In Showtime, Buffy asks if the Turok-Han can be destroyed with germs. This is a nod to season three’s big bad, the Mayor, who had a fear of germs.

Andrew asks Dawn in Showtime if she wants to “play Kevin Bacon”. Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon is a game that attempts to connect any actor to the prolific Kevin Bacon in six steps via his co-stars.

In Showtime, Xander says the new public library is due to open in May 2003. This is, of course, an in-joke as Sunnydale is destroyed at that time.

In Showtime, Buffy says, “Welcome to Thunderdome” and Andrew says, “Two men enter, one man leaves”. This is a reference to the movie Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, starring Mel Gibson. The “Thunderdome” was a caged fighting match to the death. The tagline for the movie was “Two men enter. One …

Beljoxa’s Eye informs Giles and Anya in Showtime that something has disrupted the line of the Chosen, giving the First a chance to wreak havoc. This explains why the First has been dormant for so long. The Slayer herself is the source of the disruption, and Anya realises that she …

Beljoxa’s Eye is a huge eyeball covered with smaller eyeballs and chains. It exists in another dimension (seemingly a black wind-tunnel), of which only demons can open the gateway. The eye is an oracle. It tells Giles and Anya, “The Eye sees not the future - only the truth of …

In Showtime, Eve/the First says the Slayer has the “weight of the world on her shoulders”. This is a reference to the penultimate episode of season five, which was called The Weight of the World.

The black outfit that Buffy/the First wears when it appears to Spike in Showtime is the same outfit that Buffy wore in Never Leave Me when she tells Spike she believes in him. Buffy/the First says in this episode, “He still thinks I believe in him”.

Buffy says, “Here endeth the lesson” when she has kills the Turok-Han in Showtime. This has been said before in the series: by the Master in season one’s Never Kill a Boy on the First Date and Spike in Fool For Love. The line is taken from the movie The …

In Showtime, Buffy says, “Welcome to the Hellmouth” to Rona, in an obvious reference to the show’s very first episode.

When the season seven video box set was released in the UK, the episode Showtime was missing. In its place was the next episode Potential. Showtime was added as an extra episode on the second season seven box set that was released on 8th September 2003.

The telepathic voice of Buffy in Showtime was not the voice of Sarah Michelle Gellar in the original airing of the episode. She was unavailable to record her voice for the U.S. version, but it was her voice when this episode aired in the UK and Australia.

Rona, an African-American potential Slayer, arrived in Sunnydale via bus, and was saved from the Bringers by Buffy at the station (Showtime). She never had a Watcher and stood up to Buffy and the others on many occassions. Rona’s arm was broken by Caleb in Dirty Girls, but she …

Chloe was a very young, dark-haired potential, first seen in Showtime. Kennedy shouted at her when she couldn’t keep up with the other potential’s training. Chloe hung herself in Get It Done when the First’s plan got too much for her.

The search engine Buffy uses to find out more about the First Evil in Bring on the Night is called ‘people.places.things’. Willow uses the same search engine in Chosen. Buffy searches for the word “evil” and gets 900,517 results. The search results on her screen include:
Evil, Evil, Evil: If it’s …