Gravity Master

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

"Gravity's one mean mother, huh?"

Jacob Taylor, Mass Effect 2

The ability to control gravity as a superpower (or Applied Phlebotinum that serves the same purpose).

Such a power is often coupled with a large amount of leeway as to how gravity works, such as making gravity a force with an exact cut-off range, only working on a specific object, or the third law of motion being violated with only one object being attracted to another. This power is essentially Telekinesis with different flavor text.

Of note is that control of gravity is sometimes (especially in Japanese media) associated with control over darkness, letting the user create Black Holes. Expect plenty of Art Major Physics along the way.

Examples of Gravity Master include:

Anime and Manga

  • In Guyver, at least one Zoalord, Richard Guyot, has the power to manipulate gravity. His most basic attack, Gravity Bullets, fires tiny orbs of super-gravity clean through a target, while his ultimate move, Gravity Crusher, creates a black hole—when he first uses it, even the other Zoalords call him insane, warning that he could potentially consume the Earth and everything on it with that attack.
    • The Guyver units themselves have gravity control via the Gravity Medal at the waist. The basic version allows flight and powers the Pressure Cannon attack but the Gigantic Exceed version can also use a black hole, with considerably more control than Guyot demonstrated.
  • Maro, The Brute in Black Cat, can both control the gravity around him and project super-dense gravity bombs.
  • In Bleach, this is the ability of Izuru Kira's zanpakutou Wabisuke. Specifically, it doubles the weight of anything it hits, including the weight increase from the previous hit. If he hits something several times with it, its weight increases exponentially and becomes nigh-immovable. He usually hits the opponent's body.
  • In Busou Renkin, Victor's axe Fatal Attractions grants him this power.
  • Darker than Black has three examples: First there's a guy who can make himself or any other person weightless in the first episode, but needs to break his finger every time he uses it; another guy can increase the pull of gravity within a certain area, and a third guy with a power similar to the first, briefly seen in the last episode of the first season.
    • Four examples: The OVA features an unnamed female Gravity Master who can make things/people become heavier and/or fall up.
  • Brago from Gash Bell, a primary case of gravity being associated with darkness.
  • Albireo Imma from Mahou Sensei Negima.
  • The Deva Path of Pain in Naruto is able to manipulate gravity to use different techniques to push objects away from him (Shinra Tensei) and pull them toward him (Bansho Ten'nin). Nagato, the body's controller, can also do these as well as launch a black sphere that sucks in everything around it (Chibaku Tensei). There is a period of time between each use, the length of which is dependent upon how much power is put into the technique.
    • Onoki, the Tsuchikage, can greatly increase or decrease the weight of an object, though it seems he's changing it's mass instead of just its weight.
  • Seto from NEEDLESS.
  • The Dark-Dark Fruit (Yami Yami no Mi) in One Piece, which is eaten by Blackbeard, can make a dark miasma which crush whatever it covers or suck anything into it (which Blackbeard can also regurgitate back out).
    • A smaller example is Miss Valentine of Baroque Works. Her Kilo-Kilo Fruit (Kilo Kilo no Mi) allows her to make her own weight anywhere between 1 to 10,000 kilograms, letting her float around with her parasol or crush someone like an egg.
  • Asuka from Psyren.
  • Chinmei, one of the Five Stars and the 2nd Red Cross Knight of Samurai Deeper Kyo has this power, as well as the bad guy in psycho academy.
  • Kozato Enma of Katekyo Hitman Reborn seems to have powers based around gravity, but the full extent of these powers is not yet revealed.
  • Isaac, Alyssa's Child from the My-HiME Manga, can manipulate gravity.
  • Joker from Flame of Recca has a madogu which grants this ability - though he initially pretends to simply possess incredible strength.
  • Chelsea Rorec from Tokyo Underground is apparently the only gravity Elemental User. (Fire was not cool enough, ya know)
  • Biagio Busoni from A Certain Magical Index, who increases his opponent's personal gravity until they can barely move.
  • Bluenote from Fairy Tail.
  • Some of the top-end combat boomers from Bubblegum Crisis are equipped with gravity guns. They can't manipulate gravity outright, but they can use it as a blunt instrument to pound their target into paste.

Comic Books

Fan Works

Literature

  • Szeth son-son Vallano from The Stormlight Archive. Can stick two objects together, cause objects and people to 'fall' in any direction, and can cause objects to attract other objects. Also by the end of the first book Kaladin is developing these powers.
  • The K'Chain Che'Malle in The Malazan Book of the Fallen have this as their primary Warren.
  • Dekka from the Gone (novel) series.
  • In The Dresden Files, gravity control is a subset of Earth Magic. It takes awhile to pull, but the results are... impressive.
  • Both Sullivan and his brother Madi have this power in Hard Magic. Sullivan had enough time to practice with it in prison that he's able to do things that other Heavies never even dreamed of.

Live-Action TV

Tabletop Games

Video Games

  • Armed and Dangerous had an awesome gravity-controlling weapon that first anchors the player to the ground, and then somehow flips reality upside-down, causing any nearby enemies to fall into the sky then back to the ground when it turns off.
    • Evie in Vindictus can acquire the power "SP: Gravity Inversion", which does the same thing.
  • Black-aligned elements in Chrono Cross invoke precisely the non-distinction between gravity and darkness described in the page intro.
  • Gravity Control is one of the powers in the MMO City of Heroes, available to the Controller and Dominator archetypes.
  • In an example of this trope crossing over with Dark Is Edgy, the main character in The Darkness can do this as part of his suite of darkness-themed superpowers, generating a miniature black hole that sucks everything in the vicinity into it.
  • The Final Fantasy has the spell Gravity/Gravira/Graviga (occasionally known as Demi), which reduces the enemy to some fraction of their current HP (Except bosses, of course). It is usually depicted as a big black ball, possibly representing a black hole.
  • Final Fantasy X has Sin, whose primary 'hat' is gravity. It is able to levitate its massive body pretty much anywhere, and it is a frequent user of the aforementioned Gravija. Sin is so powerful it can tear apart whole cities just with the gravitational force it generates, sucking everything in like a black whole. It is also capable of projecting gravitational fields that can withstand insanely powerful energy blasts, and even projects those fields outwards to vaporize enemies and scar the entire planet.
  • Gravity Man from Mega Man 5.
    • Galaxy Man's Black Hole Bomb from Mega Man 9 works in this way, even though the robot master himself does not have a particular affinity for gravity.
  • Gravity Antonion from Mega Man X 8 is also a master of this trope, even turning the screen upside-down for some reason.
    • Gravity Beetle in X3.
  • Five words: Zero Point Energy Field Manipulator (alias "Gravity Gun").
    • Slightly justified in its potential failing of physics in that the 'Gravity Gun' is just a nickname. Whatever mechanism it actually uses for throwing stuff around is not explained.
  • Halo has the Gravity Hammer.
  • Kingdom Hearts has Gravity spells in the first game and Chain of Memories, and Zero Gravity spells in Birth by Sleep.
    • Also, Organization XIII member Xigbar is a dual-arrowgun-wielding Nobody with dominion over space. He teleports, walks in the air, and can distort dimensions.
  • All biotic powers (with the exception of Reave and Dominate, that are specific to asari biology but available to the player as a bonus) in Mass Effect are achieved by mass manipulation, and thus could be called a form of gravity control. A low-mass field will lift an object or move it in any direction. A high-mass field will slam it into the ground or crush it. Biotic characters can even use the Singularity power to generate miniature black holes that will attract all loose objects and weakened enemies (though strangely not stronger enemies or fellow party members). Also, the Normandy uses a similar effect to achieve thrust while still remaining stealthy. The Tantalus Drive Core generates a high-gravity field in front of the ship that the Normandy "falls into", and momentum carries it from there.
    • In fact, mass manipulation (or "mass effect") is how everything in the series works, via a strange material called "element zero" or "eezo". How it works is simple: positive charges to it increase its mass, and negative charges decrease mass. The possibilities explode from there. For example, FTL travel is achieved by making the net mass of a ship negative, thereby making relativity look the other way. BioWare really did their homework.
  • The boss Nightmare in Metroid Fusion can control gravity, making it take longer for you to reach your full jumping height—and making your missiles fall to the ground. Only your Pure Energy beams can work in the high-gravity, never mind that gravity affects all particles the same regardless of mass, and since your beams go at about the same speed as the missiles they should have the same arc.
    • Like he's any better in Other M. The first phase, it uses a gravity field to weigh down Samus while peppering her with energy spheres and lasers until she can short out its generator with the Ice Beam. The second phase? It uses its gravity powers more defensively, including shooting a black hole from that generator that causes ALL of Samus' projectiles to warp off their path and into it.
      • But oddly enough, not Samus herself
        • To be fair though, she was useing her Gravity Feature, which means Nightmare's powers can't affect her.
  • The Pokémon move Gravity allows several Mons to do this. Using it removes the immunity to Ground attacks Flying types and Pokémon with Levitate have, prevents use of attacks which involve jumping or flying, and reduces everyone's evasion by 2/5, all of which lasts for five turns.
  • In Super Robot Wars, Shu Shirakawa's Granzon is able to manipulate gravity to a physics-breaking extent. In event scenes, it uses this ability to throw its enemies around like ragdolls. In actual combat, it gets more creative, using attacks that create wormholes and fire miniature black holes at the enemy. A few other mecha have lesser gravity-based powers, such as warp field barriers and weapons that fire beams of gravity at the enemy.
    • The latter could be justified if the beam's effect is to create a rapidly-shifting gravity field which causes objects inside to vibrate rapidly and hence disintegrate - sort of like a sonic weapon that works IN SPACE! - or, more mundanely, if it simply fires a beam of gravitons.
  • In VVVVVV, it's the only ability you have. You either flip up to the ceiling, or flip to the floor.
  • The BioShock (series) 2 DLC patch Minerva's Den introduced the Gravity Well plasmid, which allows you to throw a ball that exerts a massive gravitational pull which can suck in all the enemies and objects around it for a short period, immobilising them.
  • The Dark element in Phantasy Star Universe takes the form of damaging gravity fields.
  • Amorphous has the Void Eater. It's a Blob Monster with extremely high, compressed density, allowing it to manipulate gravity- and how! It can:
    • Utilize a gravitational field to draw the player towards it.
    • Compress and decompress itself to send out a deadly shockwave.
    • "Collect and compress local particles and then project this incredibly dense material in a type of 'Density Stream' which would draw in and obliterate any nearby matter". In other words, a Disintegrator Ray that sucks the player towards it.
  • A mage player character in Dragon Age II can take the Force Mage specialization, which is... well, it's this trope. The player character's mage sister Bethany will become one if she makes it to Act III of the game.
  • The M-308 Gunner mecha from the NES Irem game Metal Storm has the ability to flip gravity.
  • The newest character, Ley, in Grand Chase mixes this trope up with Summon Magic.
  • Quantum-Genesis heroes in Darkspore are either this or Time Master.
  • In Age of Mythology Atlas' divine power is the Implosion: a sphere that use gravity to suck all the enemy units in its radius (it even bends nearby buildings) and then explodes, spitting back the surviving enemies.
  • Sigma from Overwatch has a powerset built entirely around gravity manipulation: he levitates while moving around, hurls piles of rocks with his powers, and his Ultimate has him lift anyone caught in its radius high into the sky before slamming them against the ground for heavy damage.

Web Comics

  • One of the characters in the webcomic Knowledge Is Power has gravity manipulation as an ability.
  • In Schlock Mercenary, gravitic technology is used for both protection and offense ("gravy-guns"), as well as sundry other uses such as Artificial Gravity and ship propulsion. The UNS Tunguska - between its ridiculously overengineered power supply and its AI Gus - has extremely precise control, lifting the Toughs into the air as a show of force, transmitting a message by using gravity to rattle the ship's hull, and even gravitically controlling Tagon to shoot Jak in the head. All of this is notable in that it probably is NOT Art Major Physics.
  • The aptly-named supervillain Greta Gravity in Spinnerette possesses gravity-altering powers. She has demonstrated her powers in the comic mostly by levitating objects, but has also used it to make the eponymous heroine heavy enough to crack the sidewalk just by standing on it.
  • Wayward Sons: Hermaz can decrease gravity's effectiveness on himself and others, and somehow use it for midair propulsion. He once increased it instead, grounding and immobilizing a winged enemy.

Web Original

  • Several characters from the Global Guardians PBEM Universe have control over gravity. The heroes include Collapsar, Neutron Star, Orbits I and II (one is a Canadian hero, the other a Turkish hero), Gravity Man, and White Dwarf. The villains include Urania, Gravity, Black Hole, Event Horizon, Crusher, Deadweight, and Singularity.
  • Solar Max II from the Academy of Superheroes Universe is an extremely powerful gravity-wielder, enough so that he can make black holes and bend space. Devastator, a supervillain, has power over multiple forces including gravity.
  • This is common enough in the Whateley Universe that there are standard 'moves' for gravity-wielders. Jadis' new roommate Misty can lift several tons, or can slam someone to the ground with several tons of force. Misty has (unfortunately) named herself 'Superchick' and adopted a trademark-violating costume she made herself.
    • Then there's G-Force, who is one of the Capes (the Future Superheroes of America club) on campus. When attacked by G-Force, Phase demonstrated that this power set has some distinct weaknesses.
  • A supervillain known only as the Chief Designer, apparently a former head of the Soviet space program, created a device called the Gravity Engine, strong enough to pull the Moon from its orbit, and gave it to The Mercury Men to do just that.
  • The Gmod Idiot Box: Gravity Cat Not Amused.

Western Animation

Other Media

  • Bionicle has Toa of Gravity and Kanohi Garai, Mask of Gravity and Nuhvok-Kal. The Makuta species can also control gravity, and, in turn, spawn Rahkshi of Gravity.
  • Fantasy artist Robin Wood's "Theory of Cat Gravity", which holds that cats lie in the sunshine to absorb some of the sun's considerable gravitational force. They release that gravity when they're sitting on their owners, which explains why it's so difficult to get up when your cat has you pinned.
  • Shouji the Tenmaranger from Gosei Sentai Dairanger.