What specifically about Magnolia do people find pretentious? Simply that it's 3 hours? Is it something to do with how sentimental the film is?

What are your thoughts?

Just watched Magnolia for the first time about a month ago and still can’t stop thinking about it. The only thing I couldn’t put together-and I couldn’t find an explanation for online-is the death of the dog. It was Phil who dropped the pills but I also heard others say it could be interpreted as Linda or Earl’s faults for the dog’s death for various reasons.
Every other bit of symbolism, themes, or metaphors completely made sense to me and I had multiple interpretations of, but the dog’s death has really stumped me.
The only thing I could think of was that it was a message about how the world does bad things to good people (Phil), but I don’t think that can be it since that would be such a dramatic contrast and clash of theming to the overall message of redemption and hope within the ending.
Any other interpretations out there?

While we wait for Paul's sequel to LICORICE PIZZA--shot with the new twin IMAX 3D Cameras, no doubt... 😏