Kevin Smith once explained his Devil' Advocacy for the Star Wars prequels as being the result of the original films being such a monumental influence over him, that he was incapable of expressing anything but love for the new films. I'll admit, I thought I'd feel this same way about The Hobbit, the book occupying such a special place in my heart that the film would look better through my rose coloured glasses. It didn't. If a movie, or book, or TV show is bad, no matter how much you love it, it is still bad. And if you can't recognise that, then it's not your love getting in the way, making you an apologist, it's denial. It's your stubborn nostalgia unwilling to admit the truth to you. Or maybe you just don't know what "good" and "bad" are.
Someone who did not have this problem with the Star Wars prequels was Simon Pegg, who so hated them he wrote a television series essentially just to have the excuse to bad mouth them publicly. That series, and a certain amount of raw comedic talent, has allowed his reputation to rise, resulting in his being cast as Scotty in the the Star Trek reboot, directed by J.J. Abrams, who was recently chosen to direct the first in Disney's beating the dead horse business plan for the Star Wars films.
And here is a short video of the two of them talking about how they were influenced by Star Wars, and how Abrams wasn't by Star Trek, and how that turned out to be a good thing for Trek, and might not be such a good thing for Wars (look how badly it went for the last guy who loved those films too much; badly to the tune of $4 billion. OK, bad example).
Via /Film.