Very true. I remember seeing Tron (not true CGI) in the early 80s then The Last Star Fighter (arguably the first CGI use in a large manner in a movie) and thinking this is amazing. I didn't understand the hate then but I could easily tell this did not stand a candles chance in hell against Star Wars and their use of miniatures and other practical effects.
Terminator 2 was the movie that I beleive turned A LOT of "anti-CGI" fans around with the liquid Terminator effects.
I think use of AI is in that position now. The tech is new, it is resource heavy, etc. Same as CGI was back in the day. Toy Story for instance, all computer graphics, took around 8 hours on high end computers, that required quite a bit to keep cooled, to render one frame of animation. Now someone that can follow a basic Blender tutorial can have many minutes of similar animation after a day or two.
I think there will be a future where AI is accepted alongside CGI and the latter is viewed by then modern fans like we do today when looking at practical effects versus CGI. It is evolution of the method in which content we enjoy is created.