Shawn Pyfrom, played the little boy (Hans) in the episode Gingerbread. He is now widely known as Andrew in Desperate Housewives. Shawn has also played a young Michael Landon in Michael Landon - The Father I Knew, and has been in Malcolm in the Middle, State of Grace, Family Guy …

One of the movies playing at the cinema in Amends is Abilene, which was not released until March 13, 1999 - three months after the episode aired. Carey Meyer, who was the production designer for Buffy, was also the designer for Abilene, so the movie’s reference is a little in-joke …

In Amends, Buffy says, “Tree. Nog. Roast Beast.” This is a reference to How The Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss in which Roast Beast is the traditional Christmas dinner.

Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead trilogy, starring Bruce Campbell, is alluded to a few times in Buffy. In Amends, the First screams, “Dead by sunrise”, which could be a nod to the subtitle of Evil Dead 2, namely, “Dead by Dawn”. In Crush, Xander says to Spike, “Hey evil dead you’re …

Buffy mentions the trashy British tabloid “newspaper” The Sun in Amends.

Amends had at least two other titles before Joss Whedon decided what to call it: ‘Old Enemies, Dead Enemies‘ and ‘A Buffy Christmas’.

The Mutant Enemy monster seen at the end of the credits is altered in the episode Amends. He wears a Santa cap, and there are bells jingling in the background.

Cornelia Hayes O’Herlihy played Margaret, the servant girl Angel tried to kill in Amends. She previously played Jane Spencer in Diana: Her True Story. Serena Scott Thomas, who played Gwendolyn Post in Revelations, played Diana in the same TV movie.

Mark Kriski played the weatherman in the episode Amends. He is the real-life weatherman for KTLA’s morning news. KTLA is the L.A. affiliate of the WB Network. He has appeared as a weatherman in Gangland, Chairman of the Board, Speed, Speed 2: Cruise Control, 7th Heaven and The Jackie Thomas …

Giles is called Jeeves by Buffy in The Wish, and by Willow in Grave. Jeeves was an intelligent English butler in P. G. Wodehouse’s fantastic series of Jeeves and Wooster novels.

Xander says of Cordy in The Wish, “tears of a clown”. He’s quoting from the 1968 hit song by Smokey Robinson and the Miracles.

The episode The Wish is clearly influenced by the 1946 movie It’s a Wonderful Life, which tells the heart-warming story of a suicidal man who is shown how the world would have been different if he’d never been born. The film was directed by Frank Capra and starred James Stewart.

In the episode The Wish, it is revealed that vampires are attracted to bright colours.

We see Cordelia’s bedroom in Sunnydale for the first and last time in the episode The Wish.

Nicole Bilderback played Cordelia’s friend (the girl killed by the Master’s machine) in The Wish. She also appeared in the Buffy pilot episode. Nicole appeared with Seth Green (Oz) in the 1998 film Can’t Hardly Wait as a girl with whom Seth’s character nearly has sex. Nicole also appeared in …