So what is your answer?

Speaking only for myself, there are two big reasons I never go to 3D shows anymore.

First is that the technology is just plain uncomfortable. The glasses feel bad, and my eyes hurt after a while.

Second is that filmmakers seem to have no clue how stereoscopic depth perception actually works. Objects only have perceptible parallax out to a couple dozen feet. Beyond that, depth is perceived purely by other means. But 3D movies keep applying parallax to objects much farther away. All this does is make them look closer and therefore smaller. The worst example I saw of this was an IMAX film at the Smithsonian about the development of the Boeing 777. There was a scene of a distant 777 in flight which popped the plane out of the screen. The result was that this 100-ton building-sized machine looked like a child's toy.

If the technology can be improved so it doesn't hurt, and if filmmakers can figure out how to use it without it looking utterly stupid, I'll give it another shot. Until then, I'm sticking with 2D.

The 3D movies I've seen were just too dark. Add to that fingerprints on ill-fitting glasses and the faintly cross-eyed feeling I get watching scenes where the 3D is pronounced, and I'll much rather watch a nice, bright, 2D version.

To each his own, I guess: the lower brightness is actually the main thing I like about 3D. It's occasionally done well enough to add something to the movie. Other than those cases, the only benefit is having not as bright a screen in a dark room.

I've read that some theatres reduce the brightness to extend the life of the projector light bulb.

I generally am not a fan of 3D, but my theatre seems to light 3D movies perfectly, while their 2D showings often seem dark.

Personally I find that even when it's well done it creates moments that draw me out of the movie and make me very aware that I'm in a cinema

When it's badly done it makes my eyes hurt after a while and I find it tends to make everything look blurry

Not that you asked me, but here's one reason: I have keratoconus and even with glasses and multiple eye surgeries don't see 20-20. Moreover, my right eye is considerably worse than my left, which means that I can't quite get binocular vision to work, making 3d viewing impossible for me. I realize folks like me are a tiny minority, however.

Perhaps a broader reason is that 3d seems to encourage filmmakers to go for visual spectacle over good storytelling.

I lost my right eye when I was very young, so for me as well 3D is just a way to make a movie look worse.

3D gives me a headache. It also looks rubbish. I watched Gravity in 3D after Mark Kermode admitted it added something. It was bearable because it was a concise film and was enjoyable. But it works only in specific cases like these. It's more like a theme park ride than something that works on any film. Other times I was forced to watch 3D were: Dredd (only available in 3D), The Hobbit (was curious about 60fps which was only available in 3D). I regretted it each time.

My wife and I were on a date and I thought watching the first Hobbit movie in 3D would be a fun, impromptu thing to do after dinner.

She loved the experience, so I sat there for three hours watching a blurry movie because the 3D glasses were awful and causing pain.

Never again.

For us it was Avatar, but at least both of us couldn't stand it. I couldn't focus due to the 3D glasses not sitting at the right distance in front of my real glasses, and my bespectacled girlfriend got sick about 20 minutes in. We left, got our money back, and never bothered with 3D again.

"Because I don't like gimmicky depth, distraction from the story, and worse dynamic range, and I'm not 5 years old to care for floating Ice Age characters...".

5yr olds aren't supposed to use the tehnology...possibly can cause developmental problems with 3d perception.

5 year olds are seeing in 3D 24X7 already. Sounds fishy.

3D movies aren't real 3D, they leverage a subset of what we have learned to judge depth by independent of (and inconsistent with) other depth cues.

I can certainly see how too much early exposure would actually interfere with the development of the usual association of cues that support perception of distance.

Citation? It's hard to believe that watching a 3D movie even once per week would have any negative developmental effect.

Motion sickness

Stereo-blind.

One reply to that is "I ain't got 4D for that fad"

4D==time :).