Agreed, they have made this much better looking. Of course it is not perfect but at least it is very obvious who it is supposed to be, which I am happy with.
I am thankful that I pre-ordered this and that HT did go back and work on this sculpt. I ordered this despite not seeing this film (I was initially excited to see it but the trailers and most of the word of mouth has dampened my enthusiasm) or knowing anything about this character. But I think the costume looks awesome.
As stated before I am a Marvel guy but Batman has always been one of my favorite characters. That said I recently (2022 I think) started collected some DC characters besides Batman (Wonder Woman 1984, JL Superman, BvS Batman, Cyborg, IA Joker) and now on Pre-Order I have IA Superman, Supergirl, and Flash.
When I started in this hobby in 2017 I had zero intentions of collecting DC figures, but DC has some great iconic characters that I felt needed to be in my collection or otherwise I would regret it one day. Overall If I had been more impressed with the DCU/DCEU films I would have probably been more motivated earlier, but I think the DCU/DCEU has not done justice to these characters for to most part.
I am glad that Hot Toys seems to be putting a lot of effort into their DC characters lately regardless of how the movies are received and I think that is a great thing.