My thoughts on the DA2 Andersmance
I think what players tend to overlook when it comes to the Andersmance in DA2 is that Anders cannot have a 'normal' relationship, not really -- he cannot love Hawke as 'freely' as Merrill, Isabela, Sebastian, and Fenris (post-Danarius' death) can.
Anders is a mage. From birth, his magic marked him. No matter how many times he tried to escape and assert his freedom, the Chantry would always hunt him down, separate him from his loved ones, and bring him to the Circle in chains. Since he was young, the Circle has been drumming into his head that mages are not allowed to have relationships, not allowed to keep their families, not allowed to get married or fall in love.
Malcolm and Leandra Hawke made it work, but they had to live a half-life constantly on the run, hidden and never staying anywhere long, and after Bethany (and potentially Mage!Hawke) was born, they had to keep their children's gifts a secret, constantly wary of templars, and laying low. That's not a great environment for children to grow up in, always in fear of being caught and taken away.
And even though Anders stood defiant against the Circle, and dared to fall in love with Karl, the Chantry took Karl away from him as well.
To Anders, falling in love is an act of rebellion. Pursuing a relationship is a careful and deliberate choice, one, as a mage, he has to stake everything to make.
Which is why Anders' relationship with Hawke is such a rare and precious thing to him -- it is something he literally has to fight tooth and nail for, something he cannot ever take for granted, something the Chantry told repeatedly him that he could never have. He also knows the sheer risk of having a relationship with Hawke -- what if the Chantry did to Hawke like they did Karl? What if, just by being involved with Anders, he led Hawke into danger?
So I cannot measure Anders' relationship with Hawke with the same yardstick as I measure the other romances in the game -- for Anders, the stakes are higher and totally different. For Fenris and Isabela, killing just one man (Danarius and Castillon) meant they could be free, but how many Knight-Commanders, Grand Clerics and templars need to die for Anders to truly be free? Hawke can settle down and have a normal life with the others, and being in love with them does not put Hawke in danger (broadly speaking, since this is the Kirkwall Squad we're talking about lol), but with Anders, the shadow of the Circles and Chantry would always loom over them, for as long as they live. Anders does not have the luxury of having the same choices under the same circumstances as everyone else.
When Anders tells you, "Ten years, a hundred years from now, someone like me will love someone like you, and there will be no templars to tear them apart," he really meant it. I wonder if players truly understand the gravity, the significance of those words. How much it mattered to him that he and Hawke could love openly and freely, without fear, without having to run and hide all the time. How much it mattered to him that other mages could love openly and freely and without fear as well.
I think people tend to not factor this in when they look at the Andersmance is because the severity of the Chantry's corruption and abuse of power is not apparent to most players, and it's not obvious to the casual player that being a mage is such a dire, life or death situation (even if you play as a mage in all the DA games, you can romance the LIs with zero restrictions since you have Player Privilege) -- people cannot see the agonizing, heartbreaking choices Anders and every other mage has to make when they dare to fall in love.
Side note, I'm not putting down the other romances. I just want to draw attention to the fact that the Chantry makes life hard for mages (something not so obvious in gameplay) and a romantic relationship with a mage, Anders included, is an uphill battle from the start.
