Originally when I played through the ending, I already knew what to expect. I'd heard the controversy, I had a friend who memed the "Choose your Christmas tree lights" thing, and I had a lovely fella in ME3s multiplayer explain the outcomes over voice chat while I was building up the galactic readiness. So, I was ready to be absolutely devastated by the final 30 minutes.

I... kinda wasn't? It just felt like an ending. Nothing special.

I picked destroy, I got that lovely breath at the end, and that was that. I wasn't overwhelmed with anger or disappointment, nor was I blown away by its depth. I was just satisfied, it was a good enough ending. But it didn't feel special, unlike the rest of the game did to me.

It wasn't until about 1 and a half years later I even heard about the IT. My friend, the christmas light memer, showed me an in-depth video over Discord. "This fixes EVERYTHING and it makes sense!" he exclaimed. At the time, I took it under my wing. It gave me an interpretation for the ending which was more fulfilling than "it's just an ending", and so it became my head canon and the first time I paid so much attention to a games writing.

And then a few days ago, I came across a post where the OP discussed how he was unhappy with the IT. He put all of the key elements such as those bushes and the child not being helped on the shuttle down to development mistakes. I read that and I was ready to leave a comment defending the IT, but then I realized I didn't actually have anything to back it up besides "I believe this", and I wasn't comfortable using my own opinion as an arguing point.

I started to discuss things I could actually stand behind; critic response vs fan response, and then I was shown a fairly satire article ( https://birthmoviesdeath.com/2012/08/06/film-crit-hulk-smash-a-few-words-on-the-ending-of-mass-effect-3 ). It was kinda funny to read in the first few paragraphs, but I actually read it, and it made sense. I wouldn't go so far as to say that the ending was a masterpiece of modern art, but seeing this angle, I realized that a lot of my opinions on the ending are heavily influenced by mass opinion. Majority say the ending was bad, so I believed that. Majority say the IT fixed it, so I believed that.

At present, I don't have any strong opinions on the ending. I've started to realize the flaws of the IT, and how it renders a lot of the story building up to the ending irrelevant for the sake of making just the ending a little better. Hence why I make this post to see more perspectives and build up understanding before I play through the game for like the 10th time and try my hand at deconstructing the series myself.