I agree with some of the sentiment in TFA, but I think the author goes way overboard and ends up disliking some of the movies "just because".
I do agree that the dialogue from Gladiator II is awful, but what did we expect? The movie shouldn't have been made at all, Gladiator didn't need a sequel.
As for literalism: it's always been there in mainstream movies, I think. That we got so many (non-auteur) movies that are not so literal is surprising, actually.