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I think you pretty much answered your own question by describing the mood of the Avengers. Superhero stories are usually meant to be more positive in tone, usually with some cornball humor thrown in to wink at how inherently absurd the whole genre is. That goes double for an 'old school' pure-babyface character like Superman-- yeah, I get that he's inexperienced and outgunned in Man of Steel, but they didn't even really make an effort to show him saving people apart from catching the occasional soldier on his way back to the fight, and saving people is what Superman is supposed to be all about.
That said, I'm hoping they're taking the direction you suggested: Lex Luthor turns people against Superman because of the destruction of Metropolis, while using that as a distraction from whatever evil scheme he's got going, so Superman eventually teams up with Batman and Wonder Woman to redeem himself (though I'm sure he'll first have to be 'humbled' by getting smacked around by Batman because people just can't let go of The Dark Knight Returns). He keeps getting better through Justice League so by the time Man of Steel 2 finally rolls around, we get a Superman closer to the one people are familiar with, one that can stop those kinds of global catastrophes without the horrific losses, and who actually smiles and acts like a nice guy in between sessions of punching things really hard.
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