Nah fr ur so right on thus
My guess is that they can guarantee sales with the main characters, whilst they like the side characters but can’t risk making the whole story about them?
i like to think of it like this: they create a new universe for their story and when they enter it obviously they are at first drawn to the flashy couple with all the “perfect” attributes like “strong alpha” and “tormended omega” but while they continue to flesh out their story they stumble across the people that are actually unique, even if they are ordinary or dont fit into those perfect categories, but at this point its too late to change the story entirely so they have to stick to the main couple and as they continue writing they lose more and more interest in that couple so the plot also suffers …
My first thought is that they choose to play it safe or their editors tell them it's best to play it safe. Couples like that do sell, i feel like this is the middle ground where they both play it safe AND experiment once they have a pretty solid base.
LITERALLY bc i was obsessed with Ian and Van only to be severely disappointed to learn that they were only a side couple I’m also looking forward to this side couple like at this point I might just have side couple syndrome instead of the usual second ML syndrome
somebody needs to study the phenomenon of authors writing their main couple super generic and boring (like here for example with the classic strong alpha x helpless/kinda dumb omega) but they accidentally create a really great setting for an actual interesting (side) couple that have complicated dynamics that make you want to explore their individual characters … its happened so many times honestly (liveta for example with van and ian, or the royal bridegroom and so many more that i cant think of right now)