Good film with a bad ending

I've always really liked this movie, but the ending never sat right with me and felt totally off. The story was essentially over once he was rescued in the helicopter, and that was the logical cut-off point. But then we have this bizarrely extraneous "secret mission debriefing" scene, then sneaking him off to a ship with crew members that we barely know or remember, leading to this silly cheering climax without a care in the world about the others who didn't make it.

Nothing bittersweet about it, no impression that he's a bit traumatized, maybe thinking back to Duane's death, or asking if they found Gene or any of the others, etc. Maybe he's a bit of a changed man, not quite as quirky now. We get none of that, just surface-level happy sappy stuff, totally out of place compared to the rest of the movie. How about just a shot of him holding and looking at the "sole" or something, as a contrast... nope.

If they really wanted to do the "still frame of him smiling with a text overlay" thing, just do it at the helicopter rescue. That would have elevated the overall film quite a bit imo, because during rewatches I just skip the entire ending. It's so needless. Herzog could have done better.