first of all, i think it's understandable to be taken aback by the epilogues and be sour about the continuation of homestuck: it's kind of the point! a big thematic throughline is how clinging onto continuation and "more content" is a bad impulse. "the narrative" has always been a somewhat sinister force within homestuck proper, and post canon is just way more harsh with that notion.

idk if you're caught up on beyond canon, but personally i think it's pretty good, especially the newer stuff, so for me that was a big part of what "got me back" into homestuck. yes, these characters have changed, a lot, but i also think a big part of what made me go into HSBC with an open mind is getting into it after re-reading homestuck proper, instead of just going off my memories/impressions of my first read. changing things up, especially in terms of character relationships and progression, has always been something homestuck did fairly often, and often without much fanfare (there are so many romantic relationships that get built up, and then get together and break up off screen, in retrospect), so this helped me being open to character dynamics shifting in post canon stuff. seeing new, interesting character progression is honestly what i like seeing from HSBC, even if those plot points are stuff i would've hated when i first finished homestuck.

also a big thing is, i guess, getting into fan stuff! there's plenty of fan continuations, hell this forum links to some of them. out of the stuff i personally read there's two main "fan continuations" i actively keep up with, burning down the house (a FRAF work, also heavily jane focused if that helps sweeten the deal) and john ruins a wedding (this one is just really funny and there are several bits from it that live in my head rent free because of how hilarious they are). it helps getting multiple takes on the characters and seeing them explored in several different directions, i feel, to get back into homestuck as a concept, and also helps accept different versions of these characters without feeling like something was lost about them because they're different from how they were like in homestuck proper.

here some things i like from the current comic in no particular order:

- aradia and sollux! both separately and their relationship. one of my favorite things about them in homestuck proper has been how their relationship is weird, undefined, and nonetheless stable and consistent, and this stays true as aradia abandons him to go on an inter-planetary quest and they're both completely chill with it. they're both great side characters to just have around, and HSBC understands that by not trying to jam in any unnecessary character development or focus for them. sollux is literally just there to be funny and not give a shit about what's going on, and aradia is in a similar boat, and i feel like that's where they shine best post their act 5 arcs of homestuck proper!

- the implication of meenah extending karkat's lifespan with her thief of life powers without telling anyone. that's just plain funny

- the whole candy timeline relationship drama between rose, kanaya and jade is actually pretty interesting when actually given time to be explored, and doesn't seem as out of character and plain strange as it did when it was first introduced. the whole point of candy is that growing up takes a lot more than just settling down and having kids like in a fanfic, and that a bunch of sixteen year olds becoming gods and being allowed to stagnate are likely to grow into very dysfunctional adults. i think a lot of the disconnect comes from the fact that homestuck proper uses godtier as just an extra power up, and post canon stuff grapples with how it actually affects the characters. if you look at it from this perspective, it totally makes sense for rose to get caught up in her seer powers and fall into nihilism and questionable morality. it makes sense for jade's loneliness to come back as she doesn't find the perfect person to settle down and have a nuclear family with from the group of friends she had since she was literally thirteen, so she uses the idea of motherhood as a crutch for the fact that she was promised a "standard" adult human life that she just couldn't achieve. the basic premise is that sburb didn't actually prepare any of these characters for adulthood, didn't actually make them properly deconstruct their flaws and worldviews and so when they get to the part where they're supposed to actually know how to live their lives, they're stuck in this weird limbo where sburb took away their ability to grow up along the lines of the cultural norms of their upbringing, but also didn't adequately offer up any alternative. they're a bunch of kids trying to reconstruct what adulthood, and subsequently society is supposed to look like when their world ended when they were 13! of course they'd be a mess

- along the same lines i feel like john's depression/clinging onto the past is an interesting re-examination of his upbringing, too. he grew up with a guardian who literally had celebratory notes set up for all his milestones, which is a great thing to have until you suddenly have that taken away from you. and then he becomes the defacto protagonist of their sburb sessions, being the key to defeating caliborn, so when all that ends he just becomes aimless, no real goal or idea of a goal to strive towards. he has a child just because that's what you're supposed to do, and then is an absent figure because nothing actually prepared him for parenthood. on a meta level, i also think this is an interesting exploration of "what happens to the protagonist when the story of which he is the main character ends".

- vriska's whole deal is pretty good. it's nice to see a character like her actually grapple with her past, she's normally a character that moves fast, always doing new shit, so it's nice to have her sit down and actually think on things. it's a nice exploration of her character and all the main points from her lengthy past.

overall i think what helps being less sour about the continuations of homestuck is to go into it with an open mind and try not to get too defensive over these characters or think of these stories as an attack on them - think of it as an extension of their characters, things to relate to homestuck proper and how these characters change, stay the same, or elaborate on their previously established themes, motifs, etc. yes, the continuations are more focused on the meta narrative, but it's important to remember that these characters still exist in relation to said meta narrative - as much as these characters serve to explore the meta, the meta also serves to explore these characters. i think it really does help not to think of HSBC as "the true continuation", but rather one of the explorations of homestuck, its characters and themes, among many (which you should check out!). reading more fanworks, character analyses, and overall engaging with these characters on multiple levels really helps perceiving HSBC as examinations rather than bastardizations, in my experience.