Mirror punishment a song satirizing mirror punishment. For example: The refrain line "to let the punishment fit the crime" has sometimes been quoted in the course of British political debates, though the concept predates Gilbert. For instance, episode 80 of the television series "Magnum, P.I.", entitled "Let the Punishment Fit the Crime", features bits of several songs from "The Mikado". The phrase and the Mikado's song also are featured in the "Dad's Army" episode, "A Soldier's Farewell." In "The Parent Trap" (1961), the camp director quotes the phrase before sentencing the twins to the isolation cabin together. Mirror punishment A mirror punishment
Gilbert and Sullivan of trade between England and Japan, Japanese imports, art and styles became fashionable in London, making the time ripe for an opera set in Japan. Gilbert said, "I cannot give you a good reason for our... piece being laid in Japan. It... afforded scope for picturesque treatment, scenery and costume, and I think that the idea of a chief magistrate, who is... judge and actual executioner in one, and yet would not hurt a worm, may perhaps please the public." Setting the opera in Japan, an exotic locale far away from Britain, allowed Gilbert and Sullivan to satirise British politics