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Comment by orourkek | Hacker News Reader

It's more of a plot hole than fan-fiction. The article is an exhaustive look at provable (written) arguments that can refute the eagles as a possibile solution to the Mordor trip. The author is trying to prove that the plot hole is, in fact, a plot hole by nature of it being plausible.

Using other possibilities to refute a possibility goes against the spirit of the article, where the author looks for concrete facts that would render the plan implausible.

In the end, there's nothing I know of (or that the author could find) written in the books that disproves it as a possibility. It simply isn't addressed directly in the text, even where there was a prime opportunity to strike it down (Council of Elrond).

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I do not agree that it is a plot hole, unless every possibly important unanswered question qualifies as a plot hole.

I agree that the use of eagles is an unanswered question, that might, to some, seem somewhat surprising that it was never mentioned.

My answer is that Tolkien made the artistic choice to speak of the powers of both Sauron and the Ring in poetic terms only. The last thing he wanted to do is delve into details about Sauron's Anti-craft Aircraft potential when shooting at eagles from throne of Barad-dur, even in a passing comment. He worked very hard to shield our eyes from such details.

Fan fiction fills up spaces that were not covered in the original story. The pros and cons of airborne travel into Mordor are one of those spaces. The author of the article is just as entitled to speculate on this point as anyone who responds to him.

To be a bit more succinct than my previous reply, I think there is a legitimate distinction between "making up content to fill up spaces not covered in the original story" (i.e. fan fiction) and "reasoning out as much as you reliably can about what filled up those spaces, and no more".

Fan fiction is creative writing, more or less by definition: inventing new details is fine unless they conflict with the original story (or even if they do). The author of this article is very explicitly trying to avoid "making up" an answer: he's searching for evidence only within the original story that could constrain the answer to a question relevant to that story. They're both games for fans to play, but at least to my eye the two are worlds apart.

Except the evidence in the original story is clearly insufficient, and absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. We know nothing of Sauron's capabilities to detect and confront airborne intrusion into Mordor or about Gandalf's assessment of these capabilities. Assuming Sauron could not see or bring down the eagles and that Gandalf was aware of this fact is, from this point of view, adding new elements to the story and therefore fan fiction.

It may simply not have been addressed because it was obvious to anyone present that it was an infeasible plan.

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