Noted director Boyd Kirkland: "I like shows that get into human dilemmas where you see into characters' minds. This is one of my favorite shows. Another reason I like this so much, is that Batman is not driving around playing catch-up. He knows what's going on and is behind-the-scenes manipulating the situation to serve his ends. To me, this is the epitome of how Batman should be portrayed."
Bruce Timm said of this episode, "It's a real witty script and Boyd Kirkland did a great job directing it. His storyboards were staged brilliantly. There's this one great shot on the storyboard. You're looking at a church and the camera pans to where a restaurant is. I found that it was the first time I actually thought of Gotham as a real place. It's easy for the city to be just a backdrop, but here it felt like it had geography."
Arnold "Arnie" Stromwell, featured in this episode, also appears as a younger man during a flashback in the episode Robin's Reckoning: Part I (1993).
The relationship between Arnold Stromwell and his brother Father Michael Stromwell bears resemblance to Angels with Dirty Faces (1938), which revolves around a gangster and a priest who were best friends in childhood find themselves on opposite sides as adults.
Much of the plot of the episode bears some similarities to Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" and the film "It's a Wonderful Life (1946)", with Batman (acting as the "guardian angel") showing a cruel man familiar places and jogging old memories of his past in an attempt to change his ways.