...was supposed to free us from them?

This is a free market, everyone who want's to enter can join specially Banking institutions. They have deep pockets which means more money can be injected into the ecosystem that may push the price to another level.
We know for the fact that banks wanted to always makes profits so it makes sense for them to enter as well. I also don't think that HOLDers are praying for banks to enter Bitcoin, maybe want they wanted is for everyone to enter and Bitcoin be adopted globally.