I was given to understand two specials- one pre-filmed this spring, and one live episode... As for Clara, I reckon she's the Bat-Signal, a living meme created as a call (or lure) to a Doctor who's disappeared off the radar post-TWORS. not necessarily by villains.
Not bash exactly, as I understood it. After Rose had informed Jack that the Doctor's name was "Mr. Spock", the line that was originally to follow her "Don't you ever get tired of 'Doctor'? Doctor who?!" was, "I'd rather have 'Doctor Who' than Star Trek!" Moffat then decided it was a silly joke. That hardly seems to be bashing it, though. On topic, I had a thought about the Doctor, that perhaps he's been gradually erasing his own memory to avoid answering the First Question. We know that Moffat likes to play around with memory (the Silence, the Daleks forgetting the Doctor, Clara/Oswin's dying "...remember", the gag with the memory worm), and its validity. We know that "on the fields of Trenzalore... where no living being can speak falsely or fail to answer, a question will be asked"; if the Doctor's name is significant in a Rumplestiltskin-esque way, and will cause untold problems when revealed, perhaps the only way the Doctor can avoid revealing it is if he himself doesn't know the answer. I'm betting that the gag with Strax and the memory worm and the Doctor seeming not to fully remember the Great Intelligence were pieces of foreshadowing. Like Strax, the Doctor could be using a memory worm or some other technique to gradually erase his early memories and not even know he's doing it. Of course, he'd eventually have to rediscover his identity - cue big 50th special in which the Doctor relearns who he is by revisiting his own past. Perhaps Clara could be the key to his memories somehow.
I think that's reading too much into the Doctor's memory lapse about the GI. Remember, most viewers of the new series aren't familiar with the old series, and the new episodes have to be made to stand on their own. Having the Doctor remember the details of his previous encounters with the Great Intelligence and explain them to somebody would've been too much of a distraction from the current story, so it had to be kept an Easter egg, a passing reference that would mean something to the old-school fans but not distract or confuse the modern viewers. In-universe, the Doctor is supposed to be over eleven hundred years old now, and was less than 450 when he encountered the Intelligence. How well do you remember things from nearly 2/3 of your lifetime ago? Even with a lifetime far shorter than the Doctor's?
Not that I totality diagree with you but the Doctor can remember events from his childhood. In the end he'll remember what he needs to remember if the plot calls for it.
PHP: I don't think modern viewers would be at all confused as the Doctor has a habit of talking about things he's done that we haven't seen.
^But it wasn't something they had time to go into in the story. It would've been a needless distraction. So they just reduced it to a throwaway "seems familiar" as a nod to the old-school fans. There's no reason to see it as some kind of important plot point about the Doctor suffering memory loss. It's just a matter of storytelling logistics.
I don't think that's how it was meant either, but the possibility exists, and stranger things have happened on the show.
I don't think it was foreshadowing either; my guess is that Moffat didn't have time for the Doctor to go into an explanation (he didn't even have enough time to explain how the Doctor defeated the GI ).
I of course considered that, and it is perhaps the most obvious interpretation, but I'm just supposing that it may be something more given the theme of memory running through the whole Moffat era to date, and this episode in particular; the memory worm, "run, you clever boy... and remember," and with the 50th coming up it would make sense for them to do something that harks back to the old days. It just felt like foreshadowing to me. I don't think it would've been as it could have been done very quickly, as with the encounters with other classic foes. It didn't require any detailed synopsis of the GI's earlier appearances - something like "there are Cybermen in our universe" is all you'd need, like "I've fought it before... a long time ago. I didn't make the connection at first." That wouldn't distract or confuse the casual viewers (most of them are smart; they know it's a 50 year-old show - it's a mainstream British institution and the upcoming anniversary has been mentioned a fair bit in the press already - and would likely gather that it's a reference to an old story without it hampering their enjoyment) and would be a nice Easter Egg for the die-hards. The "it rings a bell" was instead far too jarring and distracting to this long-time fan (even if the intent was to simply suggest that the Doctor's getting on a bit, it runs the risk of being misinterpreted, hence this discussion). The Doctor has often talked of events from his past - including his childhood - with a degree of clarity. The Web of Fear was the adventure that included his first meeting with a certain Col. Lethbridge-Stewart, and I'm not sure he'd just forget that, no matter how long ago it was now (if he is just forgetting these things due to old age, then he's in trouble, as a man is the sum of his memories, a Time Lord even more so...).
Actually, to me, that sounds rather stilted and cliched. Just from a stylistic perspective, that's not a better way of doing it. Well, I didn't find it jarring. I just found it a reasonably casual way to handle a throwaway Easter-egg reference.
Hence, the I hope. It could turn out to have been the GI. I wonder if that ice Clara landed with will turn out to figure in her having multiple lives? This Victorian Clara being a template for future Claras, somehow?