Ricorigs it already had, in the guise of the Mk9A which could easily have had an EO capability added.
Otherwise, I think your feelings are reflected exactly in crewrooms across the Corps.
Briefly back to Politely (the Wildcat guru) - can you tell me what use a 2 hour endurance is at sea? It's not a great deal of use over land but for a helo designed to go out on station for an hour it rather limits its ability.
There is mention of aux fuel tanks extending the endurance to 4:30 - are they a standard fit for the RN ones? If so, there goes your 800kgs of lift capacity.
Your presumption is that Wildcat will be used like a Lx3 is probably incorrect. In the main, it works better like smaller ASAC.