80s movies are kicking our ass (Part 2)

Let me try and put this another way. Look at how special effects were done back then. Let's take for example Ghostbusters again. All of the monsters and ghosts in the movie were practical effects, puppets made with tender loving care by hand.

You can SEE the effort put into Slimer there. The effort put into making him look "real" translates onto the screen and makes the movie better to watch. The original Terminator used a camera lens as a stand-in for Arnold's eye during close-ups. It's that kind of creativity that made films great. Sometimes it's not how expensive something is to make or how bleeding-edge the technology is. Transformers's special effects don't suck, obviously, but there's something wrong with them. You know why? Graphic artists slave for months to make Optimus look like he does, so it can't be that no work was put in. It's probably because as moviegoers, we still know when we're looking at CGI. If we can tell, it's usually an experience breaker. Puppets and animatronics at least are physically real. If we know we're at least looking at real matter, it adds life and personality, and gives the whole movie character.