This episode marks the first outfit change for Gabrielle. The character goes through many wardrobe changes during the entire series.
The famously deceitful king Sisyphus defends angering Zeus by saying his country needed water. This refers to the time Zeus changed into a giant bird to abduct Aegina, daughter of the river god Asopus. Sisyphus saw a giant bird carrying a young lady to a nearby island. When Asopus came looking, Sysphus told all in exchange for a guarantee of ample water for his capitol city, Corinth. End result, Zeus gets to rape Aegina, vaporize Asopus, and sentence Sisyphus to Tartarus.
The character Celesta does not exist in the original myth, where Sisyphus captures Thanatos, a male death god.
Highway to Hades (1995), part of Xena's companion series, is a sort of follow-up to this one, although it appears to violate some continuity matters.