I'm in the awkward and apparently uncommon position where I'm a prequel fan who also enjoyed TLJ but was disappointed with TFA. Most of the sequel hate is targeted at TLJ though, which I can't relate to.

TLJ better embodied that sense of originality and mytho evolution, world detail, and silent film aesthetic style, that the prequels evoked IMO.

I was surprised that prequel fans were so disparaging of TLJ rather than TFA. I'd have assumed it would be the other way around. And I wonder if it's at least in part just a bandwagoning/echo chamber thing more than anything.

TLJ was also more closely based on Lucas's idea for VII to my understanding, and the Lucasfilm story group and Filoni worked more closely with Rian on the story, whereas I think Abrams was more distant from them. (Although I can't grab a source to verify that at the moment, so don't quote me on it.)