Ian had an out, and Sam even gave it to him in my opinion. The interview with Sam was the rug pull that fucked his intentions to make Sam look like a crazed loser, but Sam still took him out to shoot guns, hang out around the fire, and gave him an MDE fan's wet dream of a poster.
It was another metaphorical E-mail to Ian just asking him to squat 225 below parallel and embrace a more masculine side to himself.
He didn't have to openly promote Sam, but he didn't have to be a bitch about it either, just go "Wow you fooled me!", have fun with someone being human in front of you, and say in your docu "I guess we will never know the real Sam Hyde".
Instead, Ian moped like a bitch because his plan was ruined and he couldn't smear or milk Sam. The documentary was very much salvageable, just not in the way Anus and Ian intended it to be.