At no point do I recall Netflix promoting this rating system as anything but way to get better matches. The fact that so many comments are about losing a system

At no point do I recall Netflix promoting this rating system as anything but way to get better matches. The fact that so many comments are about losing a system for criticism, just confirms that it was the wrong metaphor to use in the first place. Perhaps they could bring back a "critical review" mechanism, but I'd guess it wouldn't affect your matches at all. And probably be mostly unusable on a TV anyway.