Cases like this are risky endeavors for lawyers. Clients don't have many choices in this kind of case because they are very difficult if not impossible to win. The lawyer and the client, before the case was even filed, assigned value to the risk in a mutually agreed to contract.
Wronged person has no opportunity for recourse other than to utilize services of lawyer at essentially any rate lawyer chooses, because some recourse is better than none. Other than choosing no recourse for a wrong (how about that, a society where justice has a price you have to be able to pay), that sounds almost suspiciously close to "duress", what with a legal monopoly on being admitted to the bar (you cannot represent 'yourself' in a class action).
Now that the risk has been played out and the plaintiff has won, the outcome looks unfair. Before the case, only a crazy person would take the case, even with the huge payout potential. After the case, that crazy person that went all-or-nothing when no one else would is lambasted by a bunch of uninvolved bystanders for being greedy.
Alternatives: crazy person actually is not all that crazy at all, and had a reasonable belief and expectation that there was a significant likelihood of success, however much lawyers like to pull out the "risky endeavour, very difficult if not impossible to win" card.
Or crazy person is entirely crazy, in which case is of suspect judgment. If you jump from a plane without a parachute, you're crazy. You don't become less crazy because you survived, to use your attempt at an analogy.