Oh yes, that's proper 'Who' at its best, and all it takes is a dangerously well organised villain (the Great Intelligence, the one who was also responsible for the deadly Snowmen form last Christmas episode, we remember) and a couple of new mysteries for the Doctor to focus on: who is Clara Oswin, or how is the great Intelligence and she connected with each other? Who was the woman from the shop who knows the TARDIS' phone number? River? Is the Doctor's future self manipulating his past/future and 'making' Clara bump into him, somehow. At least Moffat promises us to find out within this season.
Talking about the new companion... Do you know her most important quality which makes her the perfect companion for the Doctor? He's already seen her dying. Twice. And he suspects that there isn't much he can do about it. So it doesn't matter if she has some fun with him before she ends up in a Dalek and/or a Victorian coffin. Moreover, it's really great to see the Doctor inviting her on board the TARDIS and she turning him down. Well, I guess in *real* life that would be people's natural reaction, it's just that the Doctor and real life aren't really acquainted with each other.Then again, Moffat is the best when it comes to making the least realistic or even logical things appearing real. Where else could you see a girl not being utterly shocked by meeting a *proper* alien. I loved the Doctor's reaction, though 'Yes I am. Are you OK with that?'
Actually, it were the innumerable small moments between the two of them which makes the whole story perfect and adds some real life feeling to it; like the Doctor leaving the jammie-dodgers for her, him hinting at her Victorian past/(future?), well, at least now we sort-of know where her excellent hacking-skills ('Asylumn of the Daleks') come from, or the last minutes in which she asks him to ask her tomorrow again to travel with him, because she'll may say yes then (and we and the Doctor know she will). And when was the last time the Doctor actually received a proper phone-call via the Police Box phone? Or that he heard the 'bells' of 'Saint John' ringing? And we have already a few loose ends which asks to be tied up some time in the future. E.g. what was that leaf thing all about? And why doesn't she want to talk about it?
Sure, there was some sort of a sub-plot going on with those spoonheads which served the Great Intelligence as a tool to 'feed' on healthy, human minds, for whatever reason... And his servants/employees used the wi-fi to do all this, which is some sort of spooky (especially as since a few minutes a new wi-fi spot has kept appearing in my wi-fi list: ALIEN lol) But all this simply demonstrates the Big Moff's magnificence; I guess there aren't many screenwriters who'd use such an elaborately crafted plot as the background-story to introduce the new companion. The story could have lived up to any standards which poor Russel T Davies set up for 'Who's finales.
What I don't get is what 'the Doctor saving the plane' scene was about. After all, it didn't really add anything to the story; it simply allowed Moffat to cheat and get done with the the Doctor introducing himself to the new companion, which is part of the actual ritual. And Clara didn't seem too shocked by this new information, either that or she simply couldn't be more shocked as she was in a then still just about to crashing plane. So maybe there wasn't exactly enough time for the information to sink in.
All in all, 'The Bells of Saint John' was a great opener and next week Clara will be on her first alien planet, visiting a place which she certainly won't find in her book. Maybe we'll get an appropriate reaction to the Doctor *really* being an alien then.
