I don't know, the F-35 seemingly has a huge gap in perception between people who support the program and those who don't. Was it like that for the F-22 or F-16?
Yes it was. F22 slammed face first into the so called “Peace Dividend” era of the end of the Cold War. Much like Zumwalt and Seawolf. It was viewed as a relic of the Cold War unnecessary overly expensive. To complicated.
F16 suffered even more with issues of engines and a period where they suffered an accident every month. F100 engines proved so troublesome that the USAF opened a competition to replace it leading to the F110. Then the F100 was fixed and to this day GE and PW fight back and forth on F15 and F16 models and buys.
Of course there is one other aspect here. F35 was the first fighter of the Social Media age.
F16 had its teathing issues on page 9 of American newspapers and in Aviation periodicals. It’s biggest exposure of problems was an HBO movie Afterburn 1992 which though liked by critics, pretty much flopped. This differs from the “Reformer” propaganda the Pentagon wars later in 1998. Being a product of the 1980s the internet was primitive, highly specialized and largely isolated from the public sphere. Other than the occasional report in Popular Science or Popular Mechanics
F22 emerged in the latter 90s early 2000s The Internet was a thing but social media was blogs. Aviation media was still specialized. RT and Counter media was only came in later. By the time it did F22 was in production. The bigger push at the time was Budget and Asymmetrical warfare as the US entered retaliatory war against the Taliban and AQ.
F35 pretty much came about as Social media and the Internet really took off along side RT and other alternative media choices. RT and A&E in particular set to attacking F35 with a campaign of Editorials and Documentary media centered around the The Retired DOD analyst and Reformer activist Pierre Sprey. This introduction to the media as the so called “Designer of the F16 or A10” set a bias into the mainstream media. Unlike in the past where in Aviation media was normally highly specialized increasingly aviation news and defense affairs moved to a point where in everyone and every media source had an opinion or Parroted a source of their favor. Blogs and small media platforms emerged so Bloggers could now reach global audiences. Most of the reporters tasked to these jobs having no defense or Aviation background they based their assumptions on defense programs off the Pentagon wars movie. So they wanted to find a boondoggle. Every report of a problem was page one well every fix or correction page 9.
So like M16 is a jam-Omattic, M2 Bradley is a Death trap, M1 Abrams drinks super tankers dry and breaks down after turning the desert to glass, V22 is one second away from falling to its doom and Strykers roll over at the slightest gust of wind. F35 is doomed...
