Seeing a rotten picture for the special effects is like eating a tough steak for the smothered onions, or reading a bad book for the dirty parts. Optical wizardry is something a movie can do that a book can’t but it is no substitute for a story, for logic, for meaning. It is ornamentation, not substance. In fact, whenever a science fiction picture is praised overeffusively for its special effects, I know it’s a bad picture. Is that all they can find to talk about?

Isaac Asimov (1920-1992) Russian-American author, polymath, biochemist

“Editorial: The Reluctant Critic,” Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine (12 Nov 1978)
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Writing about Close Encounters of the Third Kind.