Huh. I have literally never seen a WD drive fail. I had one that started making some unsettling noises after 10+ years of use but I didn't notice any failure until I ultimately removed it a few years later. A friend even bought a second hand Raptor once, which I thought was a terrible idea, but he had no issues with it for several years until he replaced it with an SSD.

Of course I know this is probably a very biased experience because I have never encountered WDs in a professional setting where the drives are a lot more solicited and thus more likely to fail.

Edit : also I only ever bought WD blacks which are higher end IIRC, and so did most of my acquaintances. Can't speak for blue/reds etc