If there's one thing that warms my heart a bit, it's how much players have always loved Endermen.
I've been playing minecraft since before wolves were added. I remember Endermen coming out, and just how much me and my siblings loved them. We were hardly alone. They're one of the most popular mobs in the game.
Because here's the thing about Endermen, they were the very first mob added to minecraft that felt ALIVE. They came before villagers, back when piglins were pigmen and only existed in zombie form, back before there was anything even remotely human that you could vibe with. Even after Villagers, even after Piglins, there's still something special to Endermen that captures players' hearts.
I think it comes down to the fact that Endermen are functionally useless to the player if you don't murder them. They can't trade or barter with you. They have no dungeons or fortresses for you to take from. They can even be quite annoying depending on what blocks you make builds out of. Endermen have little regard for the concept of personal property.
But, despite all of that, an Enderman isn't hostile to you by default. You never have to fight them. All they ask is that you look away. As long as you do that, then they're more than content to exist in your presence. Going about their day, doing their own thing, picking up blocks and moving them around.
And people love them. They love these alien creatures who have nothing to offer but their existence. I know so many players who go out of their way to not bother Endermen when they encounter one. Players who find one and keep it in a boat just to have some company. Endermen are adored by players just for being there.
Why? Because we were alone. We were alone in a world, and then we weren't. Endermen are strange and useless and dangerous but they are alive. They made us less alone. They were willing to exist with us peacefully when nothing else was. And that was more than enough to prove their value. They were friends to us, because they were there.
Even after we got villagers, even after we got piglins, maybe even after we found other players and servers and worlds upon worlds of other people, we never forgot our first friends. The ones who we didn't understand, who would attack us for a glance, but who were there when nobody else was. They were there, they existed, and we didn't need anything else to love them.
