If no-one is expecting that kind of architecture, then the comparison really isn't valid. The airports of wealthy North American and Western European countries don't compare to those of small, rich, autocratic states like Qatar and Singapore, so why compare them to the central spine of Epcot?
It is certainly a valid argument that the architecture of these recent refurbishments is not interesting, is bad, etc. These comparisons suggest two related things to me, though. One is that no-one has any realistic idea what Epcot in the 2020s is supposed to look like. The other is that people have blown out of all proportion how innovative and futuristic the original EPCOT Center was when it first opened. So, people start scouting around for projects that aren't realistic comparisons like the Jewel at Singapore Airport that cost over $1 billion as a reasonable analogy for how 2020s Epcot should look and complain that spaces that are actually more in line with the scale and scope of the original EPCOT Center like Connections and Creations aren't like stepping through portals into a world no-one had previously been able to imagine. Again, you can critique the latter on their own merits, but critiquing them because they don't look like the airport terminal of an oil rich Gulf State is silly.