Arr::get($data, 'more.complex.0'); is much nicer, I agree.

I do think better languages do it better, for example in Elixir I can extract multiple elements out of an object at the same time.

  object = %{nested: ["my value"], other: "some element"}

  %{nested: [first | _], other: other} = object

first now equals "my value" and other now equals "some element".

PHP sucks because of the legacy it pulls with it that keeps it from being simple and elegant. It also fails pretty hard when you use it outside of it's niche, and a multi-purpose language > single purpose language.