I don't think it was another kid. It didn't speak and it was lightning fast.
Clara and Rupert were under the bed for a full minute before it sat on there. It took 36 seconds to leave the room (after pulling the blanket off). Hardly "lightning fast". Also, 12 year old orphans might not always be the most talkative bunch, especially when there's a strange man in a bedroom.
It was also really late at night so not many were up.
Well that explains it. Rupert mustn't have been a child either.
The Doctor could have used his screw driver to analyze but that's too easy.
Fairytale era is over, the magic wand is gone (mostly).
It was just a lame, convoluted episode that led no where.
Introduces the possibility Danny is involved in future events.
Is an episode about what may lurk in the dark. Shows the Doctor is afraid of it.
Shows the lengths the Doctor goes to to test things.
The Doctor believed in the beings even if they didn't exist yet he didn't care that one was in his Tardis after the episode intro.
It would have been with him 2,000 odd years. Why would he feel threatened? He just wants to see it, and to see if it malevolent or not.
He believes they could exist and is a bit stir crazy for not remembering him writing listen. He thinks they exist and Clara lets him believe yet experiences something herself. So, the Doctor went from wanting to know if they exist and thinking one was aboard the Tardis to not caring at all whether they exist or are aboard his Tardis all in the same episode.
Clara was the Doctor's nightmare. She doesn't let him believe the "monsters" are real: "What if there was nothing? What if there was never anything? Nothing under the bed? Nothing at the door? What if the big, bad Time Lord doesn't want to admit he want to admit he's just afraid of the dark?"
She imparts information to him and begs him to not check it himself because it's too important that he not see.
The episode contradicted itself and was therefore utterly pointless.
No, it didn't.
I get the theme of being scared but the Doctor doesn't run off with his tail between his legs
No, he goes to the end of the universe and calls you out for a fight. Or he decides to commit genocide (both are shown in the episode).
Anyway, remember that time the Doctor ran away to the back of the train from that thing in Midnight? I do.
and doesn't believe that something cannot be explained with science and reasoning.
This incarnation is more of a scientist than any of the others. He comes up with two theories:
It's nothing.
It's something (that can't be detected, or interact).
The episode leads you to believe it's nothing more heavily than something, but there is the possibility of both. That's the point of the "monster" it only exists hypothetically.