SFX pretty good, characters & pacing lacking.

Rating: 6/10 (19 December 2016)

It's OK, I suppose.
Good parts: Period costumes & sets were beautiful. Special effects were (mostly) very good, and the Fantastic Beasts were individually great fun.
So-so parts: The acting was only OK. Newt (Eddie Redmayne) in particular left me dissatisfied. Yes he's playing an introverted character, but I saw no reason for the bond he seemed to build with Tina. The MACUSA wizards & witches were extremely underdeveloped, including the President. Their hot-and-cold treatment of Tina for her interruptions made no sense to me either.
Poor: The editing seemed off to me, in a way I haven't noticed since The Chamber of Secrets. --- awkward pauses littered the film, robbing it of its momentum. Newt's interaction with some of the larger beasts didn't look realistic (e.g. his stroking the Thunderbird's neck). And I personally dislike FX-heavy movies where the Big Bad is some amorphous cloud (not as bad as Green Lantern, but pretty bad).
Final thought: why do so many large beasts have bird's heads? This seems to be a thing with Rowling ...