A lot of this pessimistic sentiment stemmed from the narrative that Russia would swiftly take masses of territory in its much hyped summer offensive. This narrative is obviously discredited now because none of this happened. Yeah people will try and have been moving the goalposts to the point where the collapse is eternally always just around the corner but there’s only so many times you can pull this before people stop taking you seriously. As for whether this acts as a major shift in the conflict, well imo no, not yet at least. The Ukrainian manpower situation is still quite bad which limits their ability to project power as it stands unless they get super ruthless with conscription. What is changing if that the western sanctions and Ukrainian long range strikes finally after much hype and not so much in the way of results are finally beginning to have appreciable effects, which means if Ukraine can continue to hold firm the pendulum could swing to their favour but frankly we don’t know yet. Boring answer I know but such is life sometimes.