deus ex machina

American  

[dey-uhs eks mah-kuh-nuh, dee-uhs eks mak-uh-nuh] / ˈdeɪ əs ɛks ˈmɑ kə nə, ˈdi əs ɛks ˈmæk ə nə /

noun

1. (in ancient Greek and Roman drama) a god introduced into a play to resolve the entanglements of the plot.

2. any artificial or improbable device resolving the difficulties of a plot.

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deus ex machina British  

/ ˈdeɪʊs ɛks ˈmækɪnə /

noun

1. (in ancient Greek and Roman drama) a god introduced into a play to resolve the plot

2. any unlikely or artificial device serving this purpose

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Etymology

Origin of deus ex machina

1690–1700; < New Latin literally, god from a machine (i.e., stage machinery from which a deity's statue was lowered), as translation of Greek apò mēchanês theós (Demosthenes), theòs ek mēchanês (Menander), etc.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

deus ex machina

For Apple, as for Jobs, the whole episode involved the kind of deus ex machina you could never get away with in fiction.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 17, 2026

A kind of deus ex machina, he pops into the novel at key points, offering incredible amounts of money like a possibly sinister fairy godmother in a Brothers Grimm tale.

From Seattle Times ● May 15, 2024

With truth under assault and accountability seemingly non-existent, a billion-dollar bullhorn sharing micro-targeted messages on multiple platforms may not be an ideal deus ex machina, but it is the one our info-siloed public square demands.

From Salon ● Apr. 6, 2024

When Seven and Raffi figure out a way to transport assimilated crew members off the bridge using phaser rifles, it’s quite the deus ex machina.

From New York Times ● Apr. 20, 2023

At least the texts, while not exactly a deus ex machina, reveal a stark truth: Kareem isn’t the one.

From "Love, Hate & Other Filters" by Samira Ahmed