Along with Nolan and Snyder he was among the "newer" directors that carved out a good spot. But everyone expected Elysium and Chappie to live up to District 9 glory, which is hard... now with District 10 that expectation is gonna be magnified

I mean people won't expect a compelling story/characters with Monkey vs Lizard they just want to be entertained in that borderline insulting way: fun and dumb. District 9 however was a grounded, serious movie as established by the trailers... also stuff like "from producer Peter Jackson" (this was before The Hobbit when Jackson's name still carried a ton of weight) sold it as being an exceptional Sci Fi film, which it is. Can't really blame people for expecting the same quality in Elysium and Chappie which were mediocre in comparison.