I wish for a viable third party and they don’t meaningfully exist.

You and me both.

I don’t hold my breath for Linux phones ever taking off. They’d need a major player backing them to break the duopoly. Apple and Google won’t let a third player enter the market. Samsung tired at least 2 times and failed. Microsoft was squeezed out. If they couldn’t do it, no one can. We can only hope that one of the big two does something really stupid one day and basically dig their own grave.