct misuse in wicks and examples, particularly for characters in the DCAU, or Carrot of Discworld. The main issue is that this trope is a large upper body and tiny legs. And if the legs are long, they are not tiny.

Now me choosing this name on ykttw likely is a big problem, as it only implies half the trope. So this needs a rename.

"Top Heavy Guy" seems like an almost perfect name to me. "Top-heavy" in common usage means difficult to balance because most of the weight of the object is in its upper half. It could be taken to mean merely that the top is heavy, even in objects that have an equally heavy bottom, but that is unusual usage and isn't represented in the dictionary I'm looking at.

I would hate to see this trope get an awkward name just to eliminate ambiguity that only barely exists. Anyone who looks up "top-heavy" in the dictionary would not consider this trope name ambiguous. Few tropes are as clearly represented by their names as this one. The only people who mistake the meaning of this trope's name are the ones who both haven't heard of the term "top-heavy" and then choose to guess at what it means rather than looking it up.

Well it seems enough might not understand the term.

I'd prefer to broaden this to include the stick thin legs. As a rule of thumb, if the arms are two or more times as thick as the legs (and this isn't commented on) that seems like this visual style to me.

The point here is a comical image, not just an ultra muscular torso. They are two separate tropes.

Why not bump the comedic version to Exagerated or Comical Top Heavy Guy.

It still doesn't state about the legs though. Something like Huge Torso Puny Legs might.

Perhaps simply having an overmuscled torso is a trope, but it should have a separate name as well, at it doesn't require the legs being puny, and thus the term "top heavy" doesn't apply.

I think the biggest problem here is that you have a very narrow definition of puny. Yes, a lot of these guys have short squat legs, but it's equally popular for them to have long thin legs that seem to lack enough muscle to hold the rest of them up.

They're still puny legs, and they still look like they're going to fall over in a stiff wind. The torso is the same shape, and the legs still look like they couldn't hold the rest of the character up. I don't really see the difference between the two.

The guys in the DCAU keep getting listed, and their legs are not puny. Official art of Carrot shows his legs are not puny. Tom Strong's legs are a bit skinny, but not puny.

Those are outright misuse, even with that suggested definition.

Plus the trope is about a specific body shape, which actually does require tiny legs.

Actually, the DCU guys are very much Depending on the Artist. As for puny and tiny, there are multiple ways that can be done. Long legs that look more like they belong on a stick figure are puny and tiny compared to the rest of the character. That's the sort of legs that DCU guys get under some artists.

This◊ character for instance has legs completely out of proportion to his body. They're long, but they look tiny and puny. Here's another.◊

edited 24th Jan '12 9:13:05 AM by shimaspawn

Well those are relatively puny, so those still count. Perhaps there should be a requirement for the torso to be taller than the legs. Torso Taller Than The Legs could work.

Also, any images of the DCAU guys looking like this?

Top Heavy Torso?

edited 24th Jan '12 9:41:43 AM by Stratadrake

Hmm yeah there does seem to be a lot of misuse...

The Precure example for one seems misuse this guy◊[1]◊[2]◊[3]◊ and this guy◊ are not quite this trope are they?

edited 24th Jan '12 9:49:06 AM by Raso

Same problem. It makes it seem like a big torso is all that is needed for this trope.

Not that we can't have a trope for large torsos, but this is taking it into clearly artistic physics territory.

The last guy might. I'd need to see a picture of him without baggy clothes though.

I don't think it's so much that the legs have to be shorter so much as Legs Cant Support Torso.

The thing is that, there are other ways that legs cannot support a torso. Again, this is more a body shape trope (which is what was intended from when I made the ykttw; I just admittedly worded it poorly), which actually requires a certain leg-torso ratio.

Also, that name implies being unable to stand. I don't think trope names are good when they are named for the Fridge Logic of the trope, not the actual key aspects.

Huge Torso Tiny Legs works for me.

Huge Torso Tiny Legs is exactly the sort of awkward name that we should avoid. If the name must be changed, it should at least be changed to something that is a noun phrase that could be put in a sentence in place of "top heavy guy" and still make sense.

I think the best choice would be to use a metaphor, some object or creature that has the correct shape, something that everyone knows that is big on the top and small on the bottom, and then name this trope after that. Unfortunately I don't have any good ideas, but a dreidel is something in the right direction. So for example, one might call the trope Dreidel Guy, if a dreidel had a better shape and was better known.

If we can't use a metaphor because no good ideas are available, and we can't use Top-Heavy Guy, then the next best thing that I can think of would be to ignore the top half entirely and name the trope after the tiny legs. Tiny Legs Guy isn't a terrible name for the trope because it's the small legs that are the most striking feature.

I'm not sure why we need a specific leg-torso ratio. I don't see why we can't keep our gorilla men art on one page. Mr Incredible of The Incredibles comes to mind.

....it's the huge hulking torso that's the most striking feature. I mean, I'm sympathetic to the fact that Huge Torso Tiny Legs isn't a great name, but we can't sacrifice clarity for style. A name that is accurate and indicative but sounds bad is a better name than a misleading or vague name that sounds good.

edited 24th Jan '12 7:33:54 PM by NativeJovian

Okay, I don't think I meant super specific, but a general range, or minimum range.

Well, there's two basic criteria that make me think of this: legs of equal or lesser length of the torso, and arms that are thicker than legs.

Of course everyone agrees that we don't want a name that is misleading. That should be avoided at all costs. A vague name would also be bad, though being slightly vague might be a worthy cost to having a good name if necessary.

Even so, let's not get mislead into thinking that "top heavy guy" is either vague or misleading. It is a perfectly clear and straight-forward name that accurately represents this trope. The only vague or misleading names that we have to worry about are suggested new names for the trope.

edited 24th Jan '12 7:45:19 PM by Lilwik

Those are really good.

See, this image
doesn't make me think of Top-Heavy Guy. All the male characters have biceps roughly the size of their thighs, which is edging into this, but it's nothing like Batman here
where Batmans biceps are about fifty percent thicker than his legs.

edited 24th Jan '12 9:11:40 PM by Deboss