I have to admit to still having some philosophical discomfort over SystemD as I feel that it encompasses too much functionality. That said, it does work and that is probably the most important thing.
Systemd pushed forward proper usage of capabilities, better watchdogs (in a broader sense, as systemd supports all kinds of them), isolation, policies, and so on and so forth. You need it all to efficiently control the daemons, and it's great when it's all available in a single suite.