Great material -- atrocious editing

Rating: 7/10 (10 April 2016)

I'll keep this spoiler-free.
It's rare that the editing is the link that makes or breaks the chain of a blockbuster, but that seems to be what's happened here. "Batman V Superman" is a movie with some truly great moments, both emotive and cool, but it looks like it was cut together by a young teen training himself to use Premier Pro.
Short story: beginning=good; end=good; middle=boring, badly-paced and mildly confusing.
Long story. The opening 10-20 minutes were fantastic: we went though the whole murder of Bruce's family thing again, but it was montaged very well, and had Zimmer's emotive score combined with some (actually sensible, for once) Snyder slo-mo. We then cut to Grown-up Bruce in Metropolis, and see his perspective of the third act of "Man of Steel" as he tries to save his employees from a burning building. I liked this.
Oh how we laughed at the idea of Batfleck! "No!", we thought, "He'll be awful!". But he's had the last laugh, it seems -- cause he was great! Ben's Batman is older -- early-forties -- and has evidently spent too much time doing what he does: he's much darker (even more so than Bale's) and conflicted; he kills people -- indirectly, but very deliberately. It was a fresh take on a beloved character, and I look forwards immensely to his stand-alone pictures. The sarcastic, no-nonsense Jeremy Irons as Alfred was also a pleasant surprise (you didn't know you wanted a cool Alfred until you got him).
The rest of the cast is similarly strong, including Caville, but the movie really begins to fall apart a little way into the First Act. the editing was shocking: there was no tension or buildup, and the plot didn't even begin to exist, let alone take shape, for the first hour. Superman had little motivation for fighting Batman, and Batman's motivations, though much better, don't become clear until the Third Act. This movie is simply too long, and need re-editing (a common flaw with Snyder).
That said, Snyder has grown up somewhat from the child who made "300", and the delinquent teenager trying to act cool with "Man of Steel". The stylising is less obvious, and the slo-mo is kept mostly in check. He was a little excessive with the CG in parts (very, in others), but the VFX team for the most part did a great job (with one exception -- you'll know it when you see it), and the graphics weren't quite ropey enough to detract from my immersion.
Of the fight itself, so prophesied in the trailers, I'll say this: it's shorter than you might think, and it isn't the climax of the movie -- but it's good and carries a fair bit of weight as far as emotional investment goes. I said that the movie falls apart, but it does begin to piece itself back together in time for the end, and the last 20 minutes almost justify the preceding 100.
Great moments; needs a re-edit; too long. It suffered from the long-known Snyder shortcomings: a slightly weak story and bad pacing, but it was by far and away his best movie yet, and I genuinely look forwards to the rest of the DC shared universe.
This wasn't as clean as the launch of the MCU back in the day, but we're here now, with a surprisingly good Batfleck leading the team. They have redeemed themselves for the monstrosity that was "Green Lantern", but the ratings suffer for the aforementioned inadequacies.
7/10 (I'd give it 7.5 if I could).