I don’t recall Hercules being covered in three tonnes of seizure-inducing CGI.
Sure Hercules was basically big buff dude, but I'm not talking about how inhuman being looks. There are many mythological beings that looks quite weirdly - consider all asian demigods for instance.
I’m not following the narcissist angle with Bigby et al either...why wouldn’t the characters created to play test the game (including high level play) have...high levels?
And then were kept as important and iconic part of game?
All of them.
Otherwise whats the point?
Well you can you know simply design major NPCs to suit setting, and test game on some noname PCs
The difference is that in Dragonlance he's 'corrupt', you could say 'evil' for that.
On the other hand in postmodern sjw stories, being a self-involved narcissist is considered sound. In some cases, stunning and brave.
But just because players are self-involved narcissists does not means their PCs will be.
TBH considering Critical Role are made in large part of relatively young conventionally attractive celebrities, I'm not really sure that's the point.
If anything it's cattering to weeb-tiefling-tumblr crowd with colourful PCs, more than... compensating. Advertisement method.