Alara's parents are portrayed by Molly Hagan and Robert Picardo. Hagan had a guest role on The Jem'Hadar (1994) and Picardo played The Doctor (alias Lewis Zimmerman, Lord Schweitzer, Shmullus, Mozart Van Gogh, etc.) on Star Trek: Voyager (1995). Picardo also played Richard Woolsey in the Stargate franchise, which at times was a loving parody-tribute to Star Trek; most of Woolsey's appearances were in Stargate: Atlantis (2004).
Isaac states that "Lieutenant Kitan has exercised directive 38...' which causes Mercer to ask, "No bare feet in the engineering section?" before being corrected. This comedic device where a character quotes a 'directive' believing it to be one thing, only to be told it is something totally unrelated is used very often in the space-based British Sci-Fi TV series Red Dwarf (1988).
When Ed rushes to the weapons locker outside the briefing room after having seen the spiders, then runs back towards the briefing room with a pistol in-hand, the musical cue is highly reminiscent of the action music from the original Star Trek (1966) when Captain Kirk would similarly behave as a "man of action."
With 3.32 million viewers, this was the least watched episode in Season 1.
The original title of this episode was "Nightmares".