Editorial supervision is always a must. And the editors should be there in part to prevent those sorts of things. I view it as being akin to reigning in George Lucas. When he listened to other people he made Star Wars and Raiders. When he stopped; Prequels and Crystal Skull. Not to mention Greedo shot first...cgi monsters messing up the screen...
Everyone needs a Spielberg at times to give them a sanity check; I think that's what didn't happen with OMD and similar stories.