A lot of build systems focus on trying to make it "easier" to define a build, and invariably that notion comes with a certain naiveté about what is needed for a build.

Build systems are never fun, agreed. That's not the point. The point of Bazel is having one that is correct and efficient. That makes a huge difference, though not with the same out-of-box-experience as the "easier to use" build systems.

We'll see where this goes, but I'd encourage you to recognize the difference in what is being attempted here (admittedly, not for the first time, but this design has a pretty established track record... note the comments here of people actually missing the Google build system).