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Hooking it to the side of the main tank is now seen as a design flaw. The X-37 and the Starship being on top of a stack isn't an engineering accident.

Fine then, look at Artemis 1. It looks roughly like the Discovery rockets might have looked without the shuttle attached. You can stack your payload without making it overtly glans-shaped. We have the technology.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artemis_1

get rid of the overly pointy LES and it pretty much looks like a dildo with SRBs to me.

The space shuttle was great, but it was retired for a reason.

Additionally, when taking off it did essentially look like a rocket. The shuttle is small compared to the tank/boosters combination. And these are the ones making sure it can take off.

What are those things it's attached to, and what purpose do they serve relative to the shuttle itself?