[1] Though probably never as expensive as the sum of all the legal à la carte services for anything you might want to see.
A Netflix subscription is £17. Pays for itself in two years if you have no other services
At least given the lack of alternative ISP options in my area, I'd rather pay Mullvad €5/month than assume this risk.
Think of it as a video store with one hour delivery.
For backups, assume that if it's readily available via physical media or piracy, it's easily replaced, archiving anything obscure or important by the usual means (hard drive, cloud, tape).
WRT your last point: given that essentially all Blu-ray and streaming releases are immediately and widely pirated anyway, why are official DRM-free downloads of at least older back catalog titles still not a thing? Perhaps in conjunction with a streaming service with a rotating selection that offers discounts to subscribers on currently-streaming titles, à la Game Pass?
I would much, much rather just pay some reasonable amount to achieve similar results, but you literally can’t.