It's a fantastic episode, which really messes with your brain! Buffy is not so much shifting between universes as between consciousnesses - has the last 6 years just been the creation of a severely disturbed and delusional young woman? They basically retell the Buffy story from a completely different angle, and you are left wondering what is real and what isn't. It's the first Buffy for a good while that has really left me desperate for more at the end.

Interestingly, the episode was written by Diego Gutierrez, who has been credited for as long as I can remember as Joss Whedon's assistant.

so is everything back to normal at the end? Do you see xander/giles/spike etc? Is dawn in it?

Things are not back to normal at the end - the final scene implies that the alternate reality is actually the true one, but we are left hanging...

You don't see Xander/Giles/Spike/Dawn in the alternate reality, although they are all in the episode, except Giles). Hank and Joyce are visiting Buffy in the mental asylum in the alternate reality.

wow i'll bet it's a real head twister..cos you won't know if everything thats happened in previous seasons is meant to be a product of Buffy's imagination...

Ok, this post contains a spoiler for Charmed, if anyone watches on Channel 5 not Living.
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There was an episode of Charmed on the other day that was similar to this. In an attempt to turn one of the sisters to the dark side, the source (the big villain) created a world in which she was an only child in a mental asylum, and where her two sisters and her magical powers were all in her mind. Even her white-lighter husband Leo was only a doctor in the hospital. ALthough we knew it was all a trick, it was a very good idea. I understand that the Buffy episode leaves the audience in more doubt as to which of the two lives is reality, which sounds even better.

Episode 8 of Buffy was orignially supposed to have this theme, but it was pulled at the last minute because it was too similar to that episode of charmed. So we've had it re-written for episode 17. Personaly I think its a bit stupid to imply that the asylum place is real, because it is a bit unoriginal and has been done better(DS9 anyone?) before now. However, in interviews it has been said it was never an implication that none of it was real so hopefully I should be able to enjoy it fore what it is.

i saw the charmed episode and got a bit irritated i figured charmed were more liekly to rip Buffy off than the other way round. Don't like charmed. Their plots are very similar and much like a lot of other tv shows.

i can't wait for this ep of buffy - by all accounts its a spectacular return to form. Will be back to disect tomorrow evening!