There were some moments in both SR2 and SR3 that made me cringe. In SR2, the main character is capable of such sadistic cruelty that there were sequences that were repulsive and hard to watch. This is juxtaposed against some of the most juvenile sequences and jokes I've ever seen in a video game. They toned that down in SR3, which I thought was a more tonally consistent game, but the end results were fewer high highs.
The problem with Saint's Row is that inconsistent tone. Is it a game where you can streak through a mall carrying a giant rubber dildo, or is it a game where you kidnap a character's girlfriend, lock her in the trunk of a car that gets crushed in a monster truck show? If the sex and violence is cartoonish, it should always be cartoonish.
Bleszinski is, perhaps, attracted to the less cartoonish violence and he feels that the cartoonish stuff is getting in the way. I'm the opposite. I think there should be less of the old ultraviolence and depravity in favor of cartoonishness. That being said, the writers are extremely hit or miss on their humor and either way, the game just feels like a stone soup of ideas from a bunch of exceedingly immature young men.
But I still love the series and welcome a Saint's Row 4.