Just updated to 2.0.0 on Arch x64, and things subtitle-wise are not much better. They still look much less grainy on SMPlayer, though I may be able to mitigate that at least partially by fiddling with the settings (though ideally this wouldn't be necessary).
But trying VLC out reminded me of a few more issues:
* Activating the controls while in full-screen mode (by hitting the bottom of the screen) is temperamental
* There's a lag after unpausing the video before audio starts playing again. Not functionally relevant, but it drives me nuts.
You might need to use the OpenGL output on Linux, though.