To clarify, by hiding the markup, I only mean hiding it in the markup area on the right; markup will still be visible in the main body of the document (assuming that you have selected the All Markup view).
You could change the appearance of comment text, if that helps. Modify the Comment Text and Balloon Text styles to make them stand out more. In the Apply Styles pane (Ctrl+Shift+S), type in a style name and click the Modify button; then make the desired changes.
For what it's worth, I don't like the changes Microsoft made to the markup feature in Word 2013, either.
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http://mvp.microsoft.com/en-us/default.aspx.