What's the point with that quite lackluster story in Endwalker?

[Theodric]

Honestly? It's a real turn off for me. I'm all for people not being unfeeling constructs but over the last decade or so it really seems like the bar has been set so low that a bit of sad music will play and a character will look upset and that will be mistaken as excellent storytelling.

Arguably because many consumers are a bit too prone to turning on the waterworks in response to every little thing. Even if what is supposedly 'sad' doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

You're absolutely right in that Venat should have been given a very scathing lecture (even if she wasn't there at the time to receive it).

Something that annoys me is that the potential for genuinely saddening moments is often overlooked. I'm still salty that we never got to see Varis' reaction to Regula's demise. The pair were friends since childhood which is decades ago - and to me that's a far more tragic loss than Haurchefant. A guy we knew for, what? A few weeks or months at most? To say nothing of the simple fact that it's also arguably up in the air as to whether he threw himself into danger because he was a genuinely good person or because - particularly in the Japanese localisation - he was utterly obsessed with the player character to a rather creepy degree!

[Teraq]

I am honestly salty about everything Varis. Just when he was gearing up to step into the spotlight he was offed by a worse character. He deserved better.
It did make for an interesting setting in EW Garlemald as I found it to be the best part of MSQ in retrospect (sorry Elpis but IMO you jumped the shark so hard even Mitron would think that was over the top), and yes admittedly I credit Jullus with being the first EW character to make me break down in tears, but I still think of what Garlemald could have been.

I can picture the entire fanbase crying at everything in Ultima Thule. Though personally the one part that did make me cry was the Ea. Staying home waiting to dissolve into a puddle, barely remembering how to function and do social things again, just kind of hit way too close from home for me.