 The A.V. Club 's Alasdair Wilkins gave " The Bells of Saint John " a grade of B , explaining that the plot suffered just as previous companion introductions had because the threat was secondary to establishing Clara . He also wrote that the episode " struggles to make all its chosen genre elements compelling " and was not positive towards the menace of the Wi @-@ Fi and questioned how realistic the technology seen was . Despite this , he said that it was still " fun " with good performances . Dan Martin of The Guardian was disappointed , writing that it " makes a hearty meal of its iconic London locations ... But after the tour de force that was " The Snowmen " , it feels as though this handsome episode constantly just misses the mark " . He found the monsters and plot familiar to past episodes , but noted that a " generic " opening episode had been common for the show when it was introducing a new companion , which was done successfully with Clara . Neela Debnath in The Independent echoed similar sentiments , feeling that it did not live up to the hype and reused several elements from previous episodes . Jon Cooper of the Daily Mirror wrote that " The Bells of Saint John " " had its moments " but " as a whole it didn 't reach the heights of previous episodes " . While he welcomed the departure in tone , he felt that the set @-@ pieces were shoehorned in , and also expressed concern that Clara , despite Coleman 's success , was too similar to previous companion Amy Pond ( Karen Gillan ) . 
