Isn’t there some recent controversy about to what extent the turncoat nature of Arminius was convenient or fabricated?
Yes. There is controversy about everything in history. As long as you have universities and professors and archeologists and such there will always be competing theories. Which is a good thing. But some of them are ludicrous. But there is obvious logic as to why the Romans would want to save face. But this case is pretty well documented. Like science, you have to assume everything is nothing but a hypothesis. Some of the pop-history and pseudo-science peddled these days though is quite ridiculous.