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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Brown Jenkin" data-source="post: 1291983" data-attributes="member: 2572">2.An unexpected, artificial, or improbable character, device, or event introduced suddenly in a work of fiction or drama to resolve a situation or untangle a plot.3.A person or event that provides a sudden and unexpected solution to a difficulty.There is plot problem for the characters. They are getting trashed by the Nazgul in front of the Black Gate. Pippen in fact believes he is about to die. The good guys are about to loose. Out of nowhere the eagles show up. That qualifies as "sudden and unexpected" and is a solution to a plot issue.Additionaly from a readers perpective we want to see Frodo and Sam live even if they are resigned to death. They are on Mount Doom with no food or water and are surrounded by lava. This is certainly a big problem and the Eagles are an "sudden and unexpected solution." I beleive that this was not Tolkien's intent in using them but by the dictionary definition this qualifies. Therefore the eagles "technicaly" qualify. I hope that is good enough since it seems very clear to me.Is too, infinity. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" />1.In Greek and Roman drama, a god lowered by stage machinery to resolve a plot or extricate the protagonist from a difficult situation.What is this if not supernatural aid. It seems the problem is that we have a difference of interpretation of the definition of deus ex machina. You are trying to differentiate Supernatural Aid from dues ex machina. I would argue that there is no difference. One is a subset of the other. You interpret dues ex machina as a wholely negative thing while that is but one of the three definitions given. Definition one lists a god being used to resolve a plot or extract the protagonist from a difificult situation. Gandolf is a god and he is used repeatedly to extract the protagonists from a dificult situation. There is nothing about sudden, unexpected, or improbable in this definition. In fact the is no indication that you can't use the same god over and over in this way as part of the story. Definition three also does not list any negative conotations. It is the same as one except that it widdens the field to include not just gods but any character or event. You seem to argue that Supernatural Aid is something different from dues ex machina which you use only definition two to define. I counter that your supernatural aid is just definition one or three. Again you seem to just be focusing on definition two. Both definition one and three do not carry the negative bagage. Your concept of Supernatural Aid as a legitimate literary tool is my concept of definition one or three of dues ex machina.</blockquote>

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