What is surprising is... that the rearward visibility limit surprised anybody.
When you design an airplane with the equivalent of a regional-jet engine stuffed vertically behind the seat, providing the pilot with a view around said engine is clearly problematical.
On the other hand, the new entrants to the JSF pilot community have been living on the same diet of propaganda that LMT feeds to the rest of the world (with the aid of shills and Internet-tough-guy know-nothings) so anything short of miracles comes as an unpleasant surprise.