The first half could have used some trimming. At one point, after two thirds or so, I thought: this is an outstanding crime action thriller, but a Batman film? His return and the showdown soothed that impression a little bit, but still there was a lot of JG-L and not all that much Batman throughout the film. I liked JG-L's character but the set-up as his successor was maybe a tad too obvious. I agree with you about the twists, though.

There were a few logic flaws, like the ones you mentioned, but most of them were petty enough not to force the audience to think about them much. There was always too much going on to linger on them.

On the plus side: the cast was fantastic. Michael Caine is nothing less than one of the great actors of his generation. He had some of the greatest scenes of the trilogy here.
Hathaway was a fine Catwoman. I liked the amount of LOST alumni in smaller roles. I found Bane was the right villain to pick after the Joker. His sheer physical force was so frikkin threatening, you almost felt it in your seat. I didn't care for his voice though, or how he pronounced things. That didn't seem to fit somehow. I understood everyone else fine, though
Loved the short visits by Neeson and Murphy!

I thought the prison pit scenes and the flashbacks were handled extremely well. The attack on the football stadium, the siege of Gotham and the whole showdown really paid off. That was just unlike anything you'd ever seen in a film like this and had such an unexpectedly huge scale with so much at stake. I liked how Gordon finally had a bigger role to play in the end and even though Catwoman remained unpredictable that she chose the right side in the end. The last few scenes with the solution were just perfect.

As for an inevitable comparison with that other big super hero film that came out this spring, I'd somehow find it easier to compare Bambi with Terminator 2. The approaches are so different it barely feels like the same genre. I think it was even here that someone wrote that it's like comparing a day at the beach and a day at the museum, which can be equally as rewarding and fun. I gotta say the beach won by a short head this year.

Still, 8.5 out of 10 football stadiums.