This is me. I've never seen the earlier ones, and have never wanted to. Nothing about them appeals to me...man card violation or whatever. I've been hearing people talk about those movies since I was a child, and raving about their virtues, and I've yet to hear one thing said that remotely made me want to see them.
This past weekend I was out of town and wanted to take in a movie for lack of anything better to do. However, the grand town of Tuscaloosa had all of one theater, and it wasn't showing Ex Machina, which is what I wanted to see. That 98% Rotten Tomatoes score finally got me. Even worse, I had to see it in 3-D because of the timing of shows.
All I can say is holy crap, one of the more amazing experiences I've had in a movie theater in the last 20 years. I put it up there with Jurassic Park and T2 as far as Holy Sh--! experiences, although for totally different reasons. I assumed I would never have that feeling again, given the state of effects, but never considered that I would run into it again in a mainstream movie. I've experienced it on the small screen since - Let The Right One In, just off the top of my head, but I never expected it in a major release in a theater.
The overall non-stop inventiveness of every aspect...the design, the fight choreography, the costumes, the characters, the script...it just blew my mind. I was captivated throughout...instead of "Holy crap, how did they do that?" it was "Holy crap, how did someone even think of that?". But it all worked...it wasn't just crazy crap thrown at the wall, it functioned perfectly.
Maybe it helped that I hadn't seen the others, but while it might not be the "best film" I've seen in years, it was certainly one of the most impressive experiences that I responded to the most.