Brilliant stuff! I suffer from over active ear wax glands, so it was rather spoiled last night by tinnitus. Still, I sorted my ears out this morning and watched it again on iPlayer, and it really is as good as I’d thought. Nicely scripted, beautifully designed, and top-notch performances from Matt and JLC. Wasn’t quite as impressed by the guest cast, although Ashley Walters was good. And the ending was signalled right from the start: absolutely not a Davies ex Machina.
One little thing I’d like to note: in the last scene Clara was wearing a new dress and had a towel over her shoulder to dry her hair. Basically, she’d felt the need to get cleaned up. Given how grubby she became in the episode, that would make sense, except that those events ultimately never happened. So was this an echo of those events seeping through? Or did she just manage to get messy in the moments before the Doctor hit the Big Friendly Button?