> To be fair, lots of "basic ideas" are unworkable until someone bangs their head against it enough times and suddenly it is workable.

Sure, but also lots of "basic ideas" are unworkable regardless of how many times heads get banged, due to some fundamental limitation, like perpetual motion machines or homeopathy. It's a spectrum, but from what I understand Theranos was closer to the "unworkable in theory" side of things than the "currently unworkable in practice" side of things.