One modern editor has described the play as adventure drama, characterized by simple, straightforward emotions, black and white morality, absolute poetic justice, and, above all, violent rapidity of action.
He felt that the character struck out in spectacular fashion by attempting to steal future technology and that his eventual fate was an example of poetic justice.
In some parts of the world, the term has become a metaphor for "any" action that backfires on the person/group undertaking itsometimes even carrying a sense of poetic justice.