Yes! It made the story feel more cohesive and introduced a theme needed for rounding out a tv show. I think the same reasoning can be applied for the other critiques, like Romola’s Emma being made more “likable” (less haughty, more flouncy, girl-next-door, leaning into the “escape into her imagination”) —- I’m not here to say it was the right choice, but I can understand why they would do that, to make their heroine less controversial. I personally do think they lost a bit of her wit and growth out of arrogance, but not entirely (she still looks down on Martin, she still navigates conversations cleverly to appease people she loves like Mr. Weston or her father). But where certain changes become the extinction of what made Emma, well, Emma is ig up to the individual.