I wouldn't say the Abrams films are really any more samey than the PT. It's just a matter of generic blockbuster run-run-run versus the unexpressive flatness of the PT, which was then crowded with CGI. The Prequels are consistently shot in the least imaginative way possible, except for moments in the wholly CGI sequences... which don't really gain anything. The oner that begins Revenge of the Sith feels like a flex and little more to me.
And again this puts TLJ in the weird position where people will talk about how it was shot wrong for a Star Wars film (I've seen people fulminating about a lack of wipe cuts), and it also gets accused of being samey. Le sigh.
Stylistically though, I'd say that TLJ and Rogue One (along with The Clone Wars and, to a lesser extent, The Mandalorian) show that to make a good Star Wars film, your influences must go beyond older Star Wars and other blockbusters. They go back to the sources of the OT and find other elements too - TLJ drawing on more surreal fare and David Lean films, while Rogue One takes cues from spy movies - whereas the Abrams movies and Solo do not. They're largely content to just do old Star Wars, but faster and with modern VFX.
Also, people totally complained about the politics of the PT, or at least how they were presented. There was
a lot of grumbling over the choice to make taxation and trade a key part of the conflict in TPM: