Professional photos disappointment

From the sounds of it they are using wide camera lens apertures. Without getting too techy these settings are good for low light because they make a bigger lens opening and let in more light but a side effect is that there is no depth of field. An extreme example of this is a head shot if you focus on the tip of the nose then the eyes will be out of focus. On a wider full length shot taken from further away then the whole person should be in focus but the background will be thrown out of focus, like you are seeing.

My guess is that it was an overcast day, but saying that it could just be their style. Some use these lens settings because they call themselves "natural light photographers" maybe their info says we use "fast lenses" There are some that use this technique because they do not properly know how to use flash as a tool for balanced lighting.

Personally I do not use that approach the same reason as you mention.

Look at the image and go to "properties - info" and you may see something like f1.2, f2.8 or f3.5.

How disappointing!

Do you have any that are the way you want? If you do, I'd just concentrate on those. To be honest, while we had around 300 shots from our day and love looking through our album with the photos of those who came and the venue, we've only had 2 pictures printed out for framing - and they are the same two that everyone else has asked for! So you don't really need dozens, just one or two that work.

It would be worth asking the photographer if he/she has any other pictures that are more like you wanted - if they prefer ones where the background is unclear, you may find they haven't bothered sending you ones with a clear background because they don't like them as much.

As for reshoots - it's really up to how you feel about them. I wouldn't want one because I'd always know it wasn't my real wedding day, but I know other people who have done reshoots and loved them.