Scary fairy tales: The Hansel and Gretel story as we know it now first appeared in Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm's collection of fairy tales, published between 1812 and 1815. However, Grimm's stories were based on folk tales that had previously been perpetuated by oral storytelling traditions. In Gingerbread the first occurrence of the myth is traced specifically to 1649, but this seems to be where the facts and Buffy version of events part company...

Apocalyptic phrases: Snyder�s gleeful "I love the smell of desperate librarian in the morning" is an adaptation of a famous line from Francis Ford Coppola�s 1979 Vietnam war movie Apocalypse Now, in which a hyped-up Lieutenant Colonel (played by Robert Duvall) is supervising an air raid on the Vietcong: "I love the smell of napalm in the morning".

Punch and Judy?: Willow and her mother discuss the Mister Rogers' puppet show, and one of the show's characters, King Friday. This is a reference to Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, an educational children's show - and something of an American institution - that has been running since 1965.

Money worries: Most viewers will be able to identify with a bank manager (Mr Sanderson) appearing as a vampire!